MacWorld Announcements

So the MacWorld keynote has happened and while it was pretty good, I'm not sure I'm going out and buying anything. Let's see how my predictions did.

No updates to the AirPort Express. To stream iTunes to a stereo you either need to slow your network down to g speeds or get an Apple TV.

The AirDisk Time Machine backup issue was solved with a new product called TIme Capsule. It's an AirPort Extreme with a hard disk built in. So now if your drive fails and you send it out for repair/replacement, you lose your home network too. It can also share a printer on the network. A 1TB drive will cost you $500. That's actually pretty reasonable compared to a $180 AirPort Extreme with say LaCie's 1TB drive for $370.

The MacBook Air is the new insanely thin laptop. Pretty nice, but I think it makes a better 2nd machine than a primary one. I'm not sure an 80GB drive is enough for my only machine. Aside from the drive and slower processor speeds, it seems to be the same as a macbook (same memory, graphics, screen, iSight, wifi, bluetooth) aside from all the stuff it doesn't have (optical drive, firewire, audio input). Also it's one mono speaker instead of stereo speakers. $1800 for the hard disk version, add $1000 for a 64GB solid state drive. They have a neat new way to share a remote optical drive that's pretty slick but the $100 external superdrive is probably how I'd go.

iPhone and iPod Touch got software updates, but no hard disk for the Touch yet. They put an iPod drive into a laptop, but not their slickest iPod.

Apple TV got a big makeover. You can now rent movies directly from the device with a new user interface. Also there's HD movies but only 100 at first and after that 30 days after the DVD ships. They got all the studios on board but I don't think netflick has much too fear yet. Also they still have the 24 hour bug. I've had a few friends try the movie download thing and all complain about finishing a film in 24 hours. If you have kids and start a film at 9pm and stop at 10 wanting to finish the next night. By the time 9pm rolls around for you to watch again, your 24 hours are up. It should be 30 hours at least.

No WiMax, tablets or 3G iPhones. Also no updates to the Mac Mini or the MacBook Pro. Given that those are due, I'm still waiting for them but I hope for not too long. I think I really want the next 15" MacBook Pro, but we'll see.