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Apple. September. Inexpensive

September 1 did not start well for me. All former schoolchildren and students retain a weird reflex associated with the start of each academic year. Again back to school. Aren't you happy to meet your buddies? I am, just a bit. But returning to the school bench once again is not that cool. One more year and so on. I am now far removed from the academic setting, but I still have some phantom limb. To add insult to injury remember Moscow rain, cold and traffic jams. There was good news after all. Apple sent a nice letter:

" Apple will run a live video transmission of its event on September 1.
WHAT: live video transmission of Apple event on September 1
WHERE: www.apple.com
WHEN: Wednesday, September 1 2010 at 10:00 (Pacific Standard Time)
Live video transmission
Apple will run a live Internet transmission of our event on September 1 with the help of Apple technology allowing for live video transmission via HTTP and based on open standards. The viewing requires Mac® PC with Safari® browser and Mac OS® X 10.6 Snow Leopard®, or iPhone® or iPod touch® with iOS 3.0 or higher, or iPad™. The live transmission will start on September 1, 2010 at 10:00 PST at www.apple.com".

Apple kept their word. It's 11.14 PST now and the presentation came to an end. I can still hear music in a Safari window. Everything went down well despite occasional delays. According to one tweet Apple announced its event and the news quickly spread around the globe, but nowadays EVERYBODY does it! It is difficult to disagree. Nokia did it a long time ago. Do you remember? I am sure not many people do. This is similar to FaceTime. Have you forgotten about the video calls? We can remind you. Then many people start grumbling that the feature "was developed a long time ago by scientists from… and Apple has nothing to do with it".

The goal of the company was often to simplify what has already been invented. The same applies to touchscreens – hundreds of tech savvy individuals could not decide how to make a convenient touchscreen. The answer was obvious. It has to be convenient.

The show was great and I was again surprised how the head of Apple can control the audience for more than an hour. His mission was again accomplished with great success. Due to jokes, storytelling, fun and the right focus the announcement turned out to be very action packed. Today I would like to touch upon the main points and in the near future I will prepare detailed articles on new products and services. I think in September you will read reviews of the entire iPod/2010 lineup and all updates.

iPod Shuffle

Experiments aimed at torturing defenseless public came to an end. New Shuffle offers best features of the second and third generations. It has a familiar rectangular shape, all necessary controls and VoiceOver. 2 GB of memory, a clip, five colors and the price of $49. In Russia the price will be different. OK, I will not say anything else about Russian prices. It's clear that Apple products are better to buy in Europe, USA or unlicensed.

iPod Nano

This change was long in the making and the size has nothing to do with it. More likely the sales of 5th generation Nano were not the best. May be the consumers did not appreciate the video camera or the age of players is coming to an end. This idea is not original though. The company needs new features in its products. New iPod Nano boasts a 1.54″ touchscreen (240 х 240), supports multitouch, has its own OS, which must scare colleagues from Samsung and LG. It is not iOS, but just a simple and beautiful shell from Apple. What if the marketing genius decides to enter the segment of inexpensive touchscreen phones? It can lead to unprecedented consequences. Apparently, Nano is an experimental platform to test new technologies and receive the feedback from customers. The body is traditionally made of metal and has a rectangular shape. It's like a multimedia lavalier. Nokia tried it ages ago. This idea has now been implemented and in the advert the wearing of Nano was expressly highlighted. You can display a photo or clock there and the back side features a powerful clip. It can be attached to a jacket, a belt or even underwear. Good idea for Lady GaGa. That is not all as Nano has 5 colors, 8 or 16 GB of memory, 24 hours of music playback, VoiceOver, radio and a distance recorder. They got rid of the camera and turned the player into a stylish accessory to please the ladies. Prices start from $149.

iPod Touch

I have a special word for people who use iPod Touch. I call them the Touch people. They do not want to make a switch to iPhone, but pay tribute to the technology by using Touch. It is weird, but I can understand them... Some people cannot part with Nokia E71/E72, others love their old Sony Ericsson or Motorola. Tastes differ. The Touch people will smile today, because their favorite gadget got a thorough update:

The player is much slimmer now, but the shiny back is still there and scratches will inevitably appear unless you buy a case
The so called Retina display. A 3.5″ screen (960 х 640) is really good. Now your favorite tablet/game console/player/digital assistant is even more impressive
Video camera is now on both sides and you can use FaceTime. How should it work? Can you call an iPhone 4 owner?
HD video recording... Some may like it.
A4 processor is also used in iPhone 4 and iPad. It's getting faster and faster

The rest will be mentioned in the review. Three versions with 8 GB, 16 GB and 64 GB of memory cost $229, $299 and $399 respectively. Taking into account the features on offer it is not expensive. I wonder if the Touch people will be eager to upgrade.

Новая Apple TV

The device became smaller, lost a hard drive, costs $99 and is perfectly understandable. It is connected via HDMI to a TV, while the back also hosts a main cable jack, Ethernet and microUSB. According to the official information from Apple website the latter is required "for service and support". Everything works in a simple way. You rent a movie in iTunes directly from Apple TV (no need to connect to PC and synchronize). One HD movie costs almost $5 and you can start watching it in seconds. TV shows or series start from 99 cents per episode. It is a decent price. You can also watch YouTube videos, use Flickr and other services. Send video to Apple TV from a laptop or iPad (this procedure is very sophisticated, so I must try it one day).

There are no extra features here, but users from Russia do not care about it. It's clear that the video content will be downloaded from everywhere but iTunes. Correspondently, you can pay $100 for it, but the inquisitive mind of a Russian needs more. I would probably... Don't know, really. I'll think about it tomorrow.

iTunes 10

This multimedia software was finally added an Internet application named Ping. It is a social network for music where you can share your impressions from artists, upload photos and videos, tell about your going out plans, search for friends and so on.

I should try and review it. Among changes I can name new design, AirPlay feature (wireless music playback), improved synchronization with iPod, iPhone and iPad among other things.

Updates for iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad

In November iPad will get a new firmware with multitasking support and other features of iOS 4.0. iPhone will soon get new software with the Game Center for online games, an option to take pictures in HDR mode, which is useful in bad light. iPad could be used to send documents to print, which is good.

Conclusions

It seems that the music family is not the most important for Apple at the moment. It was necessary to update the lineup, show progress, experiment with Nano, boost Touch, and try out social networks in iTunes. Mission accomplished. Only Apple TV is unlikely to be a hit despite all changes. The content is still too expensive. If movies become available on YouTube what will be the price and speed? We'll see.

Do you want to talk about this? Please, go to our Forum and let your opinion to be known to the author and everybody else.

Sergei Kuzmin (skuzmin@mobile-review.com)
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