John Brownlee - page 170

When Steve Jobs ticked through the major hardware changes in the iPad 2 at yesterday’s event, one conspicuous bullet point missing from his slide was RAM. The original iPad famously only had 256MB of RAM when it launched, which was a decision that was criticized even at the time. When the iPhone 4 got a bump to 512MB, it was assumed the iPad 2 would fall in line… but Apple’s failure to document such a clear spec bump got a lot of people nervous. Surely Apple would only not mention a doubling of RAM if the RAM hadn’t been doubled?

Apparently not. A Korean semi-conductor analyst has just claimed that he knows for a fact that the new A5 SoC in the iPad 2 comes with 512MB of RAM. It’s not just double the meg, either: the new RAM is LPDDR2 RAM with a speed of 1,066MHz, which is greater memory bandwidth than the 800MHz memory in the iPhone 4.

Without hearing word straight from Apple, this only qualifies as a rumor, but we simply can’t believe Apple wouldn’t at least double the iPad’s RAM this go-around. They’d just have to, right?

When the iPad first launched, it did so at Apple Retail Stores and online, leaving the big boxes in the lurch for months. Over time, though, the iPad did eventually creep onto store shelves at the likes of Sam’s Club, Target, Wal-Mart and Best Buy.

For the iPad 2, it doesn’t look like we’ll have to wait nearly as long: the iPad 2 will be available at Best Buy at launch, and maybe even Wal-Mart and Sam’s Club.

This is refreshing news. Apple is not taking iPad 2 pre-orders yet, which meant that anyone who wanted an iPad 2 on Friday was going to have sit in line for hours with the usual screaming idiots. Rolling out the iPad 2 at big box retailers simultaneously — even in limited numbers — should make March 11th a little more manageable.

iMovie’s not the only iLife staple coming to iOS this month, though. Apple’s now announcing Garage Band for iOS.

Featuring touch instruments including grand piano, organs, and guitars, guitar amps and effects, 8-track recording and mixing, 250+ loops and compatibility with the Mac version, Garage Band for iOS turns your iPad into a musical instrument.

When you load up the app, the first thing you see is an instrument browser. Tap one and it brings up the instrument to fill the display. Apple showed off the grand piano as an example: keys were tappable like a real piano, with a button for pedaling, and the accelerometer is used to measure the force with which your fingers are striking the display to determine dynamics and volume.

Each instrument is different, but uses a similar loyal approach. The drums and organs are simularly amazing. It’s breathtaking. On the organ, you can not only slide your note up along the keys, but also tweak the vibrato as you go. On the drums, you can get rim sounds if you hit the rim of the snare, or change the sound of the cymbal.

The music that is going to come out of the iPad thanks to Garage Band is going to defy belief. You don’t even need to know how to play: just load up the Smart Guitar and start strumming.

Recording is simple, toggled by a bright red button at the top of every display. To toggle tracks, you just hit the tracks button, allowing you to overlay multiple instruments, with support for up to 8 tracks. You can trim your recordings, shift them around, etc.

Once you’re done, you can email your song from right within GarageBand, or just send to your iTunes library.

GarageBand for iPad will be available on March 11th for $4.99 in the App Store.

Now that the iPad has a video camera, you’ll need something to edit videos together. Enter iMovie for iOS, which Apple is announcing today.

Features of iMovie for iOS include a precision editor, multitrack audio recording, new themes, AirPlay to Apple TV, and the ability to share your videos in HD.

A universal app, iMovie for iOS will also run on the iPhone. When you start up the app, there’s a new home screen which shows thumbnails of your movies in poster format.

Click through, and the iMovie interface is up top with the timeline below. A camera button on the right lets you use your device’s camera to record in realtime, or pull in from your video bin.
Tap on a clip and you get two handles to choose the segment you want to include: a reverse pinch triggers the precision editor for a more precise edit.

In iMovie for iOS you have full control over transitions: press and hold on top dot to choose the point within the video that you want to end. You can also add and subtract frames from both sides of a clip simultaneously, and view the audiowave forms of all your clips. There’s also a new voiceover recording system.

For music, you can choose songs from your iPod library, or choose another theme’s music. A Share button lets you send to YouTube, Facebook, Vimeo, CNN iReport, and to iTunes.

iMovie will be available on the App Store on March 11th for $5.

Since the iPad 2 is getting FaceTime cameras, Apple is bringing PhotoBooth to iOS.

Noting that the iPad 2 is so powerful that it can deal with nine live video streams at once, Apple demonstrates the real-time effect demos, which work similarly in iOS PhotoBooth as they do on the desktop.

With multitouch, you can now manipulate photo effects just by touching the screen, which is pretty nifty.

It doesn’t look radically different from PhotoBooth on the desktop, but it doesn’t need to be. Either way, a million loitering teenagers at your local Apple store have one more gadget to pout in front of.

Now that the iPad 2 is out of the way, Apple wants people to know what’s coming with iOS, starting with iOS 4.3, which will ship on the iPad 2.

First of all, Safari performance is getting a major boost, thanks to Apple’s new Nitro JavaScript engine.

Next up, iTunes home sharing, which will allow you to stream all of your content directly over WiFi.

Alongside iTunes homesharing, AirPlay is going to get some much needed improvements, including the ability to allow apps and even websites to play AirPlay Video.

iOS 4.3 also adds a preference for the iPad switch: either mute, or rotation lock.

iPhone 4 customers will get personal hotspot, a la the Verizon iPhone.

It’s a small bump, but no one expected more for a point iteration. I wonder if they’ll next talk about iOS 5. That’s where the big changes will happen.

With the iPad, Apple released an official case, but while it was pretty cool, the problem with it was that Apple had gone through all this trouble to make the iPad as gorgeous as possible, and now they were covering it up.

Well, with the iPad 2, there won’t be an official Apple case: there’ll be a cover. As noted earlier today, it’ll use magnets to attach to the iPad 2, protecting the screen and locking and unlocking the iPad automatically accordingly. Fold it back and it’ll function as a prop for typing.

“They grasp it, and auto-align it. I’ll show you a little video. It’s so cool. You can remove it in a second. It adds minimal weight and thickness. It’s got a microfiber cloth that cleans the screen,” Steve enthused.

The new iPad cover will come in either polyurethane or leather. The Polyurethane cases will cost $39, the leather cases $69. They come in a whole rainbow of colors.

Along with the iPad 2, Apple will soon start shipping some cool new iPad accessories.

First of all, there’s a new dock connector that allows HDMI mirrored video output at up to 1080p. Apple says it’ll work with all apps and be perfect for teachers, lecturers, businessmen and presenters. No setup or configuration, supports rotation, and you can charge your iPad while using it.

It’ll cost $39 and should be available this month.

The iPad 2 isn’t just a speed bump, though.

As rumored, the iPad 2 is getting FaceTime, courtesy of both rear and front facing webcams. This rounds off FaceTime as a ubiquitous feature on all of Apple’s mobile prodiucts.

The iPad 2 is also inheriting the iPhone 4’s gyroscope, allowing for some neat new augmented reality and gaming functions.

The most noticeable change though? Apple has made the iPad a lot thinner. It’s now just 8.8 mm thin, compared to 13.44mm thin last generation. It’s now thinner than the iPhone 4.

As rumored, the iPad 2 will come in both black and white.

Also as rumored, the 3G version will work on both AT&T and Verizon, although you’ll need a different model for both GSM and CDMA.

Prices are also remaining the same: starting at $499 for the 16 GB WiFi version, and ending at $829 for the 64GB 3G version!

The iPad 2 will begin shipping with March 11th, with preorders available starting today.

Noting that Apple has had an exceptional first year, Steve Jobs says that in 2011, Apple wants to build off the iPad’s success. Today they’re announcing the iPad 2.

So what’s new? Apple says, first of all, an all-new design. Not tweaked, brand spanking new and redesigned from the ground up.

First of all, as rumored, it’s faster. The iPad 2 will boast a dual-core A5 CPU running at 1.2GHZ.

Second, Apple has gone all out on the graphics, and are now offering up to 9x faster graphics performance.

At the same time, power efficiency remains the same, so you’ll get the same battery life.

All in all? Apple expects the iPad 2 to be the first dual core tablet to ship in volume.

While talking about the iPad’s success, Steve Jobs was happy to trash talk the competition, specifically those of Android makers.

Quoting Samsung VP Lee Young-hee,Jobs noted that the Galaxy Tab, the iPad’s most notable competition, only sold a small number of actual devices to end users.

As for the App Store, it’s currently got over 65,000 iPad-specific apps up for download. Android Honeycomb? Only 100.

Sure, it’s not a fair comparison: Honeycomb is barely out yet. Still, the message is clear: Apple is dominating.

Steve Jobs has started addressing the crowd about the iPad 2.

“Today we’re here to talk about Apple’s third post-PC blockbuster product. That’s how we think about these things. We started with the iPod, then we added the iPhone, and then the iPad. Every one has been a blockbuster,” he said.”

“When we said the iPad was magical, people laughed at us. But it’s turned out to be magical. And people questioned whether it was an ‘unbelievable’ price — well ask our competitors.”

Noting that the iPad has over 90% market share and has generated $9.5 billion in the nine months of 2010, the iPad is Apple’s biggest product to date, and maybe the most successful consumer product ever launched.

“We’ve just never had a product get off to this fast of a start,” Jobs said.

Apple CEO Steve Jobs has just taken the stage at the Yerba Buena Center in San Francisco to kick off Apple’s March 2nd Event, which is rumored to see the introduction of a faster, lighter iPad 2 with FaceTime, the latest version of iOS, an overhaul of MobileMe and more.

It’s been rumored that Steve Jobs might make an appearance, but given his recent medical leave, the Apple boss’ distinctive presence at the show was far from a certainty. Although the man earned himself a break, his presence — ushered in with The Beatles’ “Here Comes The Sun” — is a delight.

“We’ve been working on this product for a while and I didn’t want to miss today,” said Steve, garnering a standing ovation from the audience.

First up? iBooks.

This is a very tiny rumor, but in the silence before the storm, we have a few minutes to consider it: apparently, one still unpublicized hardware change in the iPad 2 is a new magnetic latch.

Way back in January, a reference to PAD_CASE_LOCK was found in the beta version of iOS 4.3, apparently a function that allows the iPad to automatically lock and unlock when you close the iPad cover. That seems pretty useful, except for the fact that the iPad seemingly doesn’t have any hardware that could make that feature work.

Now iLounge is reporting that the new iPad will be able of magnetically gripping the front flaps of folio-style cases. Not only will that make iPad cases more elegant, but iOS would know that when a lid was secured in the right position, the iPad would lock itself up tight.

Staggering genius? Not really, but it is one of those nice little touches that Apple is just so good at.

Excited for the iPad 2 today? Don’t be too excited, says iLounge: a well-informed source says not to expect the next iPad to ship for a minimum of two weeks, and more likely four.

The issue? Inventory: Apple just doesn’t have enough iPads to go around yet. A four week delay in delivering the iPad would put the launch date of the second-gen tablet at the very beginning of April… almost a year to the date of the original iPad.

In other words, a delay in releasing the iPad 2 will conform to Apple’s historic iOS upgrade cycle. At the very least, though, we should all be able to pre-order an iPad 2 today. I know I’ll certainly be. Who’ll be there pre-ordering with me?

In replacing the Mini DisplayPort in the latest revision of the venerable MacBook Pro line, you can bet that Apple’s going to start rolling out Thunderbolt to all Macs with each new iteration of the line-up… starting, it seems, with the venerable white unibody MacBook.

Speaking to large crowd at the Game Developer’s Conference in San Francisco, Rovio CEO Peter Vesterbacka spent several minutes gushing about Apple for building the App Store and allowing a game like Angry Birds to be bought and enjoyed by millions of people around the world.

Before the App Store, according to Vesterbacka, there was a “carrier-dominated Soviet model” when it came to making games for mobile devices. “Other people decided on our behalf what was a good game and what was a bad game,” Vesterbacka said.

The App Store changed all of that. “We really have Apple to thank [for our success].”

What of Angry Birds 2 though? Vesterbacka said it’s coming, and that Rovio plans on releasing new Angry Birds games (in the plural) this summer.

Chances are, we’re likely to get a sneak peek of those games at tomorrow’s iPad 2 event. Although it is likely just serendipity that both the annual Game Developers Conference and the iPad 2 launch event are taking place during the same week in San Francisco, it seems like the opportunity to get the developer of the App Store’s most popular game on stage and show off his new games would be an impossible impulse for Cupertino to ignore.

Actually, come to think of it, is it coincidence that GDC and the iPad 2 event are behind held in the same week, or will tomorrow’s announcement have a heavy gaming focus?

Most of us have been taking it as a matter read that Apple CEO Steve Jobs would not be attending Wednesday’s iPad 2 event: he’s on a medical leave of absence, and Tim Cook has proven to be a reliable — if unexciting — stand-in for Jobs in the past.

Italian Apple site SetteB it defying conventional wisdom with a new report, though: they claim that Jobs will at least attend tomorrow’s iPad 2 event at the Yerba Buena Center in San Francisco, and depending on how he’s feeling, might even host.

You know what, Steve? As much as we don’t really feel like it’s an Apple event if you aren’t prancing onstage like some sort of crazed conductor to a music only you can hear, it’s seriously okay. You can just sit in the audience for a change. You’ve earned a bit of a rest, and the iPad 2 is going to be awesome even if you’re not the one to physically deliver it in your hands to the rest of the world.

[via 9to5Mac]

We’ve seen transparent iPhone 4s before. It’s a simple process, actually: just unscrew your iPhone 4 with a torx driver, then douse the back panel in acetone or naphtha until the black paint bubbles away. Screw the now transparent panels back on, and voila.

If you hate paint thinner fumes, though, and just want to avoid the part of the process that involves huffing dangerous chemicals, the lads over at M.I.C. Gadget are selling a transparent back panel for the iPhone 4 for just $23.90 each.

It certainly looks cool, seeing your iPhone’s silicon guts electronically pulsing beneath the handset’s translucent skin, but before you decide to do this mod yourself, just a warning: this mod is going to greatly downgrade the image quality of your iPhone 4’s camera. Apple has had a near impossible time preventing ambient light from leaking onto even the white iPhone 4s sensor. How do you think your camera’s going to do when it’s got an invisible skin?

One or Apple’s subtler masteries is price. Cupertino knows how to keep the prices of their products understandable, without gumming them up with multiple SKUs and convoluted pricing structures… and while past Apple products have often times been accused of being burdened with the dreaded Apple tax, in recent years, Apple’s managed to price their products so low as to undercut the competition (the iPad, for example, is still the only competitive sub-$500 tablet).

No surprise, then, that Apple’s new business-centric IT service, Joint Venture, flaunts an immediately grokkable price: $499 for five users annually, with each additional user costing just $99. All tax deductible.

Joint Venture hasn’t been formally announced, but it’s expected to get some talk time at tomorrow’s iPad 2 event. It’s not a show-stopper service, but if I were a small business owner trying to convince my partner to switch the office to the Mac, I’d be kissing a snapshot of Steve Jobs right now.

Steve Jobs almost joined such Neo-Arthurian luminaries as Sir Elton Hercules John, Sir Robert of Hope and Dame Kylie Minogue, according to a former Labour Party politician, who says that the Apple CEO was almost offered a knighthood back in 2009 for his services to technology.

According to the former senior British MP, although the argument for Jobs’ knighthood was compelling, the Apple boss’ impolitic inscrutability ultimately cut him out of getting the war.

Although the suggestions for knighthood reached the final stages of approval, at the end of the day, Steve Jobs was irrefutably blocked by Downing Street because Jobs had once refused to attend an annual Labour conference, which would have been seen as a big political win for then-current Prime Minister Gordon Brown.

Why was Jobs considered?

Apple has been the only major global company to create stunning consumer products because it has always taken design as the key component of everything it has produced. No other CEO has consistently shown such a commitment.

If it hadn’t been blocked, Jobs still wouldn’t be the first American to be a British Knight, or even the first tech magnate: Bill Gates won in 2005. However, due to his lack of British citizenship, he still wouldn’t be allowed to go around, belligerently demanding strangers to refer to him as “Sir Steve,” a la Ben Kingsley.

Is this the Dock Connector for the iPhone 5 with its viscera hanging loose? Taiwanese site Apple.pro certainly thinks so, and as the guys who first posted pictures of the touchscreen to the new iPod Nano, they’ve got a decent history of getting their hands on parts of unannounced Apple products. So maybe!

The new Dock Connector is slightly narrower than the part found in the current iPhone, and is part number 821-1300-02, compared to 821-1281-A for the Verizon iPhone. It certainly looks legit, even if it doesn’t tell us much except that the next iPhone will be a smidge thinner.

As they are sometimes wont to do, Apple met with analysts last week to discuss — if not their plans — than at least the current state of corporate thinking and strategizing, giving an indirect glimpse into the future as Apple sees it.

One of those analysts, Toni Sacconaghi of Bernestein Research, has now issued a note about her meeting with COO Tim Cook, CFO Peter Oppenheimer and VP Eddy Cue… and according to Toni, Apple’s strongly hinting at a cheaper iPhone nano coming soon.

Last night, Apple held secret meetings with Apple Store retail staff around the world, most likely to brief employees on what to expect when the iPad 2 debuts on Wednesday. But what actually happens at those meetings? Silenced by NDAs, the employees can’t say… but that didn’t stop one of our readers from peeking through the keyhole.

His account of what he saw of the secret meeting at London’s Convent Garden Apple Store, after the jump.

No one doubts that Apple will announce the iPad 2 on Wednesday. The only question is whether or not they’ll just announce it and start taking preorders, or if iPad 2s will immediately be available for sale, as with last week’s MacBook Pro refresh.

For people looking to buy themselves an iPad 2, good news: evidence is mounting that Apple will start selling iPad 2s this week, as Apple has halted production and ceased shipments of all first-generation iPads.