Automation Adventures

Yesterday Apple had its September presentation, which, as the title “Let’s Rock” may have given away, was focused on iTunes and the various iPod models. Here are the announcements in a nutshell:

• HD TV shows added to the iTunes store. $2.99 per episode ($1.99 for standard definition), and you can view them on Apple TV and your computer (and hopefully you iPod).
• NBC returns to the iTunes store.
• iTunes 8 is announced:
  • New browsing options
  • Genius mode: automatic playlist based on songs that “go great together”. It sounds like Pandora in iTunes.
• iPod classic: the current line up of an 80GB and a 160GB model will be changed to one 120GB model, priced at $250 (what, not $249?).
• iPod Nano 4G:
  • has the form factor of the Nano 2G
  • the video of the 3G
  • Built-in accelerometer
  • new User Interface
  • landscape mode for coverflow
  • thinnest Nano yet
  • $149 for 8GB, $199 for 16GB
• iPod Touch:
  • Thinner
  • has integrated volume control
  • built-in speaker(!)
  • Genius playlist creation
  • Nike+ built-in (you still need the Nike+ transmitter)
  • $229 for 8GB, $299 for 16GB, and $399 for 32GB
• AppStore: 100 million downloads in the first 60 days. Upcoming offerings: Spore Origins, Real Soccer 2009, Need for Speed: Undercover.
• Two new headphones:
  • A regular set with in-band control (volume, next, prev, play, pause) and microphone for $29
  • An in-ear set with two drivers per bud (woofer and tweeter) for $79
• iPod Touch 2.1 software: Free upgrade for 2.0 users, $9.95 for 1.x users
• iPhone 2.1 software:
  • Free upgrade
  • improved battery life
  • fewer call drops
  • fewer crashes
  • increased speed for iTunes backups

It sounds that Apple is slowly retiring the iPod classic, and adding more emphasis on the AppStore. More news can be read at Gizmodo and other sites around the net.

A hectic schedule at work and at home has prevented me from reporting on the MacWord announcements Steve Jobs made in his keynote. A quick round-up:

• Office 2008 native on Intel
• Time Capsule, an external hard drive companion to Time Machine, with a built-in Airport Extreme base station. Two versions, 500GB ($299) and 1TB ($499), ships in February.
• iPhone update: SDK in late February, now maps with locations, SMS to multiple people, webclips
• iPod Touch has upgrade to get all this. Existing users have to pay $20 to upgrade.
• iTunes movie rentals. Regular $2.99 for library titles, $3.99 for new releases. HD costs a dollar more.
• AppleTV take 2 - no computer required, but can sync to one. HD movie rentals. Integration with Flickr and YouTube. Price dropped to $229.
• World’s thinnest notebook - the Apple MacBook Air. 13.3 inch widescreen, 3 pounds, 0.76 to 0.16 inches thick, iSight camera, full size LED backlit keyboard, large trackpad with multi touch gestures (like on the iPhone and iPod Touch), 802.11n WiFi, Bluetooth, 5 hours battery life, 1.8″ harddrive 80GB standard, 64GB SSD optional, 1.6GHz Core Duo. No optical drive - need to have it as USB connected drive, or borrow one from a PC or a Mac. Priced at $1799, and ships in two weeks.

Nice announcements, on top of the Mac Pro with 8 cores announced last week. The Apple Air is sexy and sharp, looks like you can cut someone with it. Time Capsule’s saving grace is the wireless base station, otherwise it’s just a high-priced USB drive. AppleTV v.2 might be just what AppleTV needed to take off, combined with the movie rentals. It sucks to have to pay $20 for an iPod touch upgrade, but it beats having your device obsoleted a couple of weeks after you purchase it.

Unfortunately, nothing earth shattering. Which seems to be reflected in the AAPL stock price: hovering around $177 beginning of this week, it now dipped down to about $163. That’s only a little higher than their three-month low of mid-November. I wonder what will Apple come up with around May (gut feeling they have “one more thing” up their sleeve)?