tech news and opinions
The new iPod Lineup, iPod Shuffle, iPod Nano, and iPod Classic. The iPod Shuffle in new colors. The iPod Nano with video playback capability, video output to a television through component or composite cables, new user interface, super small, and 4GB($149) and 8GB($199) capacities. The iPod Classic with the same new user interface as the nano, video output over component and composite, 80GB($249) and 160GB($349).
More after the jump
Today’s Apple Event will be beginning at the following times:
I’m sure there are a lot of you that don’t care about the Apple event but you can’t deny the fact that Apple events seem to mean a lot to a lot of people therefore I feel it is my duty as a tech blogger to tell you about it.
I will be watching Engadget’s live blog for my information and later I will be watching the video of the event that Apple will most likely post at the end of today or sometime tomorrow.
Here is what I am expecting from the event:
These are just my speculation, we will find out soon enough what exactly will be announced.
This Week Apple is holding an event and of course that means that every Tom, Dick, and Harry will be coming up with rumors to go along with it.
There are currently two rumor-like items going around that I think you should know about.
First of them being this picture:
This is a supposedly the new iPod Nano (My guess is it is a mock up uploaded to the web by probably Tom) Harry (everyone), is still saying that this is an iPod Nano, well first of all, like I said in the parenthesis this is most likely just a mock up but I also want to say that there won’t be any new Nanos on Wednesday. This is just speculation but I still believe that the current Nanos are here to stay and that picture that was floating around was actually a regular iPod. To read my full speculation on iPods this Wednesday read this.
Now Dick has been spreading rumors that Apple will be unveiling iTunes kiosks, I can tell you that can’t be happening. Why would Steve Jobs take the experience of buying music away from your own computer? That is just silly, that’s like saying that you will be able to purchase movies directly through your AppleTV, it is going to take years before we see that.
Everyone please just read my speculation on the September 5th event, it will all make sense to you, really, it will. (Add the posability that Ringo Starr and Paul McCartney may show up to do a live show.
The rumored Apple event has been confirmed, and the date has been set on September 5th. The event will take place at the Moscone West exhibition centre in San Francisco and will begin at 10 a.m. pacific time.
The picture to the left was part of the invitation handed out to the press. As you can see it says “The beat goes on.” and pictures someone holding an iPod on a coverflow album cover. Of course this must mean iPods, no, well, maybe. No one really knows except the guys in Cupertino. However, I, like every other blogger in the world have a prediction. My prediction is a new iPod, not a nano but actually a regular video iPod. One that has the same size screen as the current iPods except it is slightly thinner and slightly shorter, with a similar aluminum style to the iPod nano. Maybe it would look a little something like this:
About a week ago I posted this picture from 9to5mac.com saying, like everyone else that these were nanos but today I say that they are most likely regular sized iPods. As you can see they look similar to the Nanos the only difference is that they are a little bit larger.
I’m also going to theorize that these new iPods will have a new interface. No, not the iPhones interface, that could cannibalize iPhone sales and hurt new AT&T recruits. But instead the new iPods will be sporting the interface from these videos that I wrote a post about last month.
User interface video 1
User interface video 2
User interface video 3
Now I’m not doing anything crazy here guys, I’m just piecing together rumors that have been around for a month. The only difference is Apple hasn’t sent me a take down notice about them (Apple: mike@cybersurge.org just in case you need me for anything).
But just like any other well formulated Apple rumor I have to take it one step further adding something that probably won’t happen but I would like to happen, I predict that the Mac Pro will get some different graphics options, just to add the ability for DX10 if you run Windows under boot camp. My guess is something like a Radeon HD 2900XT or a Geforce 8800GTX.
Alas this is just speculation I, just like all of you, will have my face glued to my monitor on September 5th hitting refresh in Firefox waiting for the next update on one of the live blogs. And I just can’t wait.
No probably not. Especially since the picture is of a monitor displaying a .psd file. Seems a little too sloppy to me though so it is still a little hard to tell. When I first saw the picture the title of the window was the first place I looked, if this picture was a fake you would assume they would make sure that you couldn’t see the title of the window the .psd file was in.
UPDATE: Gizmodo was asked to take the picture down which they say confirms this rumor (I’m still sceptical). However as you can see I still have the picture here until Apple tells me to take it down because I feel it is fair use for me to have it up.
Mac Rumors has posted a few videos of what seems to be the 6th generation iPod’s user interface. I don’t know whether or not these are real or if they are just faked but they look extremely convincing.
I would guess that if these are real the iPod is running OSX since Steve Jobs has hinted at OSX iPods before, and the iPod is using the familiar click-wheel style interface instead of the iPhone’s touchscreen interface. The lack of touchscreen functionality makes me a little sad and if that is the case I will most likely wait until the 7gen iPod before I upgrade (If I ever upgrade at all seeing as I know have an iPhone).
Anyway lack of touchscreen aside the user interface looks gorgeous and I think I really like the split-screen interface elements.
I hope to be able to get them on YouTube sometime so that you can see them here but until then head over here to MacRumors post.
Update: Well MacRumors post has been taken down, Apple legal got a hold of it and had it taken down, well I had downloaded them before they were taken down so I’ll link to them here. If Apple wants me to take them down that is fine all they have to do is email me at mike@cybersurge.org and I’ll take them down immediately. (I personally don’t think that there is any reason for Apple to want this taken down, it only affirms that fact that these are probably real)
Another iPod game in the lineup, this time by Electronic Arts, it’s Sims Bowling.
“Join The Sims for fun bowling action! Enjoy challenging, realistic bowling anytime. Use the Click Wheel to control, aim, adjust your power, add spin, and then send the ball screaming down the lane. The Sims Bowling party comes to life with vibrant graphics, sound effects, and multiple game modes. Enjoy “Sims Life,” in which you create a Sim and compete in a popularity contest, or bowl against a friend in “Pass-n-Play.” Listen to your fans roar — roll strikes and make The Sims crowd go wild!”
The game is $4.99 and is available now. You need to have a 5 or 5.5 Gen iPod to play the game.
I haven’t played the game but it looks like every other bowling game, aim, select the amount of power, then roll the bowl.
I think Apple has been trying to push there iPod games by convincing game makers to make Demos of there games for free. The first was Vortex and now you can get Ms. Pacman.
Its free and I played it for a little bit, even though there is only one level. I really like the interface, to control the direction you just touch the side of the scroll wheel where you want to go. Its really easy to pick up and play and I suggest everyone go out and try it out.
6.9mm thick, and looks just like a nano
Meizu M3
Well what is Apple going to do with iTunes now. With the recent addition of the AppleTV to the product line you have to wonder if Apple will put 720p content into the iTunes music store, Its tough to say and there are a few things that Apple needs to deal with before they can go ahead with it.First of all they have to deal with compatability with their current iPods. I’m not sure if there is quite enough horse power in the current iPods to decode 720p H.264 video so that would make things difficult already. How would Apple decide to display their content on the iTunes music store. One of the key aspects of the iTunes music store is that you just download it and it works. You can play it on your computer and your iPod with no trouble but when you throw this new format into the mix it confuses people. I will know that if I download an AppleTV version it won’t play on my iPod but I don’t think my mother would.
The only thing I could think of is that Apple released the 5.5 gen iPod with a fast enough processor to handle the 720p content and they decided to phase out the older 5 gen iPod. This of course would upseet many users who would like to download content for their iPod, so of course this wouldn’t make sense. Maybe Apple will decide to have two buttons next to everything: High-Res and Low-Res the problem is of course as I mentioned earlier that would confuse some users.
Now that we have absolutly no conclusion about those problems, confusion and video compatabilty, we deal with file sizes. Not only is this going to be an issue for Apple who has to host this content but for customers who have to keep this content on their hard drives. Even though hard drives are getting bigger and bigger, we are also dealing with bigger and bigger file sizes making things difficult for many users. If you do the math a video encoded for the AppleTVs maximum quality at a length of 2 hourse will be about 4GB of video. That is quite a lot. It is about 1/10 of the total size of the AppleTVs hard drive. Not to mention that it would take about about a day to download that big file for most of us in the US with terrible bandwidth.
Let me throw this scenario at you, the iPhone can handle the same video size as your AppleTV, it might be able to we don’t know. You of course because of the high price of the iPhone went with the lower end 4GB version. That means if you wanted to watch a movie on your iPhone and that movie was 2 hours long, that would be all that you could fit onto that iPhone. How would this work, would Apple allow you to download two versions of the video or would that cost extra? will the 720p version cost extra? Will iTunes ever go high-def? These questions will be answered and since the AppleTV was “designed for widescreen televisions” I think we will get answers soon.
I’m am hoping that we will see 720p content in the iTunes music store, but I think that they will be movie rentals and after 5 days iTunes will automatically deauthorize and delete the file unless you tell it that you would like to re-rent the movie. I would assume that the price would be much lower for a rental and iTunes will, for some, become the Netflix replacement.
Ms. Pac-Man was released today for the iPod adding to the list of games for the iPod making it a 12 games. I’m not really sure why they put this one out because it is extremely similar to regular Pacman but Ms. Pac-Man has a bow on her head, unless this was their way of building up the number of games available for the iPod.
Well anyway the game is now available in the iTunes music store for $4.99 so you can go ahead and pick it up here.