Thoughts on Apple’s announcements.

Okay, so the Stevenote is over, with some neat new announcements on Apple’s part. Firstly: 

iOS 4.1 is coming out next week for iPhone and iPod Touch. Free download via iTunes. Bugs that are fixed: Proximity, Bluetooth, and iPhone 3G performance issues. It will feature High Dynamic Range photos, HD video upload over WiFi, Game Center.

- This is huge. iOS 4.1 fixes all the problems with people’s iPhone 4’s. Maybe to an extent but I’m happy with this update, and with my recent post (free iPhone 4 Bumper) all my problems are solved. HD video uploads over wifi is a great new option, I don’t want to transfer it to my MacBook to upload the full HD version to YouTube every time, this will shorten the process by at least 20 minutes. HDR photography is brilliant, admittedly it’s an art, a phone can’t do it as well as the manual process, but it certainly makes those photos of the happy family Apple likes to use in it’s adverts look a lot nicer! Finally, Game Center, I don’t game, but this looks like a big update, very happy about one universal system for all online gaming, rather than smaller ones per game or developer. 

A Sneak Peek At iOS 4.2. Wireless printing will be coming to iPad in 4.2, AirPlay, multitasking. 4.2 will drop in November as a free update for iPad, iPhone, and iPod Touch.

- FINALLY! Owning an iPad is FRUSTRATING right now. With my iPhone 4, I can multitask, I can add folders, and all the nice 4.0 updates, yet the iPad can’t. If I have to do something quickly, I always grab for my iPhone 4, the iPad has been gaining dust for a while (until today, used it to stream the keynote). November isn’t ideal, but I think I can wait. 

Apple is releasing a new iPod Shuffle, iPod Nano, iPod touch.

- This was to be expected. The new iPod Shuffle now has it’s buttons back, as people were complaining. The iPod Nano is now touchscreen, doesn’t have a click-wheel, doesn’t have an accelerometer, and requires you to rotate the screen with two fingers to get it the right way up. It’s useless other than the fact it makes a neat watch now. I honestly don’t think this thing is that good, the colours are not too nice, the camera is gone, (a huge selling point of the previous generation) now, it’s just a bigger version of the iPod Shuffle, and I don’t like it. The iPod Touch is somehow even thinner, it’s got FaceTime and the Retina display. This is nice, but it was obvious it’d happen, the iPad is next with these two “revolutionary” features.

iTunes 10 has a new logo that drops the CD, The new iTunes is “simpler”, features a new hybrid, introducing Ping, a social network for music. iTunes 10 is available today.

- This is a nice update, but yet again, Apple seems to neglect that iTunes is a processor hog, it just runs and takes up a lot of space, it needs to be written from scratch, new features won’t do that. Ping is nice, and could be quite nice if people use it, my friends for instance, I don’t think would, they’re with Facebook and Spotify, they won’t use it much. The new logo is HORRIBLE, a shame to see this from Apple, the new hybrid view is okay, but I’m sticking to the cover view, (not cover-flow) as I find that view the fastest to use.

The Apple TV has never been a hit, The new Apple TV is smaller, a fourth the size of the previous version. HDMI output, built in WiFi, gone to the rental model. Ships: 4 weeks.

If Apple didn’t think that $99 was £99, then I think the update would be fantastic, Still, £99 is cheap, and I’ll be getting myself one of these, my parents already want one too. The whole downloading content idea is gone, all rentals. So, you can rent a film for a lot less than buying it, it plays instantly. You can stream movies from your iPad, iPhone or iPod Touch to the Apple TV over Wifi, this solves the problem for no apps, because if for instance, you’re using the BBC iPlayer app, you could press the little button next to the volume slider, and the video and audio would be pushed to the Apple TV using AirPlay (previously mentioned in the iPad update). This is a nice update, and you can pick one up in 4 weeks or preorder now.

All the usual Apple marketing rubbish is over at their site now, check it out to find out more.

Those are my thoughts, do you have any?

All done.

All done. Hey everyone, I thought I’d tell you what’s going on with the blogs. Firstly, I have two. I’m two different people, so why not? Now you might be thinking, Wait, hold up what?! Let me explain.

Online, I’m a Graphic Designer, and to my friends, I’m an ordinary 16 year old boy. This gets incredibly frustrating, as I can’t post half the stuff I want to to my friends, and half the stuff I want to to you, all my online friends, without either parties thinking of me differently.So here is what I’m doing:

I now have a blog at http://blog.lewisking.net for all my online, geeky, tech stuff. This is welcome for anyone to follow, even my real life friends, if you really want to.

I now also have a blog at http://lewisking.tumblr.com where I can be the typical Tumblrite and post all the random rubbish that is affecting me, all the crazy photos/videos/stories from my day to day life. This, once again is welcome to be followed by anyone.

It’d be great if you could follow the one that you feel you fall into, if you fall into both, brilliant, watch everything I do and follow both blogs. I hope that made sense.

England.

Being British is about driving a German car to an Irish pub for a Belgian beer. Then travelling home, grabbing an Indian curry or a Turkish kebab on the way, to sit on Swedish furniture and watch American shows on a Japanise TV. 

Via thomasdavies: Taiwanese News is freaking funny. 

Via georgiehoole: I have one of these in the attic somewhere, along with a buzz lightyear. <3

iPhone VoiceControl.

Me:	Make me a Sandwich.
iPhone:	Calling Lisa King. (my mother)

Quick iPhone 4 review and video.

So I used my iPhone 4 for the first time today in the wild, well, on a day out if you must. It’s phenomenal and oh so much better than my 3G. Firstly it’s fast. Really fast. I was cutting and editing a video all day (embedded below) and it still ran like a beaut. I used it to check in with Gowalla, tweeted, checked facebook, phoned and texted people most of the day, Tracked the train times and looked at maps for locations. At the end of the day (6.22PM at the time of writing.) - I’ve still got 52% battery from constant use. My 3G would be dead now. The camera is amazing, iMovie is super powerful, after all, it’s a PHONE! The screen is just mind-blowing, it looks like a sticker on the screen the whole time. Also, the antenna issues are nowhere near as bad as the media want you to believe. Enjoy the video!

Have an iPhone 4? Comment on what you think about the phone below please?

See you all in a month.

I’m off to Ghana for a month. Expect hours of videos and thousands of photos when I return on the 9th of August. Wahey! 

See you all then! Oh, and I’ll be blogging from time to time from here: http://bit.ly/ccDybw

"Alright kid, this is where it gets complicated."

Doctor Who.

Doctor Who reminds me why it is brilliant to be british. This is TV at its best. Steven Moffat has crafted a thing of beauty this series, and it’s all about to end next week at 6.05PM.

Now I’m usually very into the program, but never as much as this, this truly has me thinking at every single twist, every single prolonged shot and every weird expression. The series is full of unanswered questions, 

1. A duck pond with no ducks
2. The doctor returning for Amy in the forest, with his jacket on, when it’s been taken by an angel. Not a continuity issue. 
3. Why is Amy’s house so big?
4. Who went past the camera in The Eleventh Hour? It wasn’t Prisoner Zero.
5. What was with the prolonged look into the TARDIS consol at the end of “Amy’s Choice” and seeing The Dream Lord again? 
6. The creepy voice saying “Silence will fall” clearly isn’t the alliance.
7. Why doesn’t the alliance know who River Song is?

Hopefully, we’ll have all the answers in next weeks 55 minute episode, but for now we can only speculate, oh and that list? Only a little sample of the questions running through my head right now. This series has been the strongest yet, yes, they all end with “the end of the universe” but Moffat actually puts things in the episodes before to link it to the story arc, rather than RTD just putting things in the end to use up budget. I always felt disappointed with the RTD era, and Moffat has made up for it big time. 

We’ll find out all the answers and more next week, and by the look of those leaked photos, we’re in for a very, very good hour. Thoughts?