Slogging through the Verge's transcript of the Apple presentation (http://live.theverge.com/apple-iphone-6s-tv-event-live-blog/), we see:

- Cheaper iCloud storage. A buddy of mine is spending a lot of coin there, and he'll be thrilled.

- Next-gen iPhone 6S / 6S Plus: the new shiny is "3D Touch", aka measuring the force with which you touch and behaving differently. One of the snarky Verge comments is that they've invented the right-click. 12 megapixel main camera, 5 megapixel front camera. 4K video. Notably, prices have not come down.

A base-model 6S with 16GB of memory is $199 with a two year contract. A loaded 6S Plus with 128GB is $499 with a two year contract. Now that low-end Android phones are coming in at $199 without contract, and fancier ones are more like $400 without contract, Apple is positioning itself way, way upmarket.

- Next-gen AppleTV, now with "tvOS", which allows you to port iOS stuff to run on the TV. That means that Apple is now competing against Xbox, PlayStation, etc. The remote control has a touchpad and a microphone as well. In short, it's very much "game on" versus Google's Android TV.

- New iPad devices, topping out in a 13" model with optional magnetically-attaching / folding keyboard and pressure-sensitive stylus pen. Fully decked out, it's over $1300. Basically, it's Apple's version of the Microsoft Surface. Among other notables, the bigger screen has enough space that they'll run two apps side-by-side.

- Apple Watch: new watchbands (yawn) and new apps. Intriguing is a live viewfinder for GoPro. That's very cool, especially with the newest, tiniest GoPro being quite inadequate in this regard. Unclear if they're allowing third-party developers to write their own watchface apps or not.

- OS X El Capitan is apparently shipping September 30.

Not present:

- Any new Mac products. I'm particularly curious what's going on when we've got a Macbook with a smaller screen than an iPad.


Curiouser and curiouser:

- The new remote control for the new AppleTV charges via Lightning, not USB-C. No mention on The Verge about what connectors are on the new iPad and iPhone models. I've had fantasies about the world standardizing on USB-C and the one cable to charge them all. Apparently not yet.

Personally, I think that could get confusing. I'd rather separate the discussions. It's not like we have dozens of threads to sift through these days


Much needed! I believe that iCloud has always been the most expensive of the bunch. I think it's still the most but it's better. They should also add options for more than 1TB.


I don't think it's "way, way upmarket." Apple charges that much because they have the best phones. The hardware just beats out everything else. Yes, Android phones have never been better, but they're still not as good as the iPhone, IMO. I think it's great that there are budget Android phones, and I tend to think that they're enough for most people, but the iPhone is still king, and I don't see them changing their prices for a long time.


This could be a huge success or a giant flop. I think the biggest obstacle is that we're heading away from TV in general, with millenials preferring to watch everything on their mobile devices. Then of course they have to contend with streaming video devices that are nearly free. Clearly this new device is a monster, but it's hard to sway people from a $35 device that they perceive as being able to do the same stuff. I'll be very interested in what developers make for it, though.


Wow! I know this has been rumored for a while, but I'm still a little surprised there's a market for this. The difference between this and the Surface is that the latter is running a full desktop OS. Is this another sign that Apple would like to drop OSX altogether?


Is this just different departments not communicating with each other? It would seem like a huge oversight to not standardize, particularly since the MacBook was announced almost six months ago...

.

About the new iPad Pro:
I spend too much time in airports. I see an awful lot of people using iPads with aftermarket Bluetooth keyboards of various sorts. These are entirely capable for a large variety of tasks, and now Microsoft is shipping a decked out version of Office specifically for this platform, which really does cover most users' needs.

Does this speak toward the death of the general-purpose laptop? Hell if I know, but it's certainly suggestive.

Please create separate threads for separate discussions.
Also please remember to keep threading working by making use of the quick reply buttons.

I'll try to clip this thread up into the placeholders. Doing this after is more work then doing this at post time.

And, now that Apple has the "tech specs" for the new machines online, it's as I feared: they're all using the Lightning connector, not the newer USB-C.

No 3rd party watch-faces in watchOS 2, though there is ClockKit for developers to make 3rd party complications for the existing watchfaces. My guess is full 3rd party watchfaces may be a watchOS 3 or further addition.

I don't quite get the new watch straps that wrap around twice, but seems there is interest in them from some on my twitter feed. It's been interesting watching the traditional tech press still not grasp the fashion angle and how this leads to even folks like yourself Dan dismissing that aspect with a (yawn) in the middle of the post. The watch with the wraparound band is notable as Apple is cobranding with Hermes to release their own unique watchbands sold only through Hermes stores or a few Apple stores.

There is also new watch base colors available, with the sport model offering fake gold models. So far I've bought one alternate color watch band, and swap it out from time to time.

watchOS 2 should be interesting to see what real native 3rd party apps can do. The GoPro demo was great to see, curious to see how that works in practice.

Most, but not all, commercial wristwatches use standardized lugs of standardized sizes, allowing you to install off-the-shelf straps, bracelets, and whatnot from any watch onto any other. I've currently got a 3rd-party nylon strap on my Moto 360. No big deal. Many people who wanted a metal bracelet installed the aftermarket Pebble bracelet on their Moto watches. Perfect fit.

So, yeah, I'm just not all that excited by Apple Watch straps. They're straps. For a watch.

Gotcha, thanks for expanding on your thoughts. The aspect I do appreciate about Apple's specific watch bands is the ease at swapping them out. No tools, no tiny parts, just a quick few second operation. I have seen adaptors to allow more traditional straps to also work with the Apple Watch. Makes it easier to color coordinate outfits for those who do so.

Can anyone tell from looking what this thing's ASPECT RATIO IS?

I can't tell from the pics if it's 16:9 or if it's 4:3 or what.

If it's 12.9" at the 4:3 aspect ratio, it might soon be time for me to use an iPad as my songbook. (Despite all the time I spent working on getting that Sony 15" folding laptop working just perfect for the job.)

It's 4:3. When a 9.7 inch iPad is in portrait mode, it's height matches the new iPad Pro in landscape orientation.

Okay, if it's square pixels (that's a pretty good assumption, but not certain), the 2732 x 2048 size puts it one pixel off from 4:3. (perfect 4:3 would be 2732 x 2049).

This is a very interesting development. I was almost certain that if they came out with an oversized iPad it was gonna be 16:9.

This is a really good thing.

Given everything else in our household is Apple (and we'll get a new AppleTV) I... am surprised neither of us finds the watch compelling. $spouse got a Fitbit Charge HR and feels it was the right choice. I'm debating whether to get a new Moto 360 Sport, or to buy a used original.

I love my Moto 360, and they're pretty cheap these days. My take has been that I think tech companies and the public have been making too much of the possibilities of wearables. I'm just happy to be able to to easily handle my email and other notifications right from my wrist, and have other glanceable data at the ready.

There were some nice products at the keynote, but nothing that got me overly excited.

iPhone 6s: indeed, 3Dtouch is the only true novelty. Well, apart from the new CPU which is supposed to be 70% faster than the iPhone 6' CPU. I'm not all that impressed. Indeed, it seems they have re-invented the right click. But why go through that much trouble? They could've just as well implemented that by using a long press or something. Seems like a lot of trouble to implement something that could've been done much easier through a UI change if you ask me. Prices also only seem to go up. Especially here in Europe, where the strong dollar has be responsible for hardware prices to rise up to 20% higher already. This makes this a really, really expensive phone. (and I'm saying this as somebody who loves his iPhone 5). I must admit: the price, and only the price, has been pushing me to glance at Android solutions like the One Plus One eg.

New Apple-TV. I've got an Apple TV 3 here (received it as a birthday present), and since no jailbreak has ever been released for this model all I'm using it for really is as a "Netflix interface" for my old dumb-tv. But that TV will probably be replaced sometime next year... by a smart TV of course, which will have the Netflix app already installed. So no more need for the Apple TV then.
I've seen the vid and it's nice to see it can be controlled via Siri, but that only seems to work in a couple of languages, Dutch not being one of them. Well, that's the main selling feature gone for me then. I'm not interested in playing games, and if I would be, I'd buy a PS4 or Xbox.

iPad Pro: nice, but crippled in its potential because it runs iOS instead of OSX if you ask me. Basically it's a Microsoft surface that isn't running a desktop OS, so you can't use it as a complete laptop replacement. Microsoft also tried this with their Surface RT series (running on ARM), but it failed completely because all people wanted was the Pro version which did run a desktop OS. Microsoft learned from this and their new Surface lineup only uses the desktop OS anymore. No more Windows RT. I think the same is going to happen with this iPad Pro, but I don't have a glass sphere and Apple certainly isn't Microsoft. It's a nice try to have Microsoft develop an Office version especially tailored to this device, but I do more stuff with my laptop than just Office work. (and I don't think I'm the only one)
In my opinion, in it's current state, it's just a large iPad which is probably nicer to use because of the larger screen. Surfing the net will be easier because of the split screen option. Viewing a movie on it will also be a nicer experience because of the larger screen. But is that worth the extra cost? I doubt it.
Oh, and the stylus (can I say stylus? 'cause it is a stylus!) doesn't ship with the iPad Pro in the box? Really? And there's no slit somewhere in the iPad Pro so you can tuck it away? You're bound to loose it pretty quickly then. (Steve jobs thought so as well in 2007). No, I don't see this becoming a big success in its current state. We'll see.

Apple Watch. New watchbands and version 2 of it's OS, which will allow it to run native apps. I'm curious to see to what this will lead, because so for I haven't been terribly tempted to want one. I hope this will change with the native apps.

http://hijinksensue.com/comic/surface-tension/

(Note the publish date too)

Mine has a habit of barely making it from the start of the day to the end of the day, but then I have "ambient mode" turned on. I'm probably going to upgrade to the new Moto 360 Sport. Any of the new Moto 360's will (hopefully) have better battery life, but the Sport also promises some new fangled screen that's readable in broad daylight. That would be a win if it worked.

Interesting. I easily make it through an entire day and more. For me it was turning off the fitness features, which didn't seem very accurate to me anyway (I question the accuracy of all wrist-worn fitness trackers).

Curiouser and curiouser. I had previously disabled all of these things, blocking notifications and whatnot, but in the upgrade to newer Wear versions it appears that the "Fit" app turned itself back on. I was still blocking its notifications, so I never noticed.

I've now turned it off. (Damnit!) And I don't have "Moto Body" installed at all. I'll see if this fixes my battery life concerns.

That makes sense. I can't remember why, but at some point I needed to reset my watch. This re-enabled all the crud I disabled earlier. It still bothers me that by default BOTH Motorola and Google's fitness trackers are enabled. So there are two things counting my steps and sending data back to my phone. What's even worse is that I don't believe there's any way to completely turn off Motorola's stuff. For example, if I take my watch off sometimes and leave it face down on a desk, I'll notice a little green light on the back. I believe that's to measure heart rate, even though I've turned off everything I can think of. Argh.

This bothers me because I'm the type of smartwatch user who really wants a minimal amount of utility from my watch. I want it to give me notifications and some glanceable data and that's it.

I'm pretty much the type of smartwatch user who wants to know what time it is, and every once in a while figure out which roll of toilet paper at Costco gives me the most sheets per peso. These smart watches are expensive though, this one cost more than $15 USD, and the custom genuine leather band I had to get after the original plastic one broke was another $1.50. Battery life is OK, about two and a half years, but of course that's with all the extra stuff (i.e., the alarm chime) disabled.

I think my smart watch requirements are of a different nature from most of yours.

tanstaafl.

Anybody knows if the new iPhone 6s finally supports USB 3.x ? Every time I update my current iPhone I think this feature is long overdue.

I doubt it, there is little point given that the flash RAM on the iPhone can't exceed the speed of USB2 transfers.

I'm sure I've read that the iPad Pro is going to support faster USB transfers, which would make sense given that they claim to have doubled the flash RAM speed on it over previous devices.

I guess you're right Andy. It's probably not going to happen soon for the regular iPhone/iPad range.

Oh yes, a fair warning to those who are still using an iPhone 5 / DON'T UPDATE TO IOS 9!!! I was stupid enough to do so and it has made my iPhone as slow as thick mud through a funnel.

I'm trying to bring it back to 8.4.1 now, but I've never done that before and of all the IPSW files I can find, the restore program says they are "not compatible". I'm guessing this is because I'm using a Belgian iPhone?

Each year I become increasingly convinced that this is a deliberate act on their part, timed to coincide with the release of the newer, faster phones.

I firmly disagree. My iPhone 5 and iPad mini 2 are just as fast on iOS 9 as 8.

What "restore program" ? All you need at the moment to get back to 8.4.1 is iTunes and the right ipsw.

In my experience iOS 9 is as fast on old devices as 8. However, it can be very slow for the first day as it rebuilds indexes, photo thumbnails etc etc

I meant the "restore phone" part of iTunes.


You're the second one to tell me that. Ok, I'll give it another day or two then...

Cheers!

Don't wait too long though, they will stop signing 8.4.1 soon and then there is no going back.

And just to be clear I'm not claiming that iOS8 and 9 aren't slower on things like the iPhone 5 than iOS 7 was, but then the newer versions do more even on old devices. They have to strike a balance between adding stuff and making old devices slower, I think they many make reasonable decisions. Though there have been the occasional exceptions in the past.