Keynote Points

Based on the feed from keynoteuser.liveoakhosting.com. A huge thanks goes out to Brian Peat for keeping up with all of it, by cell phone no less(!). I’ll come back & flesh this out after I view the online keynote QT feed once it’s posted. On with the show…

iTunes/iPod

• Apple gets rights to SNL content to sell on iTunes Store. No biggie – I won’t be purchasing any of it.
• 14 million iPods sold. That’s all the news on the iPod. What? No new Shuffles or Nanos?
• iPod Remote with FM radio capabilities. The remote part is definitely a welcome addition. Don’t know about the FM radio thing though. In L.A., there aren’t many stations worth tuning into, so it would go unused by me.

Software

• Moving on to Apeture. Not a user, so no biggie for me here – though I hear it’s nice.
• Widgets: over 1500 of ‘em between Apple & 3rd party developers. Few new widgets from Apple today: Google, Address Book, snow conditions, calendar, whitepages, ESPN Sports.
• Tiger 10.4.4 update available via Software Update – includes new widgets.
• QuickTime 7.0.4 update available via Software Update.
• iTunes 6.0.2 update available via Software Update.

iLife ’06

• iPhoto: Now up to 250,000 images, more editing tools, multiple effects, high quality printing. Cool stuff it sounds like. Added card printing. Photocasting (podcasting for Photos) when album is updated, so is RSS feed. Click photocast in iPhoto, pick quality (including actual size), update timings, require password, etc, then hit publish. It uploads to .Mac (only) and asks if you want to announce your photocast. Anyone can subscribe. – Cool stuff for sharing pix of the kiddies w/ Granny & Gramps. More iPhoto demo stuff. Watch the feed later to see some cool stuff that iPhoto can do – sounds pretty cool.
• iMovie HD: animated feeds, more than one project open, single command to export to iPod, create video podcast from iMove.
• iDVD: wide screen dvds, magic iDVD creates dvds for you. New themes, better slideshows, etc.
• Garageband: podcast studio (cool!), free effects & jingles, other podcast enhancements. Neat features to make podcast production for the average Joe easier. Can use iChat to record interviews (bad news for Audio Hijack Pro? Doubt it.) New jam pack world music.
• iWeb: Sounds like the rumor that it was going to be based on Blogwave Studio may have been somewhat true. An actual app on your machine (not a web app). Basically a web site content creation tool. Publishes to .Mac (other publishing options too? – doubt it). Not a RapidWeaver replacement, but can do some cool things RW can’t yet (image manipulation, for one). Very easy integration between Garageband for podcast publishing to .Mac. iLife still $79. Available today.

iWork

• New Version: Lots of new features, 30 day trial on all new Macs. New themes & templates. Still $79 too. No time to demo.

Hardware

• Intel Mac TV Ad: Link here.
• Intel iMac: It’s ready!??! (Dang! There’ll be some developers who are a little miffed now that’s the case. They thought they had until June to be X86 ready – I agreed with Gruber’s line of thinking). Intel processor. Same sizes, design, features, and prices. The difference – 2 to 3 times faster than the current PPC based iMac G5. It’s a dual core processor, each with a 2 meg cache. (Can anyone say fast?)
• Pro Apps: Universal in March. Trade in old discs for new universal installers for $49. Other apps announced today are universal (Quark). Not MS Office yet, though updates are on the way. MS/Apple agreement for at least 5 years to ship MSO for Mac.
• Every iMac: Now dual processor. (Dang again! Just bought a new iMac last month. Should’ve waited…). All Apple apps that come with them are Universal Binaries (iLife, iWork, etc.) Tiger 10.4.4 is running natively too. This was bound to happen. Same prices, shipping TODAY! Entire Mac line will be transitioned to Intel this year.

One More Thing…

• Powerbooks: New notebook – “MacBook Pro”; Intel core duo chip, looks like a Powerbook. Dual processors. 4-5x faster than the Powerbook G4. 1″ thin, less than the 17″. 15.4″ widescreen LCD display, as bright as the cinema displays. Has an iSight camera built into the top (latch). MagSafe power connection; magnetic power that disconnects automatically if tugged too hard. Backlit keyboard. $1999 price point. 1.67 Intel DC processor/667 bus. Ships in February 2006. Powerbook name is going away, so this replaces it.

And that’s a wrap!

[NOTE] The keynote is online and can be viewed here. Though it would appear that the server is overloaded at the moment. Maybe try a little later…