MWSF Keynote 2005
posted on january 11, 2005, tag: tech
Well, it's here. The Mac mini: a tiny G4 Mac for $499 USD. I was terrified at the idea of Apple releasing a cheap, headless Mac. My biggest fear was that it would be cheap or that it wouldn't match the quality of their other hardware. I was afraid Apple was trying to capitalize on the iPod buzz and turn it into marketshare, hoping to grab people who were cheap or couldn't afford the eMac. But the Mac mini feels aimed less at those people and more at people like me. I have two Macs, but the mini was an instant wish-list item. Tiny, silent machine with an optical drive and an ethernet card. The Mac mini would be a great photo/video/music/file/print server. It's basically an entire Mac in your pocket, and that's fantastic. I should never doubt Apple. Ever. Ever, ever, ever.
Another interesting thing from Apple today is iLife '05, an upgrade from iLife '04, which contains new versions of all of the iApps (save iTunes, which remains at 4.7). Strangely, Apple created a new logo for the suite which is very different from all other Apple icons. It's very organic looking and seems almost like a David Lanham design. iWork, a new suite containing Keynote 2 and Pages (a new word processing app), also has an organic icon. I like them both very much and I hope to see more like this in the future.
Be sure to check out the new OS X Tiger tour they've put up. You can see the new UI for Mail and some other great stuff.
Then, of course, there's the new iPod shuffle, a flash-based iPod at only $99 USD. This little guy is going to finalize Apple's ownership of digital music. They needed a small, inexpensive player for people who only need 512MB of space and they've just done it. Final nail in the coffin.
What are you most excited about?
Comments
There are 24 comments, comments are closed
mathewhoy@gmail.com on 01/11/2005:
yaya. i was just asking you about upgrading the mini. at first, i thought there'd be people upset about its upgradability, but in some of the images, the ram is on the outside and looks like it's easily updatable.
i also love the look of the new "icons" for the software. it reminds me very much of scandinavian folk art. i can't wait to get my hands on iwork.
also, the shuffle looks like a pregnancy test to me? not sure if i should buy one for my wife or not..
n3verm0re on 01/11/2005:
I especially like the disclaimer on the iPod shuffle page: "Do not eat iPod shuffle."
dustym on 01/11/2005:
I was looking at the icon when they put it up on Apple.com. My first thought wasn't so much "organic" as it was "hippie".
Nothing wrong with that, of course...
Jonathan Smith on 01/11/2005:
I think the iPod shuffle will make a great birthday present for my 11 year old daughter, and the Mac Mini will be a great replacement for her beige G3 for Christmas. :)
Shawn on 01/11/2005:
"It's basically an entire Mac in your pocket, and that's fantastic."
You must have some roomy ass pockets.
Garrett on 01/11/2005:
Alright, so it won't quite fit in a pocket—but I think the comment is still relatively accurate in its meaning. 6.5x6.5x2" is pretty darn small. (And it weighs under three pounds.)
ChrisB on 01/11/2005:
Is it just me or has the rest of the Apple product line been neglected? Would have expected a few other speed bumps, spec changes etc to iMac / iBook / Powerbook / G5.
Very excited about the new stuff, especially the 'Mac mini'. They're going to sell like hotcakes.
Geremy F on 01/11/2005:
I'm excited for both products, but I'm a little disappointed because I've been waiting what seems like forever for Macs to become affordable. After a few years, I saw that there wasn't a huge let up on the prices, so I went ahead and got a Mac G5 and now, 3 weeks later, there's an announcement of a (pretty good looking) small form factor Mac for $500.
I'm glad I waited with the ipod though. That ipod and the 512mb storage was exactly what I needed and I can't wait to buy one.
Maybe I can somehow return the cheesegrater to buy the new mac.
adam on 01/11/2005:
i hadn't heard anything about the ipod shuffle until i read your site tonight - went straight off and bought one from the apple uk store. Can't wait! i don't need the storage capacity of a mini even, so this is just perfect for me - and i think it will last longer than a hard disk ipod when used while jogging/excercising often. Can't wait!!!
Mindy on 01/11/2005:
Mac mini...i think i'm in love. i too have been waiting for the day i could afford the mac world. with this i can get data backup on a secure OS (me = xp user gasp) and have a means of testing my sites in mac browsers. wonderful news. this is definitely on my wish list.
morganiq on 01/11/2005:
What are you most excited about?
Honestly, what I'm most excited about is everyone else's excitement. This has generated loads of positive buzz in the Mac community; hopefully it'll create just as much buzz in the rest of the industry as well.
I like [the new icons] very much and I hope to see more like this in the future.
I have to admit, I immediately disliked them. I loved the slick simplicity of the previous style of marketing Apple used for their iApps. The new style looks way too cartoonish for my tastes. I certainly hope they didn't use this style for the actual application icons. :-/
Tim Uruski on 01/12/2005:
Couple months back I was thinking about throwing down some cash for a USB drive so I could take work to and from the office. The iPod Shuffle makes me glad I didn't since it costs the same amount and also plays music. That lanyard is hot too.
mathewhoy@gmail.com on 01/12/2005:
so, i was looking more at iwork last night after the effects of mwsf wore off and have a few questions:
is it scriptable? can i write a script that gets all of the text (and images) in a frontmost ichat windows and paste it into a new doc with the click of one button? can i get a list of all of the itunes tracks that are being played in that as a new one starts, it adds it to a pages document so that i can see what ordered all my songs played in (if on random)? i'm sure that it is in some way, but it would be much better if it was. i'm going to do some more poking around to see.
okay, that's it for questions, but on the topic of the shuffle: my wife said, "i would totally buy one."
that's huge for the niffer. while she loves the mac (and, luckily, the mat too - at work she has an apple sticker on the back of her peecee monitor to pretend it's a mac), she's never as excited as i am about technology when it comes out. not only is the shuffle the perfect size, but it's also the perfect price. i was thinking about it too - there is no display (which is a good way to keep the price down) which might be bad for most people. but my wife, who uses a portable cd player to walk to work (and has to carry it because it won't fit into her pockets), would appreciate its size and doesn't care about the lack of display because her cd player doesn't have one either. she just "knows" the tracks on the player based on the cd. just like the shuffle would be. even better, if you set it to randomly fill the shuffle, even better - then she wouldn't be stuck hearing the same shizer over and over and over again. 120 songs in her pocket is really a good idea. carrying around ~10 cds and player is heavy and awkward. carrying 1 stick of gum isn't. :)
that is all.
Garrett on 01/12/2005:
Mathew—I can't imagine Apple releasing an app that isn't scriptable. They're always very good about including a Applescript dictionary for each app they make (in fact, Safari seems to the be only one I ever hear people complaining about when it comes to how scriptable apps are).
mathewhoy@gmail.com on 01/12/2005:
i was thinking today that it's pretty funny that the ilife and iwork boxes exactly resemble those colours found in a box of ipod socks.
Ghast23 on 01/13/2005:
I was thrilled to hear about the shuffle, it's right up my alley. I think I'd rather spend some money on a G5 at this point, but I can see a lot of people buying that little Mac Mini. If I already had a desktop computer (I have an iBook right now), I think I'd have to get one just to use as a media server.
Jason on 01/14/2005:
i would imagine that mac mini would make a pretty good quick time streaming / web server if you bumped the memory up to 1 gig.
But heck for 500 bucks ill pick one up and throw it on my kvm just as a novelty.
Ive already pre-ordered a shuffle, i got it for like 80 bucks through my employee purchase plan. I am excited to start doing some cool dance silhouettes.
Lashlar on 01/17/2005:
I'm quite thrilled by the iPod Shuffle, as it is precisely what I'm looking for: something small and light and capable of storing some currently favored music for downtime between classes at university. I didn't want an iPod Mini because it was still too much storage space for my needs, so this is perfect. And the price is nice, too.
PJ Doland on 01/17/2005:
MWSF really let me down. I was really hoping for an xPad 2.0 announcement. Any news Garrett?
mathewhoy@gmail.com on 01/18/2005:
hehe. ya, i was hoping for one too. i've been mailing ideas to him every week or so, but nothing has come of it. :(
hehe.
Garrett on 01/18/2005:
PJ—I just need more free time. There is another version of xPad coming in the future (not 2.0 just yet), but I just don't have enough time right now to get it done. I know, it's taking forever—that's the best I can do right now.
And Mathew—perhaps I would include your ideas more readily if they weren't all "make xPad send me free money and gold nuggets in the mail." I've told you—I don't know how to make that work!
mathewhoy@gmail.com on 01/18/2005:
fine. i'll take my ideas to micro$oft then. jeeze.
PJ Doland on 01/18/2005:
All I want is the following:
- Support for numbered and bulleted lists.
- Support for line numbering.
lloydy on 01/21/2005:
You almost seem excited at the prospect of another UI conundrum (Mail) being introduced in 10.4? Personally I think it sticks out like a sore thumb.
And don't you think dashboard is little too over the top? The guys at apple were really allowed to play with their toys on that one!
But Mac Mini, iPod Shuffle - already added to increasing wishlist!