512 Pixels

I have not gotten my iPad mini yet, but the Smart Cover I ordered showed up today. Here are two photos showing the size of it, compared to a notebook and the iPad 3:

The word “intuitive” doesn’t come to mind.

Marco Arment, on talking with a retail employee demoing the Surface:

I gave up. It was like arguing with a Tea Partier.

It sounds like Microsoft copied all but the most important part of Apple’s stores: the people.

Benj Edwards takes a tour through the pre-Mac Apple.

This looks like a great update, but until Evernote stops butchering text when copying out of the app, I can’t live in it full-time.

In an interview with Harry McCracken:

It’s always been about making the best Mac we know how. Among the many benefits are making it easy to use and affordable, with great features. This high level of integration is part of delivering on that.

And on Apple’s removal of the SuperDrive in modern Macs:

We find the things that have outlived their useful purpose. Our competitors are afraid to remove them. We try to find better solutions — our customers have given us a lot of trust.

If anyone is surprised the SuperDrive is dead, they haven’t been paying attention.

Someone unplugged North America.

The Apple PR Machine:

The Company sold 26.9 million iPhones in the quarter, representing 58 percent unit growth over the year-ago quarter. Apple sold 14.0 million iPads during the quarter, a 26 percent unit increase over the year-ago quarter. The Company sold 4.9 million Macs during the quarter, a 1 percent unit increase over the year-ago quarter. Apple sold 5.3 million iPods, a 19 percent unit decline from the year-ago quarter.

Apple’s Board of Directors has declared a cash dividend of $2.65 per share of the Company’s common stock. The dividend is payable on November 15, 2012, to shareholders of record as of the close of business on November 12, 2012.

The holiday quarter is going to be bonkers.

Boom.

The guys at Macminicolo:

Don’t look now, but the new Mac minis are getting comparable to the last gen Xserve and 2010 Mac Pros as far as benchmarks. Tech progress marches on.

During yesterday’s keynote, Apple’s Phil Schiller burned the Nexus 7 several times. Here is a bit of copy from Apple’s site:

iPad mini is small enough to hold in one hand, yet it has a 35 percent larger screen area than a 7-inch tablet.

Apple also continues to make a big point out of the fact that there are 275,000 iPad apps out there, and that they are far more than blown-up phone apps. This of course is also a jab at the Nexus 7, which runs phone apps in the absence of a tablet interface.

There’s no getting around this is a problem in the Android ecosystem. Coupled with the fact the iPad mini is bigger and made of better materials, the Nexus 7 and its cousins look like toys compared to Apple’s new mini-tablet.

I’ve read a ton of things over the last 24 hours written by people upset that Apple spent so much time calling out the Nexus 7 and similar products. I’ve seen people call it unfair and even un-Apple-like.

Both accusations are wrong.

Apple’s done this before. When introducing the original iPhone, Steve Jobs showed this slide:

Jobs called out these phones as being inflexible, due to having keyboards sunk in plastic. He praised the iPhone, with its ability to show a keyboard and other buttons in software, as-needed.

(Jobs also preached the virtues of Multi-Touch and iPhone’s software.)

During the original iPad event, however, Jobs didn’t call out any products like this.

Now, Apple’s doing it again. What gives?

Well, it’s all about the market.

In 2007 with the original iPhone, Apple was entering a preexisting market. Smartphones were around before the iPhone, and Apple needed to build a case explaining why its product was different — and better.

With the iPad, Apple basically invented the tablet market. They were creating a new class of devices, defining the very market it is now commanding. Apple needed to build a case for the “third device,” but it didn’t need to compare it to other products already for sale.

(Apple did destroy netbooks in its presentation, but I don’t think it’s the same thing.)

Yesterday, Apple entered a market that was already up and running — the market for smaller tablets. Like with the iPhone, Apple built its case for a better product by comparing it to the competition.

I understand that people were uncomfortable watching Apple go after the Nexus 7 so viciously. Apple didn’t say anything that was untrue. That said, this isn’t not anything new, and nothing that Steve Jobs wouldn’t have done on stage.

Apple:

The version of Disk Utility that comes with Fusion Drive is unique. Earlier versions of Disk Utility can’t be used with a Fusion Drive.

The whole kbase article is an interesting read.

via The Loop