It was expected that yesterday evening’s Apple event would see the announcement of new iPads, and two new models of iOS tablets were indeed unveiled at the tech giant’s San Francisco presentation.
The first is a new iPad Air, which is significantly lighter and thinner than previous iPad incarnations. It will replace the 4th generation iPad, and also boast the same ‘A7’ 64-bit processor as the recent iPhone 5s. There will also be minor camera improvements, including a front camera capable of 1080p video. Available in Ireland from November 1st, prices start at €489 for 16GB Wi-Fi model, with eight models altogether (the highest specced is the 4G 128GB version at €879).
The iPad mini has also received a significant upgrade, finally boasting a much requested 2048×1536 ‘Retina’ display that doubles the resolution of the first model mini. It will also contain with the powerful A7 chip. Prices start at €399 for 16GB Wi-Fi, again with eight different configurations up to 128GB with 4G support.
Both the iPad 2 and original iPad mini will still be available, and their prices have been lowered.
Laptops and desktops
Although it had been announced earlier this year, the biggest surprise at yesterday’s event was that the latest revision to Mac’s laptop and desktop OSX would be released immediately and free of charge (as long as users were already running Snow Leopard or higher).
OSX Mavericks was made available through the Mac App Store last night, and supports a vast majority of Apple MacBooks and desktop computers released since 2007. Apple says the update will significantly improve battery life for laptops, with improvements of up to several hours more than previous OSX versions. As well as ‘under the hood’ improvements, other major Mavericks features include iBooks, Apple Maps, improved Notification tools and Finder tabs.
To go along with Mavericks, a new line of MacBook Pro laptops were announced. Both the 13” and 15” have enjoyed significant spec updates, and all ship with flash memory as standard (128GB SSD for the cheapest model). Prices start at €1349 - which is lower than previous MacBook Pro entry point prices - and are now shipping.
It was also confirmed that the company’s ambitious Mac Pro redesign will ship in December. The cylindrical powerhouse will set you back a minimum of €3,099, and is squarely aimed at media and design professionals that make use out of processor intensive applications and software.
A few predicted that the event would also see the announcement of a revision to Apple TV, but it seems for the moment Apple will be sticking with the 2012 model.
