This Week Marks the 20th Anniversary of the iPod and 30th Anniversary of the PowerBook
Apple's virtual "Unleashed" event coincides with two major Apple product anniversaries this week, including the 20th anniversary of the original iPod being announced and the 30th anniversary of the original PowerBook's introduction.
Steve Jobs unveiled the original iPod on October 23, 2001 at a small press event at Apple's former Infinite Loop headquarters. Jobs famously pitched the iPod as offering "1,000 songs in your pocket" and compared the device's "ultra-portable" size to a standard deck of cards, which was impressive at the time.
"With iPod, Apple has invented a whole new category of digital music player that lets you put your entire music collection in your pocket and listen to it wherever you go," said Jobs in a press release. "With iPod, listening to music will never be the same again."
Alongside the iMac and the iPhone, the iPod was one of a few key products that helped Apple become successful again after the company flirted with bankruptcy in the late 1990s. The device has since become a niche product for Apple, though, with the iPod touch being the only remaining model available for purchase today following the discontinuation of the iPod classic in 2014 and the iPod nano and iPod shuffle in 2017.
Fittingly with Apple expected to unveil
redesigned MacBook Pro models today, this week also marks the 30th anniversary of the
original PowerBook models being unveiled on October 21, 1991 at the COMDEX trade show in Las Vegas. By modern day standards, these PowerBook models were Apple's first true laptops with a hinged form factor still familiar today.
Related Stories
In what has become one of the most defining moments in Apple's history, today marks the 20th anniversary of Steve Jobs introducing the original iPod at a small press event at the Town Hall auditorium at Apple's former Infinite Loop headquarters.
Above is a snapshot of what Apple's website looked like on October 23, 2001, the day the iPod was announced, courtesy of the Wayback Machine.
Our ...
One day ahead of the 20th anniversary of Steve Jobs unveiling the original iPod on October 23, 2001, Apple's former senior vice president of the iPod team Tony Fadell has reflected on his role in creating the device in an interview with CNET's Roger Cheng.
Fadell said that Apple was on a mission to launch the iPod before Christmas 2001. Impressively, he said that he "really got started" with ...
Occasional leaker Mr White has today shared interesting images on Twitter of what appears to be an old-school fifth-generation iPod touch prototype with chamfered edges and a brushed aluminum finish. The original iPod touch 5 that Apple released in October 2012 had a unibody anodized aluminum chassis with rounded edges, and was available in several colors, including slate. Another...
Native Union this week announced the launch of AirPods Beanies, a new carrying case for the AirPods that's modeled after the iconic iPod Sock. AirPods Beanies come just after the 20th anniversary of the iPod, and will be appealing to iPod fans.
Apple began selling iPod Socks in 2004, offering a set of six for $29. When they were introduced, Steve Jobs jokingly referred to them as a...
Thursday September 9, 2021 11:59 pm PDT by
Sami FathiApple today added the 16GB fifth-generation iPod touch, released in 2013, to its list of obsolete products.
This specific variation of the iPod touch was released as a lower-end option to the fifth-generation iPod touch released a year earlier. Compared to its 32GB and 64GB companions, the 16GB model was only offered in a single silver color and lacked a rear camera or loop.
Apple...
Internal Apple emails have revealed that the company discussed offering a Mac tablet, a 15-inch MacBook Air model, an iPod "Super nano," and more.
An email shared by the Twitter account Internal Tech Emails, disclosed as part of Epic Games' legal dispute with Apple, shows an Apple executive team meeting agenda written by Steve Jobs from August 2007, just two months after the launch of the...
This week marks the 25th anniversary of Apple announcing that it had agreed to acquire NeXT for $400 million. The stunning move brought Steve Jobs back to Apple over a decade after he left the company following an internal power struggle.
"The acquisition of NeXT is the start of a new chapter in Apple's history and represents a milestone in our transformation as a corporation," said former...
Today is January 9, which means it's been 15 years since Apple CEO Steve Jobs stood on stage at the Macworld Expo in San Francisco, California and gave the world its first look at the iPhone, a device that would go on to change everything.
The original iPhone was a tiny little thing with a 3.5-inch LCD display, a plain old Home button, a thick chassis, huge bezels, a Samsung processor, and a ...
Popular Stories
It's now been a few months since the M1 Pro and M1 Max MacBook Pro models launched in October, and MacRumors video editor Dan Barbera has been using one of the new machines since they debuted. Over on the MacRumors YouTube channel, Dan has shared a three month review of his MacBook Pro to see how it has held up over time and how it's changed his workflow.
Subscribe to the MacRumors YouTube ...
Apple's AirPods have been credited with saving a woman's life after a potentially fatal fall, People reports.
When a 60-year-old florist in New Jersey tripped and hit her head in her studio, she lost consciousness and awoke heavily bleeding. With nobody around to call for help, she realized she had her AirPods in, and used a "Hey Siri" command to call 911. An operator was able to stay on the ...
Apple suppliers will begin producing display panels for the third-generation iPhone SE this month, with final assembly of the device likely to start in March, according to information shared by display industry consultant Ross Young.
Based on this production timeframe, Young believes the third-generation iPhone SE is likely to launch in the second half of April, or perhaps in early May at...
Apple will no longer include EarPods with every iPhone sold in France, starting on January 24, according to a notice posted by a French carrier (via iGeneration). Apple was previously required to include EarPods in the box with the iPhone due to a French law that required every smartphone sold in the country to come with a "handsfree kit," but the law has now been changed in favor of reducing the ...
Earlier this week, Bloomberg's Mark Gurman tweeted that Apple "will be holding a spring event" to announce a new iPhone SE and other hardware. In a recent edition of his newsletter, Gurman said the event is likely to occur in March or April.
Gurman did not elaborate on what "other hardware" will be announced at Apple's purported spring event, but rumors suggest at least four products are...
Wednesday January 19, 2022 2:22 am PST by
Sami FathiApple is now requiring that customers in the United States verify that they're active students, teachers, or staff members at an educational institution in order to access education discounts on products.
Previously, little verification was needed for customers to purchase products through Apple's education store in the United States. Apple's education stores offer models of the iPad and Mac ...
Apple today released a new 4C170 firmware update for the AirPods 3, an update from the prior 4C165 that was made available in December.
Apple does not offer details on what's included in new firmware updates for the AirPods, so we don't know what improvements or bug fixes the new firmware brings.
There is no standard way to upgrade the AirPods software, but firmware is...
Thursday January 20, 2022 3:32 am PST by
Sami FathiApple patched two significant security vulnerabilities when it released iOS 15 that could have potentially exposed users' private Apple ID information and in-app search history to malicious third-party apps and allowed apps to override user Privacy preferences, Apple has revealed in a recent support document update.
With most iOS, macOS, tvOS, and watchOS updates, Apple provides a list of...
The watchOS 8.4 release candidate that was seeded to developers and beta testers this morning addresses an ongoing bug that could cause some Apple Watch chargers not to work properly with the Apple Watch.
Back in December, we reported on a growing number of charging issues that Apple Watch Series 7 owners were facing. Since watchOS 8.3, there have been a number of complaints about...
Top Rated Comments