June 23, 2003: Apple launches its gorgeous Power Mac G5, a powerhouse desktop computer with a perforated aluminum chassis that earns it the affectionate nickname “the cheese grater.”
Starting at an affordable $1,999 (more than $3,300 in today’s money, adjusted for inflation), the Power Mac G5 is the world’s first 64-bit personal computer. It’s also Apple’s fastest machine yet.
May 8, 1997: Apple launches the PowerBook 2400c laptop, a 4.4-pound “subnotebook” that’s the MacBook Air of its day.
The PowerBook 2400c predicts the rise of speedy, lightweight notebooks, while also paying tribute to Apple’s past. Its design echoes the original PowerBook 100. Even years later, it remains a cult favorite among many Mac users.
May 6, 1998: Steve Jobs unveils the iMac G3, a brightly colored, translucent computer that will help save Apple.
Ten months after Jobs’ new management team takes over, the iMac loudly announces that the days of Apple quietly fading into the background are over.
Apple reportedly stopped looking for a replacement industrial design chief. This is surprising, as it’s a high-profile position once held by Jony Ive, who led the team that created the iconic look of the iPhone, iMac and more.
The corporate rearrangement increases the power of Jeff Williams — Apple’s chief operating officer and possibly Tim Cook’s eventual replacement as CEO.
Legendary Apple design chief Jony Ive, responsible for the look and feel of iconic products like iPhone, grabbed headlines Wednesday for a new creation — a big, red paper nose. That may sound odd, but it’s for a good cause.
Ive and his team came up with the nose to go along with Red Nose Day, March 17. That’s charity Comic Relief’s day of giving in the U.K. and around the world to help end poverty, particularly among children.
A leaker with a pretty good track record for accuracy said Sunday the upcoming iPhone 15 series will feature rounded corners and edges, plus a titanium case. Rounded corners would harken way back to earlier iPhones and a titanium case would be a first for Apple handsets.
The rumors came from ShrimpApplePro, who gets it right a fair amount of the time when predicting what Apple will do.
Three years after the influential Jony Ive vacated the role of hardware design chief at Apple, it’s opening up again, according to a report.
Vice President of Industrial Design Evans Hankey, who stepped into the top job in 2019, plans to step down. And Cupertino hasn’t said yet who will take over when she goes.
Apple desperately needs to shake up its iPhone Pro colors. The brand-new iPhone 14 Pro — in the exotic-sounding “deep purple” color — actually looks like a dull gray in real life.
When Apple marketing chief Greg “Joz” Joswiak revealed the new deep purple color at last month’s Far Out product launch, I immediately thought of “Smoke on the Water.” I envisioned a bold hue that would actually look trippy and unique. And I thought maybe Cupertino’s brightest minds finally broke free from the iPhone Pro’s typically mundane color palette.
What was I smoking?
Jony Ive’s 30-year partnership with Apple is over.
Ive and Apple have reportedly severed ties completely, ending a relationship that spanned more than three decades and resulted in some of Apple’s biggest products, including the iPhone, iMac, Apple Watch, spaceship campus, numerous retail stores and much more.
Contrary to rumors, the upcoming M2 MacBook Air may not come in the same eye-catching colorways as the M1 iMac.
Instead, it will be available in the standard three colors as the current-gen MacBook Air, with a shade of blue being the only new addition to the lineup, according to the latest intel.
It’s understandable if you’re feeling slightly underwhelmed by the upcoming iPhone 14. Leaks, combined with artist renders, give us an early glimpse of the iOS handset coming this autumn. And if they’re accurate, this year’s iPhone lineup will look nearly identical to its predecessors going back years.
That’s because Apple uses a three-year cycle in iPhone designs these days. That’s not laziness – there’s a solid reason for the choice.
Six months after its launch, people are still griping about Apple Watch Series 7. Even our own Lewis and Erfon recently agreed on The CultCast that Series 7 wasn’t worth the upgrade.
Many have moaned that it lacks new features, with some even suggesting it was a last-minute rush-job on Cupertino’s part. Personally, I don’t believe a word of it. I love my Series 7 and I think the haters have got it all wrong. Here’s why.
Former Apple design chief Jony Ive recently served as a guest editor for the UK’s Financial Times. In the magazine’s “How to Spend It” issue, he lists a dozen tools he finds indispensable for “making.”
More specifically, these are his top picks “for making, for marking, for measuring, and carrying with you every day.”
But don’t break your neck craning to see if he included any Apple items, or even computing products. He didn’t.
Confession time: I’ve got the Sierra Blue blues.
Like so many others, I absolutely love my iPhone 13 Pro. It’s the perfect size, and the amped-up camera works beautifully. (Love those macro shots!) Six months on, the performance, the reliability, that gorgeous ProMotion screen — it’s all fantastic.
But the one thing that fails to surprise and delight me after half a year is the Sierra Blue color I picked. It’s just … meh.
The MacBook Pro’s Touch Bar was a technological marvel in its day. It brought the magic of multi-touch to macOS and, with its stand-alone T1 chipset, it put ARM-based Apple Silicon inside the MacBook when the M1 chip was still just a twinkle in Cupertino’s eye.
There’s no doubt it was a clever piece of engineering, but it proved unpopular with pro users. Many missed the tactile feedback of the traditional Escape key and function keys.
Apple rejigged things last year, shrinking the Touch Bar to make room for a physical escape key, but it was too little too late. Many will be glad to see the Touch Bar go, but I’m gonna miss that little sliver of multi-touch magic at the top of my keyboard.
In 2016, Apple proudly unveiled a new MacBook Pro that rejected the HDMI port, the MagSafe charger and the SD card reader of the past. Fast forward to 2021, and the company just released new MacBook Pro models with an HDMI port, MagSafe and SD card reader.
Why the reversal? Apple’s head of design Jony Ive left in 2019 after decades with the company. His tendency to push form over function led Cupertino down the wrong path in many ways. And Apple is just now undoing mistakes Ive was responsible for. Like taking out ports that most buyers wanted.
Apple Watch Series 7 may see the wearable’s most significant design change since the first iteration came out six years ago. The folks at phoneArena.com put together a set of 3D renders showing off the possible new look.
YouTube channel ChargerLAB got its hands on Apple’s new MagSafe Battery Pack and gave it the teardown treatment to see what secrets it contains.
The video, which you can check out below, shows off the magnetic battery pack’s dual-cell design. It looks like it essentially contains twin iPhone batteries — providing a total power output of 11.13Wh, based on two 3.82 volt batteries (7.62 volts combined).
The next-gen Apple Watch could get a huge makeover, with a new, flat-edged design and a green option reminiscent of the AirPods Max.
The redesign would bring Apple Watch into line with the flatter design language and form factor of current-gen Apple products including the iPhone 12, iPad Pro and iPad Air. Apple tipster Jon Prosser revealed the info about the upcoming wearable, likely to be marketed as Apple Watch Series 7, on an episode of his Genius Bar podcast with Sam Kohl.
Apple’s debut M1 iMac is a winner, according to the first wave of reviews that arrived Tuesday. The first iMac redesign since 2012 earns praise for its ultra-thin looks, its gorgeous 4.5K display and its M1-powered performance.
T3 hails it as “the world’s coolest desktop.” While it seems likely that other, better M1 Macs will follow — especially for power users who need a bit more oomph — the new 24-inch iMac certainly lives up to the hype.
When it comes to new tech, the focus understandably falls on what’s changed, not what stayed the same.
That’s absolutely the case for the new iMac, which Apple unveiled Tuesday at its “Spring Loaded” event. Plenty of attention is (rightly) being lavished on the iMac’s beautiful redesign. And the fun splash of color for the first time in years. And the debut of Apple’s M1 chip in an iMac.
However, one thing that stayed the same largely fell under the radar. That one thing is Apple’s terrible mouse — or, more specifically, the ridiculous location of the charging port on the Magic Mouse 2.
Apple is holding its iPad wrong. The company designs its tablets as if the best way to hold one is in a portrait orientation. But landscape is actually more common, and Apple should make changes to the iPad’s design to reflect that.
The iMac Pro was sleek and fast and capable and ultimately … uninspired.
That’s Cult of Mac writer Luke Dormehl’s take on Apple’s recently expired pro all-in-one. He serves up a compelling “Dear John” letter to a weird period in Mac history. And it doubles as a lovingly hopeful look at what the future holds.
If you want to peer even deeper into the Cupertino crystal ball, we’ve got a hot mess of new rumors and leaks this week as we speed toward a probable Apple event on March 23. Catch up with this week’s free issue of Cult of Mac Magazine. Download it to enjoy on iPhone or iPad, or get the stories below in your browser.
The iMac Pro is seemingly nearing the end of its natural lifespan — and good riddance to it.
In fairness, the iMac Pro was not a bad computer. It was even, technically, a pretty great one. But it epitomized an era of Mac design that may have been the most uninspired and directionless in Apple history.
Something weird is brewing in Apple land. The company, which for years wasn’t big on embracing its past, has gone retro.
While the innovations — ranging from the first 5G iPhones to the exciting new Macs powered by Apple’s proprietary processors — keep coming, Cupertino is reportedly revisiting some of its past designs for its next generation of products.
And you know what? I like it.
