Apple has posted a new version of Boot Camp today. Boot Camp 1.2 brings several updates, including Windows Vista support.
Boot Camp allows owners of Intel-based Macs to dual-boot their Macs into Windows and Mac OS X. The new version offers these features:
- Support for Windows Vista (32-bit) - Updated drivers, including but not limited to trackpad, AppleTime (synch), audio, graphics, modem, iSight camera - Support the Apple Remote (works with iTunes and Windows Media Player) - A Windows system tray icon for easy access to Boot Camp information and actions - Improved keyboard support for Korean, Chinese, Swedish, Danish, Norwegian, Finnish, Russian, and French Canadian - Improved Windows driver installation experience - Updated documentation and Boot Camp on-line help in Windows - Apple Software Update (for Windows XP and Vista)
SeekingAlpha points to some Automator actions (New Video Capture, New Audio Capture) first posted by TechRestore as evidence of possible future DVR capabilities in the Apple TV. This conclusion is wrong.
Looking back, TechRestore's original article is a list of what files can be found on the Apple TV hard drive. The Apple TV contains a stripped version of Mac OS X 10.4.7. Amongst other things, it includes Quicktime functionality to play back audio and video.
Every Quicktime install comes with Automator actions, including:
New Audio Capture New Video Capture Pause Capture Start Capture Stop Capture
These Automator actions can be found in any Mac OS X 10.4.x install under /System/Library/Automator and have no unique relationship with Apple TV.
Bloomberg reports that Apple Inc, Dell Inc, Sony Corp and five other technology companies were added to an ongoing lawsuit over patents covering Bluetooth technology.
The suit threatens the ability of the computer and device makers to deliver wireless capabilities to customers. The companies are accused of infringing four patents covering technology that lets users exchange data among mobile phones, personal computers and other devices without using cables.
The suit is being brought by Washington Research Foundation, a non-profit organization. The suit is specifically aimed at CSR, the maker of the Bluetooth chips used in Apple's computers. CSR believes the "suit is without merit in relation to CSR's Bluetooth chips and CSR will defend its products rigorously."
Macsimumnews publishes an Apple Seminar email which claims "Meet the New Macs" on April 17th. Macsimumnews speculates that this may coincide with new Mac releases at NAB.
The truth, however, is that these seminars run year around with the exact same title.
A quick search reveals other "Meet the New Macs" as soon as March 29th (Thursday). Another "Meet the New Macs" event took place 3 days ago on March 24th (Google Cache).
Apple's seminars refer to all current Macs as "new Macs" and has no relation to product releases
The Apple iPhone was seen at the CTIA Wireless 2007 trade show and caught the interest of Kevin Martin, the chairman of the Federal Communications Commission. According to this news article:
"He spent more time with it than I did," Stephenson said in an interview afterward. For a minute, "It seemed like he wouldn't give it back," Stephenson joked.
AT&T's Chief Operating Officer demoed the device during his keynote speech.
An Ars Technica blog entry claiming that one of Apple's secret Leopard features will be 3d user interfaces sparked a bit of discussion across the Mac web.
The article is self-described as "wild speculation" so no specific inside knowledge is claimed. The author imagines:
We've already seen the iPhone seamlessly zoom in, zoom out, and flip icons, windows, and screens. Think about what a real computer could do here. Cover flow and multi-party iChat video show a glimpse of what a 3D accelerated user interface could look like, with light sources, reflections, and more.
While this is based in speculation, we have heard rumors that much of Apple's new Finder interface will take advantage of the new technologies in Leopard -- specifically Core Animation. Apple is already promoting the use of Core Animation in building better user interfaces. From a WWDC 2007 session titled "Building Animated Cocoa User Interfaces":
Delight your users with dynamic, responsive user interfaces. In Leopard, standard AppKit NSViews can be rendered and animated using Core Animation. Learn how to combine familiar Cocoa controls, views, and event handling with the power of Core Animation layers to create stunning user interfaces.
Apple is already using Core Animation in Leopard's Time Machine and details about Core Animation's capabilities are listed on their site.
Information Week goes into some detail about what's new in Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard Server.
The list details items that have been publicly posted and are not amongst the "secret" features Steve Jobs claims they are holding back, but does provide an interesting summary of the upcoming server operating system.
The features include iCal Server, Wiki Server, 64-Bit capabilities, File Services, Web Services, QuickTime Services, iChat Server 2, Mail, Xgrid 2, and Open Directory 4.
These features are detailed on Apple's Leopard Server Sneak Peak pages.
A Reuters story reports on comments by AT&T Chief Operating Officer Randall Stephenson during a speech on Tuesday.
While AT&T/Cingular is not accepting pre-orders for the iPhone, they have set up a email signup list to find out when the iPhone is available. During the speech, Stephenson revealed that "one million people have asked us to call when [the iPhone] is available", suggesting a high interest in the upcoming Apple phone.
Apple's iPhone is expected to ship in June of 2007.
Adobe has updated their site with information about Adobe Creative Suite 3 (CS3).
The Adobe Creative Suite 3 family offers you choice in the combination of creative tools you master, the design disciplines you explore, and the richness and scope of content you create. This revolutionary new release includes six editions, each combining tightly integrated, industry-leading components that enable you to handle virtually any creative task.
A webcast of the live launch event will be webcast today at 3:30 pm EST. The new versions of Adobe's popular graphics applications support Intel Macs natively for the first time.
Previously leaked price points were generally accurate as was upgrade pricing.
With the introduction of Creative Suite 3, Adobe has introduced a new set of bundles, which can be viewed at a glance in this product matrix. The bundles are as follows: CS3 Design Premium, CS3 Design Standard, CS3 Web Premium, CS3 Web Standard, CS3 Production Premium, and CS3 Master Collection. More details about each bundle are detailed at Adobe's site.
Upgrade pricing is also complicated, but we've posted a consolidated Upgrade Guide that lists your upgrade options based on what software you currently own.Upgrade Guide
Product names linked to appropriate upgrade bundle at Amazon.com.
You Own
Available Upgrades
Price
Combo of Macromedia Dreamweaver 8, MX 2004, or MX and Macromedia Flash Professional 8, MX Professional 2004, MX or Macromedia Flash Basic 8, MX 2004, or MX
Combo of Adobe Creative Suite (any version) AND Macromedia Studio OR Adobe Creative Suite (any version) AND Adobe Production Studio (Standard or Premium) OR Macromedia Studio (any version) AND Adobe Production Studio (Standard or Premium)
Adobe is planning a media event on March 27th (Tuesday) to announce Creative Suite 3 pricing and availability. Amazon jumped the gun a little and posted a few pages revealing product specs and pricing for several of the CS3 products with ship dates of April 20th and July 1st, depending on the product.
We've received pricing information for the entire Adobe CS3 line of products and included it in a table below:
Prices represent full retail prices and products are linked to Amazon descriptions where applicable. "up"-links denote links to upgrade-products at Amazon. This upgrade pricing (not listed above) is available to owners of earlier versions of Adobe software. To see upgrade prices and see if you can qualify for these updates, see this full upgrade pricing table.
Adobe's new CS3 bundles can be confusing, so to see what is included in each bundle, refer to this matrix:
Adobe's CS3 represents the first version of Adobe's popular graphics suite which supports Intel Macs natively. This should provide significant speed boosts over the current (PowerPC) versions running on Intel Macs. Adobe's slow transition to Intel is cited as one of the reasons for relatively slow Mac Pro sales over the past few quarters.
Users have been able to run various apps (World of Warcraft, VLC, Firefox) remotely through VNC. Other efforts reveal that the Apple TV does respond to an external keyboard.
The most significant step at this stage has been the ability to boot the Apple TV from an external USB drive. A video demos the external USB drive on an (essentially) unmodified Apple TV.
Contradictory claims about Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard continue to trickle in.
The most authoritative word, however, comes from an Apple rep who "confirmed the reports are wrong and Leopard is still scheduled to ship in this spring as they previously announced."
Perhaps predictably, Analyst Shaw Wu claims that "Mac OS X Leopard will ship on time in the 'Spring' timeframe, or Apple's June quarter". This, of course, appears mostly speculative based on public information.
T3.co.uk goes to far as claim that 8-core Mac Pros and the final unveiling of Leopard will be coming at April's NAB event.
Some readers have noted that Apple has pulled the Logic 7.2 crossgrade from its Online store. This has lead to speculation that the rumored Logic 8 (perhaps revamped (page 2)) may indeed be released this week at MusikMesse in Frankfurt, Germany.
Logic 7.2, a universal version of Logic, was released in February 2006. The last major release of Logic was back in September 2004 when Logic 7 Pro and Express were introduced.
Update: User 4Godnotes that Final Cut cross-grades have also been pulled. Final Cut Pro is expected to be updated at this year's NAB conference.
Despite some questionable rumors that Apple was delaying Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard until October, Jupiter Research's Michael Gartenberg reports that an Apple representative "confirmed the reports are wrong and Leopard is still scheduled to ship in this spring as they previously announced."
Again, "Spring 2007" gives us a timeframe up to and including June, which is when the Worldwide Developer's Conference takes place.
Update: Shaw Wu, an analyst, believes that "Mac OS X Leopard will ship on time in the 'Spring' timeframe, or Apple's June quarter" and that Apple is nearing final candidate release.
After a longer than expected period of anticipation, we have received our Apple TV and have had a number of hours to spend reviewing it.
For our review, we strive to give a scientific, thorough, and unbiased reaction to a product based on a product's ease of use, features, performance, reliability and lifespan, and value. For more detailed information on how we conduct our reviews, see the review guide page.
Without further ado, read on to get our complete review of the Apple TV.
Review updated 3/26/07 to reflect details on surround sound capabilitiesThe Apple TV Market
First of all, there seems to be a lot of confusion as to the purpose of the Apple TV. Many users have been yearning for a so-called "convergence" device from Apple. Such devices aim to consolidate multiple devices into one jack-of-all-trades device (such as Apple's iPhone). The Apple TV does not appear to be such a device, as it lacks such necessary capabilities such as an optical disk (DVD/HD DVD/Bluray) player, TV tuner, or DVR capabilities.
Apple has said that the "Apple TV is like a DVD player for the Internet ageproviding an easy and fun way to play all your favorite iTunes content from your PC or Mac on your widescreen TV."
Ease of Use: 19 / 20
In all, the Apple TV was very easy to set up and use. Setting up the Apple TV was a breeze once you get the appropriate cables, which unfortunately are sold separately (see below). Connecting to my encrypted draft 802.11n wireless network was a breeze even though I am not using Apple's base station, though entering the WPA password on screen was a hassle. I can't really blame Apple for that, and the fact that it only has to be done one time isn't enough to dock points, however I can immediately see the use for one of Apple's recent patents.
Using the Apple TV was very similar to using an iPod or Front Row, and Apple was good enough to include a printed User's guide for those who like to read the manual before getting knee deep into their toys (I wouldn't know the type).
The one complaint that I have for the Apple TV's ease of use was the lack of accompanying cables for connecting the Apple TV to your system. If the Apple TV is supposed to be the "DVD Player of the Internet age," why doesn't the Apple TV come with any cables whereas every DVD player on the market comes with even the most basic of cables?
Features: 10.5 / 20
The Apple TV's features are mediocre. While I feel Apple covered many of the bases in creating the Apple TV, they left much to be desired as well.
One of the Apple TV's advantages over competing products is that it is one of the few products that is cross-platform. While some complain that iTunes is required, I believe the more significant fact is that you can use it out of the box with both Mac OS X and Windows. Competing products, such as the XBox 360, rely on Windows Media Center, and have very limited cross-platform capability.
The hard drive in the Apple TV is a useful feature implemented in a mediocre fashion. I found that an iTunes library with many movies and TV shows can quickly fill the 40 GB (32 GB useful capacity) hard disk, even after only selecting a portion of my collection. It would have been better for Apple to have included or offered a higher-capacity disk.
Apple's selection of ports on the back (HDMI, component video, optical digital audio, analog audio) is perfectly suitable for connecting to high-end TV's, but competing products offer the ability to connect to standard televisions as well, using composite and/or s-video connections.
Apple initially announced that the Apple TV would support up to 720p resolution. In fact, users found that the Apple TV can output up to 1080i, and through some tweaking, down to 480i for lower-resolution sets (see "Helpful Hints" below). Such "Easter eggs" are always appreciated, however users of larger (50" and over) TV's may be yearning for "full" HD resolutions of 1080p which some (but not all) competing solutions offer. However, with limited availability of 1080p content outside of photos, this issue isn't a show-stopper.
The limited set of codecs Apple chose to support comes as no surprise, given the product's integration with iTunes and close ties with the iTunes Store. Officially, Apple supports only H.264 and MP4 movie formats and iPod-compatible audio formats. Despite Apple's inclusion of digital audio output, Apple neglected to include support for discrete 5-channel surround sound. Instead, Apple chooses to encode movies using Dolby Surround, which sends 4 channels over a stereo signal. The resulting experience is much less thrilling than true Dolby Digital surround often found in DVDs.
Performance: 18 / 25
Performance, in the case of the Apple TV, is measured by how well the Apple TV performed as a "DVD player in the Internet Age" with its feature set.
First off, I have to give kudos to the designers of the Apple TV's graphical interface. I noticed barely any interface latency, and menus "scrolled like butter." Put simply, the interface is stunning and a joy to view. Although TV shows cannot be broken down into seasons, as in Front Row, little niceties such as having a TV show, podcast, or movie description appear when hovering over the title were extremely well done.
The Apple TV's movie-playing abilities are good, but not great. For many users, a lot of video content will likely come in the form of video podcasts or iTunes Store purchases. While video podcast picture quality vary between podcast, Apple's supplied content quality ranged from poor (for older 320x240 iTunes purchases) to pretty good (for newer iTunes store content encoded at 640x480).
Apple implemented a variable-speed fast forward and rewind, which is to be expected in such a product. When watching iTunes Store movies, chapter switching works as expected, but there was no scene selection screen to go directly to a given chapter, as in most DVD's.
Likewise, the Apple TV's music playing abilities are functional, but not very innovative. As in Front Row, the screen shows the album artwork with a progress bar. While the interface will switch to the screen saver after a given period of time, perhaps a still better use of widescreen TV real estate would be for an option to enable the venerable iTunes Visualizer.
I found the performance of the Apple TV's streaming capabilities to be quite good. While I was operating on an 802.11n network, other reports have noted that similar good performance can be had on older 802.11g networks, though sync times may be slower. The Apple TV's capable streaming abilities help alleviate the pressure off of its 40 GB hard disk (see Features above), although the Apple TV will only play slideshow music and photos that has been synced to it.
Reliability and Lifespan: 25 / 25
The Apple TV is solidly built. Connectors feel solid and not overly prone to being damaged. In addition, the Apple TV software has a built-in software update mechanism, which we hope/expect will be used in the future to fix at least some of the shortcomings noted in this review, and perhaps add features (see rumors on the Apple TV gaining gaming functionality).
Apple's 1-year limited warranty on the Apple TV is pretty much the industry standard for consumer electronics, although Apple's network of Apple Stores (and corresponding Genius Bars) makes accessibility to help better than for competing vendors. In the end, I have nothing negative to say regarding the Apple TV's reliability or lifespan.
Value: 10 / 10
Opinions on the Apple TV's value will vary from purchaser to purchaser, but compared to competing products (see below) it is surprisingly low-priced at $299. While competing products do offer additional features (1080p, optical drives, YouTube integration) at higher price points, the Apple TV is still well-positioned.
Overall: B- ( 82.5 / 100)
The Apple TV is good, but not great, and suffers from a few flaws that prevent me from giving it a glowing endorsement. It does a good job of getting content from iTunes and iPhoto onto a widescreen TV, but some loose ends end up preventing the product from shining. Despite this, one can always hope that Apple will continue to improve the Apple TV through the product's built-in software update mechanism.
- Apple TV ($299) -- Pros: Easy to set up and use, gorgeous interface, cross-platform connectivity to 5 computers, price -- Cons: Limited surround sound, limited codec support, some features are incomplete/unpolished
Comparable Products
- Netgear EVA8000 ($349 at Amazon) -- Pros: 1080p support, YouTube integration, PC desktop viewing -- Cons: not Mac/iTunes compatible, lacks support for 802.11n
- XBox 360 (Reviewed by CNet) ($399) --Pros: Gaming, HD DVD viewing with add-on accessory, HD Movie downloads available --Cons: Price, no HDMI output, limited Mac compatability
- Playstation 3 (Reviewed by CNet) ($499) --Pros: Gaming, Bluray built-in --Cons: Price, limited game titles, Price (did we mention that?), limited Mac compatability
- Mac Mini ($599) --Pros: Fully functional computer, can access Internet content via Safari --Cons: Price (if just using in media center)
As part of our reviews, we feel it is essential that the "voice of the people" be heard as well as this reviewer for additional insight into the Apple TV. Especially insightful comments posted to the forum thread will be "promoted" here:
I just tested 720p content, streamed from a G4/933MHz over an 802.11g network, skip-free and the color, clarity and contrast are stellar on my Sony WEGA XBR HDTV CRT (1080i)... CRT's are the best test as flats are generally inferior in terms of contrast, clarity and color.
There are two key omissions from this device that make it less useful than I had hoped.
1) Parental controls. Apple has parental controls everywhere else, why not on the Apple TV? I want to be able to let my kids loose on the device, but can't keep them out of any potentially inappropriate content (Since they are 5 and 3 there's plenty of content in that category.)
2) Subtitles/Closed Captions. Apple is usually very good at providing accessibility. I often watch TV at low volumes or when the kids are making lots of noise, so I usually turn on subtitles/captions just in case. TV doesn't support captions/subtitles.
All in all, I'm still more positive on it than the MR review and would give it a solid B, and might even make it a B+ after using the thing for a while.
The 720p output from AppleTV looks as good as any 720p/1080i channels I pick up from my cable provider.
I have had the ATV since Friday... Pros- 1. easier to set up than the 42" Toshiba HDTV it is hooked up to. 2. interface is as simple as it should be, no one in my family had trouble using it. (myself-38, my wife-32, my son-8, my daughter 3 1/2.) I love the remote, really comcast's remote is obscene it has like a thousand buttons... Only problem is when I use the remote my wife's Macbook starts firing up front row. (I have work on that) 3. I have it hardwired to my home network so I can't testify to the wireless capabilities, but it was very fast syncing 26mb of data. 4. Has multiple options for syncing movies and TV show, like the last five downloaded, or unwatched. 5. music and photos are great. Caught my wife playing music through it today and was pleasantly suprised. 6. Playback has been flawless, even the trailers directly streamed. I have a $50 dvd player which barely plays dvds from netflicks, it gets hung about halfway through any movie. (its only 3 months old also.) 7. For the price it really makes me love my TV. I mean, I really only watched a couple of TV shows, football and an occassional movie. Now I really don't mind plunking down a few bucks for some stuff from the iTunes store, before I would just buy something to watch on a plane once in a while. Cons- 1. Would be great if it were a dvr. But with comcast I already have one that works well, and I have an eyetv on a mac. Would love it if eyetv worked with it but I would think the quality of my eyetv would not be that great (SD) 2. It would be better if you could purchase directly through it. 3. Needs more content on iTunes, with better quality. I am sure blue-ray or HD disks would be better quality, but I am not running out to buy one either, not even with a game system. I already have an Xbox, PS2 and Wii and really need another game system like a tax audit. 4. 33mb of space is puny, but managed correctly probably isn't a problem. more storage would be a benefit. 5. As an Apple product it is solid, but not crazy brilliant as we all are accustomed.
Overall, I have to say I really love it, not just from a fanboy, it is just a solid product that I really never thought I would enjoy so much. Its usefullness is really amazing for $299 (+19.95 for a cable) it really brought all my media into another room of my house. Instead of watching dvd's and other things on my wife's Macbook or my Macbook Pro, or sitting in my office which I usually do, I finally get to use my widescreen tv.
Macworld reports that Sony will be delivering several new TV shows to Apple's iTunes Store.
The new shows include "News Radio", "'Til Death", the original animated "Spiderman", "Starsky and Hutch", and "Charlie's Angels" and have already appeared on iTunes.
Meanwhile, for new Apple TV owners, Apple has compiled an Apple TV podcast showcase which are described as "podcasts that can make your television shine".
AppleInsider claims to have uncovered the specifics of how Creative Suite 3's bundles will be broken down.
CS3 Design Standard/Premium Reportedly aimed at "print and publishing professionals", the standard bundle will include InDesign CS3, Photoshop CS3, Illustrator CS3, and Acrobat 8 Professional. The Premium edition will tack on Flash CS3 Professional and Dreamweaver CS3, and exchange the standard version of Photoshop for Photoshop CS3 Extended.
CS3 Web Standard/Premium Aimed at web developers, the standard edition will include Flash CS3 Professional, Dreamweaver CS3, Fireworks CS3, and Contribute CS3. The premium edition will add Photoshop CS3 Extended, Illustrator CS3, and Acrobat 8 Professional for more demanding users.
CS3 Production Premium For filmmakers and video production professionals, Adobe will be issuing Production Premium containing Photoshop CS3 Extended, Illustrator CS3, Flash CS3 Professional, After Effects CS3 Professional, Premier Pro CS3, Soundbooth CS3, and Encore CS3.
Lastly, Adobe will market a package of all of the CS3 products under the name of Master Collection. For further reading, AppleInsider has the rumored product matrix along with European pricing listed on its site.
The process essentially involves the addition of the Perian plug-in into the /Library/Quicktime/ directory of the Apple TV's hard drive. Perian is a "a free, open source QuickTime component that adds native support for many popular video formats".
This confirms that the Apple TV is essentially running a version of Mac OS X. The process does require disassembly of the Apple TV unit to access the hard drive, but should pave the way for easier tutorials.
Meanwhile, Gizmodo posts a success story of upgrading the Apple TV's hard drive to a 120GB drive.
Apple's first foldable iPhone, with a book-style design featuring a ~5.5-inch outer display and a ~7.8-inch inner display with a minimal crease down the middle.
