Amidst all the new announcements today, Steve Jobs only mentioned the new revision Mac Mini in the Q&A section at the end of the event.
The new models sport either a 1.83GHz Intel Core2Duo or a 2.0GHZ, both have 1GB of RAM, and you get either an 80GB hard drive or a 120GB. Intel GMA 950 graphics remains unchanged. Oh, and you get iLife '08 with it too.
Early reports from various websites attending the Apple Special Event confirm that new iMacs are being launched. They will have 20-inch or 24-inch displays, aluminium enclosures and glossy GLASS displays. They look very thin, black on the back, with a full compliment of ports. More news as we have it.
Update 1: Models will have up to a 2.4GHz Core 2 Extreme processor, up to 4GB of memory. ATI Radeon HD graphics card, and up to 1TB of hard drive storage. 802.11n wifi and Bluetooth 2.0 built-in. The keyboard will also be wireless, nice thin design (0.33-inches thin), like the one we reported on last week. All models available starting today (not sure of the lead time until the AppleStore is back online).
Early opinion: The new iMacs look pretty darn cool. It seems like Apple has not re-invented the iMac, rather it has evolved it. The materials used look like they are really top quality, aluminium, glass and superb finish plastics. This looks very exciting.
Update 2: iLife '08 also being detailed. One of the apps in the suite is being replaced.
iPhoto gets new 'Events' organising, so photos taken on particular days or shoots (like a Birthday party) are put into these 'Events' so they can easily be retrieved. Improved editing also allows you to copy changes you made on one photo onto other photos. Another new feature allows you to hide photos, which is pretty cool.
Update 3: Looks like .Mac is getting the rumored upgrade. With .Mac Web Gallery you can do one button publishing of galleries from iPhoto, or… from your iPhone. You can then download print quality images from this new 'Web 2.0' application. At last, there is a way to get photos out of your iPhone without syncing, so the iPhone talks to .Mac all in time for the UK launch, yippee. Photos sent to your .Mac from the iPhone can then sync with iPhoto. Other users that you authorise can also send photos to your .Mac Web Gallery.
Update 4: iMovie is next, with a new way to edit your movies. Works with AVCHD hi-def camcorder. One click encoding for iPod, iPhone, Web Gallery, Apple TV, YouTube etc. With the YouTube option, you can also upload direct from within iMovie.
Update 5: iWeb now has Live Web Widgets, you can grab content from the likes of YouTube, Google Maps, AdSense etc and drag it right into iWeb. The Media Index page allows you to drag photos and videos onto the page and it'll build itself.
Update 6: iDVD gets ten new animated themes and professional grade encoding.
Update 7: Magic GarageBand, sort of seems like a modern day Bontempi organ. You pick your genre, piece of music, change instruments. It is all simplified and you play around until you have something you like for the project you are working on.
Pricing: iLife 08 for $79 available today, and starting today it ships with all new Macs.
Update 7: Big one this, well in size at least. The .Mac storage has been bumped to a massive 10GB, up from 1GB. No doubt this is to allow for all those photos from your iPhone and HD video content. This makes me happy.
Update 8: iWork 08. Wow, Steve, you are giving us the whole caboodle today :-) Starting off with Keynote with new transitions and text effects.
Update 9: Pages, now with two new modes, a word processing and separate page layout mode. 140 new templates and compatible with Microsoft Word documents (no word on if this includes 2008 versions, but I expect it will). Plus they added change tracking.
Update 10: New application time ladies and gentlemen. Numbers is Apple's new spreadsheet application. (Sidenote, probably too much info, but I am nearly wetting my pants with all these announcements). Numbers can import from Excel and has customisable templates and works in the same fashion as Pages and Keynote.
Pricing: iWork '08 available today for $79.
Update 11: Q&A session, Steve invites Tim Cook (Apple COO) and Phil Schiller (EVP Product Marketing) up on stage. Various questions to follow;
Q: How thin are the iMacs?
A: They're really thin. You can measure it in the next room in just a few minutes. But they're appreciably thinner.
How is the Mac Mini doing? And are you updating it? A: We are refreshing the Mac Mini and making it even faster. It's already in the online store.
Comment: What the ?@£! does this mean when the store comes back online we will have a new Mac Mini? Come on store, go live again!
Q: What's the relationship between Apple and Google/YouTube?
A: We like their products. It's a good relationship. We like working with them.
Questions an answers from Gizmodo.com (so don't expect too many, I don't want to steal their limelight).
Q: Will the iPhone use both EDGE and wifi to upload pictures?
A: Yes, both.
Why not support HD uploads to .Mac?
A: The camcorders right now don't capture in HD, just slightly less than HD. That's the resolution we support.
Q: Apple is known for premium priced products, and has a notion of being for the elite. Is it your goal to overtake the PC in marketshare?
A: I'll tell you what our goal is. Our goal is to make the best personal computer in the world and to make products we are proud to sell and recommend to our family and friends. There are some stuff in the industry that we wouldn't be proud to ship and recommend. THere are thresholds we can't cross because of who we are, so there is a very significant slice of the industry that wants that too. Our products are usually not premium priced, you add the features you have to add to make them useful, and in some cases they are more expensive than our products. THe difference is we don't offer stripped down, lousy products. If you move those aside and compare us to our competitors, we compare favorably.
Looks like that's it. Check back soon for Geekanoids thoughts on what Apple has announced today.
Monday, 30th July, 2007; Geekanoids today announced the completion of their Laser Etched MacBook Pro Project. A new top of the range MacBook Pro funded by some rather snazzy sponsorship. Check out the full details below and some video footage further down the page.
As you are already reading this on the Geekanoids website, you probably know the type of content we cover, but for our new readers here is the lowdown on just what we do. Geekanoids is a UK based website, covering technology related news, as well as publishing full written and video reviews of various products. Although there is a bias toward Mac related content, a wide variety of content can be found. This includes reviews of Mac and PC software, digital cameras, mobile phones, and a whole host of gadgets. You will find a strong Mac content mainly because it is our platform of choice. If you are a PC user, this shouldn't put you off visiting us, as many of our articles and reviews are applicable to all platforms, so if you are looking for unbiased opinion on that new printer or digital camera you have your eye on, check Geekanoids out, as we may well have covered it.
Over the past month Geekanoids have been working closely with a number of companies worldwide to sponsor 'laser etched' advertising space on a new MacBook Pro. Owner/Editor of Geekanoids, Dave Cryer said, "We really wanted to improve the content on on the website and it became clear that our most popular content was our video reviews. We needed more powerful equipment to produce the video content and saw this as a very creative way of raising the funds. Without the support of these great companies it would not have been possible."
The funds raised covered the cost of a 15.4-inch MacBook Pro, which sports the latest Santa Rosa chipset and LED backlit screen. It will be used with Apple's Final Cut HD Express software to create some very informative and unbiased video reviews. The reviews will be available on both www.geekanoids.co.uk and via the podcast section of the iTunes Store.
The laser etching was performed by Razorlab, based in London, UK. The whole process was a joy to experience, and with their meticulous attention to detail, the end result really looks fantastic. When viewed in dull light, the etching appears as a light grey, and when caught at an angle by artificial or sunlight, it appears to light up as a vibrant white finish.
It gives us great pleasure to share the transition, from a virgin MacBook Pro, to the completed laser etched version;
We quickly realized that the Apple TV wasn't going to be a HD powerhouse and our tests have indicated as much -- we have also discovered that the problem is not the hardware. We opened up our Apple TV and added a few codecs and we were very surprised at the results...
via engadgethd read more | digg story
The MacRumours Buyers Guide attempts to predict apple's next hardware release based on Apple's release trends. A must-save link if you are planning to buy a new apple anytime soon!
via macrumors read more | digg story
The Apple TV is a bigger, stationery networked iPod that you hook up to your TV, and its degree of desirability is directly proportional to how much iTunes is the center of your digital media universe. If you've got all your music in iTunes and you frequently purchase TV shows and movies from Apple's service, Apple TV is enticing indeed.
via Crave read more | digg story
First Apple TV is in and first thing we do is break it open! We'll be posting more pics every hour.
via techrestore read more | digg story