Category: Apple

Apple updated the 17-inch MacBook Pro today, bringing it in line with the “unibody” notebooks first unveiled in the fall. With one twist:

Apple engineers custom-designed lithium-polymer cells to create the largest possible battery, then they went even further: They built the battery right into the computer, eliminating the space-consuming mechanisms and housings that standard removable batteries require. The result is a battery that’s 40 percent bigger than the previous generation and offers up to 8 hours of wireless productivity on a single charge — all in a notebook that’s less than an inch thin, weighs just 6.6 pounds, and remains the same price as the previous-generation model.

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As part of today’s Macworld, Apple announced that DRM is leaving the Apple Store:

Beginning today, all four major music labels—Universal Music Group, Sony BMG, Warner Music Group and EMI, along with thousands of independent labels, are now offering their music in iTunes Plus, Apple’s DRM-free format with higher-quality 256 kbps AAC encoding for audio quality virtually indistinguishable from the original recordings.

This kills the one reason I liked Amazon’s MP3 store. Hopefully DRM will soon just be a bad memory.

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This morning, Phil Schiller took the stage at what proved to be Apple’s last Macworld keynote. These lines by T.S. Elliot line comes to mind:

This is the way the world ends This is the way the world ends This is the way the world ends Not with a bang but a whimper.

Yesterday, I posted my predictions. As usual, I was over-zealous. Most years, most Mac users are disappointed after Macworld because of the hype that is built up in the weeks before the keynote. In fact, historically, Apple’s stock sinks like a rock in the hours after the keynote because the rumors didn’t come true.

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Mac Rumors, 2002:

International Herald Tribune has an article with excerpts from an interview with Steve Jobs. Jobs is asked some questions about potential products: Q: Will there be an iPhone? Jobs: “One never knows. We don’t usually discuss products we haven’t announced.” Q: What do you think of the tablet PC? Jobs: “We’re not sure the tablet PC will be successful. It’s turned into a notebook that you can write on. Do you want to handwrite all your e-mail? We have all the technology ourselves to do that - we just don’t know whether it will be successful.

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Mac|Life has posted their favorite Macworld moments, along with 5 things they wished they could forget. One of my favorites isn’t listed: when Phil Schiller jumped off a platform to show off iBooks with Airport networking.

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Apple Introduces Revolutionary New Laptop With No Keyboard

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Here we go.

Preview of Snow Leopard - 100% Chance of Happening Since 10.6 is all about “under the hood” work, expect a bunch of graphs showing how awesome it is. Also expect a vague release date of “Summer 2009.” Maybe a refined user interface (more iTunes, less Aqua) will surface.

A Revised Mac mini - 90% Chance of Happening The little guy has been neglected by Apple for the past year, with the last update to the machine made in 2007. Rumors have it that the new Mini will be beefier than it’s predecessors. One can hope.

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Wikipedia, on “ Stevenotes.” No article at this time for “ Philnotes.”

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AppleInsider:

AppleInsider can also confirm that a similarly-timed makeover to the Mac mini will see the diminutive desktop adopt chipsets from NVIDIA’s MCP79 platform, as was previously implied by discoveries within the resource files a Mac OS X build train that shipped on the latest MacBooks and MacBook Pros.

In addition to sporting both a Mini DisplayPort and a Mini DVI connector, it’s now also rumored that the new Mac mini will see the addition of a FireWire 800 port and a fifth USB port, with the legacy FireWire 400 port going away. The Mini DVI connector will allow the mini to continue to cater to users who already own a display, while the Mini DisplayPort will offer support for customers of Apple’s latest LED-backlit Cinema Display.

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TUAW:

I think we will see an updated Mac Mini in form factor and capability, an update to the iLife suite, more features and refinements to MobileMe and updates to iWork. In fact, the entire iWork suite may end up on the web much like Google Docs. I also think there’s a good possibility we’ll see updated iMacs and a preview of the next version of OS X (aka Snow Leopard) running on them.

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The My Apple Newton blog:

The real-time clock that runs the Newton runs from 1993 through 2010. This is due to the fact that NewtonScript integers are 30 bits, and signed. 229 seconds after 1993 is 2010–the end of the Seconds world. The time system, however, is based on minutes from 1904. That won’t run out until 2920. Then we’ll really be screwed.

That means that the clock has a 17-year life. After that, the clock will have to be made to repeat some Seconds values.

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Computerworld’s Seth Weintraub:

I’ve heard that iMovie will largely (if not entirely) be a Web Application and Apple would offer its users to “upload your movies to us and edit them there.”

I’m gonna go ahead and call bullshit.

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