Apple Reveals Mac OS X 10.2, 17" iMac, Windows iPod

Steve Jobs today announced at the Macworld Keynote that Mac OS X 10.2 will be available August 24 for $129. "That's less than $1 for each major feature," he quipped. Updates will be available in some cases for $19.99. Also introduced were iTunes 3, iPod updates, iChat, iCal, iSync, a 17" iMac, and a lot more. Many of the new features have been mentioned here before, including QuickTime 6, spring-loaded folders, integrated Finder searching, better Windows integration, new Address Book, new Mail, Rendezvous, iChat, and Sherlock 3.

The Address Book is now system-wide, accessible from many applications, and even has Bluetooth integration. Jobs dialed his cell phone via Address Book, and then when someone called him back on that phone, the computer popped up with the caller's name in Address Book. He had the option to pick up the phone or reply with a short text message.

iSync is a new system for synching your contacts and calendars with GPRS cell phones, Palms, and iPods; so Palms and cell phones are now a part of the digital hub. The iSync program shows you connected devices, and allows configuration of what to sync, and when. The demo showed a complete sync of an address book on the computer to the cell phone, again over Bluetooth. iSync will also allow integration with .mac to update your contacts and calendars between multiple computers, and will be available as a free download in September.

The Mail app now has much better searching and spam filtering, and inline QuickTime (no, that won't be abused ...).

Rendezvous will allow such things as automatic accessing of other's playlists in iTunes, accessing USB printers on the network, and more, with "zero configuration" (I hope there is some configuration, so I can opt in or out of such things). Epson, HP, and Lexmark will have Rendezvous-compatible printers. Jobs didn't mention any way to share USB printers between Mac OS and Mac OS X.

iChat, the new instant messaging program, and iCal, the new shared calendar program, can work with the $100-per-year .mac subscription, or with the free AOL IM account and any web server. iChat will use Rendezvous for finding local users, and shared calendars can be sent via iChat or mail. iCal will ship in September, as a free download.

Sherlock 3 has been completely rewritten, using Internet services (SOAP? XML-RPC?) instead of trying to parse HTML. The demo showed movie listings with embedded trailers, eBay searches with intelligently organized information and pictures, Google image searching, and a Yellow Pages search that knows your ZIP code and sorts by distance, and shows directions and maps.

iTunes 3 is out today, with new features such as rating songs, keeping track of how often songs are played, playing back all songs at the same volume, integration with audible.com, and "Smart Playlists" with rulesets so they are automatically populated (e.g., "25 most played songs", or "500 MB of songs where playcount is 0", to play songs you've never listened to). It is only available for Mac OS X, and requires registration with an email address.

For the iPod, Apple lowered prices on the 5GB and 10GB models ($299, $399), and introduced a 20GB model ($499). The 10GB and 20GB have a solid state scroll wheel, a door to protect the FireWire port, a remote control, and a case. The playlist counts, Smart Playlists, and audible.com integration sync between the iPod and iTunes. Sound volume check has also been added to the iPod. The new 10GB model is 7.692 percent thinner than the previous version.

Also added to the iPod, in addition to the contacts, is calendars, synched with iCal, so it can really act as a PDA for most people. Jobs also announced Windows versions of iPod, synching with musicmatch and including a FireWire 6-to-4 pin cable.

The new iMac has a 17" widescreen display at 1440x900, with an NVIDIA GeForce4 MX, G4/800, and 80GB hard drive.

Jobs also noted that there are 2.5 million Mac OS X users, that 77 percent of owners of new Macs keep Mac OS X as the primary OS, and that they estimate there will be 5 million Mac OS X users by the end of the year, representing 20% of all Mac users using the new OS in the first 24 months.

Apple showed some new ads in the "Switch" campaign, including a student who lost her paper on Windows, a student whose CDs get messed up in his bag (although they didn't point out that he can use iPod under Windows now), and a comedian who ended his commercial with, "My name is Will Ferrell ... and I'm a porn actor."

Comments

New iMac Designed With Ancient Mathematical Secret

[Jonathan Blocksom]

The wide-screen iMac specs page gives the native
resolution of the 17" iMac as 1440x900. This is a 16:10 display ratio, which is about as
close as any monitor I know of gets to the
Golden Ratio, (1 + sqrt(5)/2), or approximately 1.618.

Clearly Apple is trying to channel Pyramid Power
to sell more computers.

A small side-note : GCC 3

[mcc]

Just one little interesting tidbit i noticed that is getting kind of lost in the noise: Did anyone else notice the little note on the Jaguar page? Apparently the 10.2 developer tools use GCC 3.1!

I found this interesting, as i had heard that the bulk of the linux distributions had not yet managed to migrate to GCC 3. Neat to see Apple is staying on top of this whole UNIX-technology thing :)

YOU CAN'T USE THE SAME IPOD ON WINDOWS AND MAC

[Krashed]

I just got off the phone with Apple and they said "you'll have to buy two ipods if you want to use them on Windows and the Mac." Damn it, why can't Apple just for once make it easy.

I am putting off my order of the iPod until I find out if there is a workaround for the "feature". That really bytes too cause it looks like the Apple Store is also offering a free car power adapter with the purchase of the iPod.

Re:YOU DO NOT HAVE TO PAY FULL PRICE

[teridon]

Please point me to a webpage which states that you can use your coupons. The upgrade page makes no mention of them.

Re:HDTV Tip:

[Dredd13]

I bet that's intentional.

Gives them 90 pixels for a title bar, without it interfering with the display area of the HDTV image.

Re:Good For Apple, Good For Us

[donutello]

Doesn't a demonstration of such kickass tech (especially the Bluetooth stuff) realised today for the consumer show just how many streets ahead Apple are?

What the hell are you talking about? My PC is quite happy to talk to my IPaq over Bluetooth today.

This is all stuff that should exist under Windows, but doesn't. Apple has, after so many years, arrived at the point of equality (and now usurption) to everything else in the market - they can only produce better and better products.


Yeah, but if any of this stuff was built into Windows wouldn't the same people on this thread be whining about how Microsoft is abusing its monopoly power to shove software no one wants down peoples throats and to drive competitors out of business ? Need I remind you that Microsoft is currently being sued for including a web browser and media player in the OS - nevermind any of the more advanced features.

Re:The Good, the Bad, and the Indifferent

[Garin]

Yep. There's good and bad. For me, though, today's announcements caused a subtle shift in my feelings. See, I just bought an iBook a couple of months ago.

Yesterday, I was a proud and happy mac owner. I really enjoyed it, and I thought the value was excellent. I was excited about the new software, the new hardware, and just the whole new approach that apple takes to computing. (Before I bought the iBook, I was primarily FreeBSD + M$ for games). I bought a new digital camera, and I already have over a thousand great pictures in iPhoto. I have 4GB of music in iTunes. All my friends use my iTools email address, and read my iTools webpages. I was learning how to develop with Cocoa. I was exploring the Unix guts, and getting to know it quite well. Even after months of use, I still thought the iBook was fun and cool -- previous laptops and other toys quickly became routine, but this was still a thrill.

Today, I -still- use iPhoto, iTunes, and the development tools. However, my attitude has shifted. Before I was totally hooked by the software and the hardware, and I was very happy and excited about it. I read the apple rumours sites, and really enjoyed this new approach. Now, after today, I'm -still- hooked by all of the software, but now I feel bitter and slightly resentful about that fact. iTunes, iPhoto, and all the rest are still excellent programs that I really don't want to give up. Now, as I say, I resent that fact rather than relish it.

The first hit is free I guess. It's very evil, what they did to me. They got me hooked, and then used it against me. *sigh*. I'll probably buy the update AND pay for the iTools/.Mac/whatever, but grudgingly. Because I'm hooked. I suppose it's my own fault, since companies exist purely to make profit and I conveniently ignored that while I played with my shiny new toys. Ah well. It was fun for a while I guess.