The Stevenote is live. Headline news sure to be the NetBook Air. So far just some iLife news– not big for me, since I’ve graduated to the prosumer apps. Anyone ready to visit the Apple Store tonight?
This entry was posted on Wednesday, October 20th, 2010 at 1:35 pm by Jake and is filed under Computer Hardware. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
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October 20th, 2010 at 1:48 pm
Probably not tonight, but maybe sometime soon!
October 20th, 2010 at 1:49 pm
Also, you can supposedly watch the video stream of the event, but it’s not working for me (probably super-overloaded). Anybody try it, or have any luck?
October 20th, 2010 at 1:58 pm
In response to Jake, I guess we’re liveblogging the liveblog! Here are my thoughts so far:
(1) I’m no prosumer user, but iLife ’11 looks pretty empty of new features. Pass.
(2) FaceTime for Mac looks like it works, and looks like a beta. It was clear they were going to do this, glad to see that they have. I’ll get the beta ASAP and try it out with Joanie’s iPhone 4.
(3) They’re talking about 10.7. I don’t like where this is going. App Store for Mac? iPad-like home screens?
October 20th, 2010 at 1:59 pm
I dig photos, but man, it just makes Engadget a major PITA to read when they post dozens of nearly identical shots. Is there a good text-only live blog (other than here)?
October 20th, 2010 at 2:01 pm
The formerly-good macrumorslive.com isn’t so good this time. I’m following engadget, too — it’s on auto-refresh every 60 seconds: 5 seconds to read whatever they posted, 55 seconds to post a pithy comment somewhere (if necessary).
October 20th, 2010 at 2:03 pm
Well, App Store is fine if it’s supplemental. If it’s the only way to install applications— the Mac would really become a 2nd class platform. It’d be like Palladium all over again for the first time.
October 20th, 2010 at 2:05 pm
See, stuff like this is really unneeded on a computer, http://www.blogcdn.com/www.engadget.com/media/2010/10/2010-10-20204back2mac.jpg . The grid display thing for apps? Fine, nice feature, but other than my top 25 apps, I never use it. With the Pre, I just type. Same on the Mac, with Spotlight. Nice eye candy, but wrong platform.
October 20th, 2010 at 2:08 pm
And what’s with all the talk of “multitouch gestures.” Makes sense on a touchscreen. On a trackpad, it becomes a chore– I shut them off after I kept using the “feature” to accidentally enlarge a web page. Ugh.
Single touch gestures are great on a trackpad. Multitouch (beyond 2-fingered scroll, I suppose) don’t seem all that.
October 20th, 2010 at 2:08 pm
I’m confused about where we’re supposed to be putting our comments, here or Twitter! To recap, here’s what I’ve been saying on Twitter:
@jakerome I don’t like where this 10.7 discussion is going.
@pyslent I really hope we’re not watching Fonzie heading for that ramp over that shark. This really really doesn’t look good.
I think we’re in agreement. I never open my Applications folder on the Mac, much less need to click on anything. That’s what the keyboard is for. And Launchbar.
October 20th, 2010 at 2:09 pm
We gonna get new MBAs or not?
October 20th, 2010 at 2:10 pm
I hope you can turn all that crap off. This image is a nightmare, as if the Dock has just exploded and dumped crap all over the screen.
October 20th, 2010 at 2:14 pm
I just ordered 50 NetBook Airs.*
*Not really.
October 20th, 2010 at 2:21 pm
Twitter update (it’s just faster to blast something out over there):
jakerome: @miked378 We totally should’ve played Stevenote bingo.
miked378: @pyslent One more thing? A good thing? Anything?Ugh.
sbono13: @pyslent I’m not impressed by what I’ve heard so far (limited to your tweets).
miked378: @pyslent How is it “90% smaller and lighter” (accordint to Engadget). The new MBA is 0.1 lbs lighter than the old one!
miked378: @sbono13 Reload The Board.
miked378: @pyslent Oh, *flash memory* is 90% lighter. Guess that’s how they saved the 0.1 lbs.
miked378: @pyslent I feel like I’ve seen that picture of the inside of the new MBA somewhere before. Oh yeah — all over the internet the past 2 days.
October 20th, 2010 at 2:24 pm
Can we talk about the inability of Engadget editors to focus a damn camera?!?!!
October 20th, 2010 at 2:31 pm
Regarding the MBA: The processor could be faster and better (it’s a 1.4 or 1.86 GHz Core 2 Duo, according to the slide). My 3 year-old Mac mini (Aug 2007 model) has the same processor, and the clock speed of the mini is the faster of those two. In fact, they’ve slowed it down from the current MBA (which is 1.86 or 2.13 GHz). Am I missing something?
Also, couldn’t they have designed away that giant bezel around the screen?
October 20th, 2010 at 2:32 pm
@jakerome It was just that one picture, and “2.3 lbs” is the number you’re looking for.
October 20th, 2010 at 3:23 pm
For $200 more than the new 11.6″ MBA, you can get a 13″ MacBook Pro. The Pro has:
— 2x memory
— 4x drive space (HD vs SSD)
— Backlit keyboard
— CD/DVD burner
— an SD card reader (the 11.6″ MBA doesn’t have one, the 13″ does)
— an ethernet jack (the MBA doesn’t have one, requires a USB adapter)
It also weighs 50% more (4.5 vs 3.0 lbs), but has a bigger screen. Oddly, the pixel density on the 11.6″ screen is much higher: 135ppi for MBA vs 116ppi for MBP.
October 20th, 2010 at 3:35 pm
The 13″ MBP does look to be a deal. Only $1100 through the Employee Purchase Program from work. But not a very good complement to a 15″ MBP.
October 21st, 2010 at 4:37 pm
Anyone see the App Store guidelines? Ugh, I don’t think I’ll even bother browsing, as 90% of the apps I use probably would be rejected from the store.
http://www.engadget.com/2010/10/21/apples-mac-app-store-review-guidelines-posted-will-photoshop/
Wonder if this gets any traction among Mac users?
October 21st, 2010 at 7:50 pm
Sounds like Apple is trying to get developers to write programs specifically for inclusion into their store. It’s just odd. My first thought on hearing it was that it would be simply another retail option for software developers to sell their wares, so probably most devs would just submit, albeit price apps 30% higher. But as it is, apps that have an internal check for updates feature, which all good apps have these days, would need to be re-written, forking development. Sounds pretty lame.
October 23rd, 2010 at 8:24 pm
The App Store feels like a dud to me, which I why I don’t get the excessive hand-wringing seen here, http://gizmodo.com/5670812/big-brother-apple-and-the-death-of-the-program?skyline=true&s=i and elsewhere. If Apple really bans all other apps, well, they’d lose a huge chunk of customers to Windows. Apple gets this, which is why I doubt they have any inclination of banning apps like BitTorrent, Acrobat or Firefox from the Mac computers.
October 23rd, 2010 at 10:57 pm
Admittedly I haven’t read those articles linked above (yet), but my understanding is that this would be an additional outlet for developers to deliver programs to users. The cons are obvious, and the pro is that it’ll be an easy way for Mac users to market applications to users, particularly new ones.
From what I read earlier this week, Apple isn’t planning on preventing anything from being installed on the Mac, nor requiring anyone to submit apps to the Mac App Store. I think of it like Palm’s market (or whatever it’s called) — it’s simply one way to distribute apps.
My personal opinion is that it’s a pretty lame idea, and as a developer, there’s no way I’d do it for any number of reasons, principallly that 30% charge and the likely onerous restrictions. Most developer reactions I’ve read are along the same lines, or if any different, they say that they’ll distribute through the app store in addition to their current channels. I’m sure there will always be a healthy dev community for Mac outside of Apple’s sanctions, otherwise the platform will be in a lot of trouble.
October 23rd, 2010 at 11:03 pm
The worry is that Apple might not need to ban those apps to render them irrelevant. What if it turned out that 90% of all future Mac programs go through this App store? What percentage of WebOS or Android apps do you think get downloaded outside of the official marketplaces? Hopefully, Mac users are smarter than to let Apple control their behavior like that, but let’s see how they go about promoting the App store.