Lions, MacBooks, Predictions! Oh My!

As I noted earlier, Apple’s Mac event is just a week away, and the invite is highly suggestive of two things:

1. New Aluminum MacBook Pro’s and/or MacBook Air, and
2. Mac OS X 10.7 Lion

The majority of the invite itself looks like the lid of a an aluminum Mac notebook, with the Apple logo freshly cut out (I’d love to get my hands on one of those scrap Apple logos). And then there is the lion peeking out. And let’s face it, I don’t think Apple will stick with the cat theme for Mac OS 11, so my bet is definitely on Mac OS X 10.7.

Needless to say, I have my hopes and dreams…

New Mac Portables

MacBook Pro

I suspect there will be slight refreshes to the MacBook Pro. Faster processors, bigger batteries, USB 3, and maybe even higher resolution screens (maybe even 16:9). Honestly, I wouldn’t mind if the Pro line took a page from the MacBook Air and moved the optical drive to an external accessory. I rarely use my optical drive, and would love to use that space for something else.

MacBook Air

The MacBook Air has always been an enigma to me — super light & portable but severely underpowered and overpriced. Also, with the 13-inch screen, a 13-inch MacBook Pro seems like a better investment.

For weeks there have been rumors that the Air may go to an 11.6-inch screen. I think this seems right. Shrink the screen, shed even more weight, give it the all-glass trackpad like the MacBook and MacBook Pros, and for crying out loud, figure out how to squeeze more than one USB port in the thing.

And hey, if the price can be chopped further, I think you may have something neat on your hands.

Lion

Whenever there is news of an upcoming major update to Mac OS X, I always find myself at a loss for what Apple could possibly add to make it better. And, of course, I am always blown away. Last time, for Snow Leopard, I was blown away by the cost — $29. Once installed, Snow Leopard blew my mind with the overall “super polished” responsiveness. Even though there wasn’t a great deal of new features, it was obvious there was a lot of refactoring under the hood.

For Lion, I can only fathom a couple things that seem like shoe-ins.

FaceTime

Apple’s giant drum to parade around this year is FaceTime. It’s in the iPhone 4 and the latest iPod touch. I also think it is going to be in the next iPad.

For years, we’ve had video calls in iChat on Mac OS X. However, right now, FaceTime isn’t getting a lot of my attention since I can’t do a video call with my relatives who don’t have an iPhone 4 or new iPod touch. Lion will likely change this. I bet iChat will gain FaceTime support for video calls to Apple’s mobile devices.

Hey, maybe Apple will give iChat a much needed facelift while they are at it.

Multi-Touch

Apple has been slowly adding Multi-Touch to the Mac over the years. Mostly, this has remained exclusive to Mac portables, but recently came to the desktop with the advent of the Magic Trackpad (which I love, by the way).

I think Apple will eventually bundle the Magic Trackpad with the iMac as the default pointing device, likely around Lion’s release, as I am sure it will utilize a fair amount of Multi-Touch interaction.

I am unsure how extensive Multi-Touch will permeate within Lion, but I’d wager it will be a foundational release to eventually move away from the traditional mouse for good.

iOS Integration

One thing I appreciate about my Mac apps that have iOS counterparts is the ability to sync their data via WiFi. The problem is that this is cumbersome. You have to launch the Mac app and the iOS app and have both devices on the same network in order for them to sync.

Some apps, such as 1Password have taken to using services like Dropbox to sync data cross device and cross platform, without requiring the user to do anything beyond the initial setup.

That is a much more fluid and transparent way of doing things. I hope Apple provides a method for developers to easily hook into a drop dead easy way to sync information from a Mac to an iOS device. Label this as hopeful.

MobileMe Included

Apple has been building a gigantic data center on the east coast for some time. I have long wondered if that was either for a streaming iTunes service, or for a free MobileMe. Overall, MobileMe is much better than .Mac, which it replaced, with one glaring exception – iDisk. It is slow and just plain doesn’t work all that well.

I’d really like to see iDisk get overhauled to be a lot like the aforementioned Dropbox. That would actually facilitate that iOS syncing integration pretty well.

My hope would be that MobileMe would move to being free with Lion, but I do actually feel like I get my $100 per year out of it. The advantage of making it free is that more users would adopt the technology, making for a leaner, cleaner experience. Also, iOS device owners on Windows may feel more inclined to have that seamless integration between Mac OS X and iOS.

UI Refresh

Undoubtedly, a major Mac OS X revision brings some fresh UI paint. Maybe I’m crazy, but iTunes always seems to be the forerunner for design choices that later find their way to Mac OS X. Particularly, I am think of the “traffic lights” going vertical, and the title bar possibly going by the wayside. It seems to work well in iTunes, though I am unsure how well the removal of the title bar would fare in other places, such as Safari (that is, unless, Tabs on Top finally made their reappearance).

I can definitely see the traffic lights going vertical. I’d bet a nickel on it.

iLife and iWork

Who knows, maybe we’ll see fully 64-bit updates and overhauls to Apple’s two famous software suites. I know I wouldn’t mind seeing both of these appear.

That’s my wish list and educated guesses.

The Great iPhone Kerfuffle of 2010

Unless you’ve been under a rock for the past week and a half-ish, you’ve no doubt heard about Gizmodo getting their hands on a prototype iPhone. Not just any prototype iPhone, but almost certainly the next iPhone. I’ve held off on writing about it for a couple reasons:

1. My tongue was hanging out for a long time on the floor.
2. I wanted to see how this played out for a little while.

I’m not going to waste too many pixels of typography discussing the circumstances of how Gizmodo acquired the iPhone or what the legal ramifications of all that may be, other than to say that I was genuinely disappointed for how Gizmodo outed the name of the Apple engineer who misplaced the iPhone. That was a tasteless act that had no relevancy to the overall story. All we needed to know was that an Apple engineer misplaced, not the name and face of the actual person. It disturbs me how Gizmodo can take such sociopathic glee in attaching that man’s name to this story for the rest of his career via search engine.

There, I am finished ranting and chastising.

Now, onto the meat of the story — the prototype iPhone. This was by far the biggest tech/gadget scoop I’ve ever seen. It may be the biggest tech/gadget scoop ever. It is so strange that we’ve actually seen the next iPhone before Steve Jobs has shown it to us.

Much to the dismay of iPhone case manufacturers, who last year were given a reprieve of redesigning their products due to the 3GS having the same body as the 3G, the next iPhone has a brand new design. I think it is safe to say the design of the prototype is close to what will be in customer’s hands. To quote John Gruber:

According to Gizmodo, one of the barcodes attached to the unit read “N90_DVT_GE4X_0493”. According to several sources (of mine) familiar with the project, “N90” is Apple’s codename for the fourth-generation GSM iPhone, slated for release this June or July. “DVT” stands for “design verification test”, an Apple production milestone. The DVT milestone is very late in the game; based on this, I now believe that this unit very closely, if not exactly, resembles what Apple plans to release.

So, given what Gizmodo showed us, I want to weigh in on the hardware.

I love my iPhone 3G overall, but one thing that is an overall flaw is the plastic shell. It feels cheap. My iPhone 3G doesn’t feel like it is constructed nearly as well as my wife’s iPod touch or my iPad. But more than anything, the plastic back isn’t very durable. A few days ago I had my iPhone replaced under warranty. I took it in to have the screen replaced, as I had dust built up between the glass and LCD. But the Genius pointed out that I had many stress fractures around the headphone jack and dock connector. She replaced the whole unit on that basis. Let’s face it, the iPhone should suffer from stress fractures on the only two ports, which are meant to be used often.

So that brings me to the point of the next iPhone’s case. It appears to be two pieces of glass with a band of aluminum sandwiched in between. The band of aluminum surrounds and supports the headphone and dock connectors — that’s a good thing. The really interesting part is the back of the iPhone. Gizmodo said it felt like glass, like the front. But Apple holds a patent for making a case out of ceramic. Polished ceramic would definitely have the feel of glass. It’s also very durable and completely RF transparent, which is very important for a mobile phone. To put durability into perspective, the M1 Abrams tank used by the United States military uses ceramic in its armor. Tough stuff.

Next is cameras. Yes, plural. Let’s start with the rear camera we know and love. It was noted that the lens itself is larger than what is found on the 3GS, alluding to the possibility of a 5 megapixel camera. This would be a wise move as many competing phones sport 5 megapixel cameras. There is also a little LED flash. This will probably be the only kind of “flash” to be on an iPhone. Yes, that was a dig at Adobe.

New to the next iteration of the iPhone is a front camera, presumably for video chat. I’m not exactly sure how much I would use this. The idea seems awkward to me as it requires holding the iPhone out in front of your face. We’ll see.

Lastly, Gizmodo thought the screen looked as if it had a higher pixel density. 960x640 would be a good assumption. It’s exactly double the current pixel count. If Apple couples that with the IPS technology they’ve put in the latest iMacs and the iPad, that will be a great looking screen. (IPS allows the image to remain fairly free of color distortion at extreme angles.)

And that’s about all we know or could reasonably assume from Gizmodo’s observations, as the iPhone’s software had been remotely wiped.

What else would I like to see? Well, I’d like to see the iPhone gain storage up to at least 64 GB. I’d also like to see Apple use a custom chip like their A4 chip that resides in the iPad. And if they can swing it, 512 MB of RAM would be great, especially with all the multitasking apps in the background in iPhone OS 4. (I was surprised that the iPad only has 256 MB RAM. I thought 512 MB was a shoe-in.)

Since that camera is thought to contain more resolution, I’d love it if the iPhone shoots 720p HD video instead of the current 640x480. Then I could get rid of my Kodak Zx1, which doesn’t see a great deal of use since I rarely carry it with me. I carry my iPhone with me at all times.

Overall, the physical design of the new iPhone is very appealing to me. It looks more in line with the machined aluminum bodies of the MacBook Pro, iMac, and iPad. The iPhone 3G/3GS really stick out as odd compared to many of Apple’s other products. 

I really can’t wait to get the next iPhone. After all, I bought the iPhone 3G on day one. I’m due for a new one.

Predicting the Future of iPhone OS

In a few hours time, Apple will pull back the curtain on iPhone OS 4. As you’ll recall, Apple’s invitation stated that invitees would “get a sneak peek into the future of iPhone OS.”

Prior to Apple events, I tend to throw in my predictions. Last time I was wildly wrong. So this time I am going to keep things conservative. The usual suspects have spoken, and I am going to ride their coattails. There are three things I think will be added to iPhone OS:

• Multitasking of some sort for third party apps
• An advertising platform for free apps, and
• Support for higher screen resolutions.

 Multitasking and screen resolution are the things Apple has been getting slammed on since the Motorola Droid and the HTC Nexus One Android phones came a-knockin’. Now, I’m sure Apple will have many more things to trumpet about. I’m just not sure what those will be.

I do, however, have my own little wish list.

Mail

• Unified inbox
• Threaded messages

iPod

• Folder support
• A freaking quick-scroll bar in the Playlist section
• Get rid of cover flow

Lock Screen

• Status summary of notifications/upcoming events/weather/etc.

Notifications

• New system for presenting these. The blue grey pop up box just doesn’t cut it.

Tethering

• I’d like to see AT&T actually support this here in the US. But, I’d actually like to see this taken one step further. I’d like to see the iPhone gain support for mobile hotspot. Some new smartphones are featuring this ability to take the phone’s 3G signal and then turn the phone into a WiFi hot spot for other devices. I’d love to see this feature, but I have doubts as that would cut into sales of 3G+WiFi iPads. 

Those are a few things I’d like to see happen with the iPhone. Some, like mobile hotspot, would likely require new hardware. Support for higher screen resolutions could be in advance of new iPhone/iPod hardware and/or taking a step toward unifying the versions of iPhone OS that iPhone/iPod run on versus the iPad’s flavor.

All will be revealed soon. Any last minute comments from the peanut gallery?

A Few Predictions on the "Tablet" Event

I’ve wrestled with the idea of posting any predictions on the forthcoming Apple Event that takes place in less than 48 hours, but I am caving to tradition. This is just something most any writer who writes about Apple has to do. I don’t have anything to back anything up besides my gut feelings. I’m really just spitballing with a best guess.

The order of events to an Apple keynote, especially a Jobsnote (love having you back, Steve), is a pretty timeless and standard affair. Everything will start by recapping a lot of market data for the Mac, iPod, and iPhone. Apple will tout the financial numbers which are being released later today.

Mac announcements will come first, if there are any. I’m expecting a cursory announcement of iLife and iWork 2010 (or whatever they decide to call it) with some brief demonstrations of the latest enhancements. I’m thinking only iPhoto and iMovie will see demos. I have absolutely no idea what could be added. Expect both suites to go fully 64-bit.

iTunes will be after that. There will be a new feature or two added. I’m hoping that the rumors of all-you-can-eat streaming TV shows come to fruition. If that happens, and the Apple TV gets a hardware refresh to support 1080p, I’m there. I’ve been looking for an excuse to drop cable TV and TiVo (combined, they are just too expensive). $30 or $40 a month would be perfect. I must say, though, I don’t really see this happening. I do see iTunes getting one or two new features, and they’ll likely tie into the iPod and iPhone.

iPod announcements will follow iTunes, and the iPod touch is going to get most of the spotlight (all 3-5 minutes of it). The gist of it will be the announcement of iPhone OS 3.2, which will support whatever new features iTunes brings.

Following that, the iPhone will get a nod, with iPhone OS 3.2 coming for it as well, natch. Here’s where I play my wild card. AT&T will lose it’s US exclusivity on iPhone. Now, I expect this to be more announcement oriented, rather than immediate availability. I expect the iPhone will simply be available this summer on T-Mobile, the other GSM carrier in the States. But I know most are hoping Apple releases a CDMA iPhone for use on Verizon (and maybe Sprint). And this could be the stage to announce that for summer availability. Either way, or even both ways, AT&T will lose exclusivity. I’m calling that one, and I’ll eat crow if it doesn’t happen.

Lastly, and this will be the most lengthy part (I’m counting 30-minutes for everything else, an hour for this), the mythical “tablet” will finally be unveiled. There’s so many delusions surrounding this thing’s hype that it’s laughable. I’m keeping my predictions light. The hardware will look similar to an overgrown iPhone or iPod touch. I mean, realistically, imagining much beyond a giant piece of glass with a metal and/or plastic back, with as few buttons as possible isn’t much of a stretch. But the secret will lie in the software. That’s what is beautiful about multi-touch input — there isn’t a lot of limit on the user interface. I think the software will be more closely related to iPhone OS than Mac OS X, but it will be its own branch off the OS X root, much like iPhone OS was.

I think it will be revolutionary. I don’t think any of us have come close to what it will do or how it will fit in with our computing lifestyles. I do think that we’ll all say, “That makes sense” after Steve explains it to us.

I just hope it has a cool name like Canvas. I’ll slap my forehead if its name is iSlate or iPad.

It Is On.

Well, something is on. Everyone has been running around with their heads unscrewed drooling about the possibility of Apple introducing a tablet later this month. I’ve held off on the drooling so as to not make a total fool of myself until substantial information is available.

However, one of the rumors surrounding the unicorn tablet has been an event at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts (Apple’s favorite iPod event venue) on either the 26th or 27th on January. Apparently Apple sent out the invites to the media this morning (no, I’m not even close to their radar). An event is planned for January 27th and invites the press to “come see our latest creation.”

The invite features a multitude of paint splotches in various colors. Reminds me of the nanos. If it is the tablet, perhaps it will have some art focus? I could speculate a lot more, and likely end up very wrong. I think the safest bet is that Apple will amaze us all, yet again.