Apple’s March 7 Event Complete Coverage: New iPad, Apple TV and iOS 5 Updates

Several hours ago Apple dropped a huge press conference in San Francisco for making three major announcements: the launch of so much rumored and awaited iPad, highly expected Apple TV and some major updates with the current iOS.

New Apple TV features 1080p programming comprising iTunes movies and TV shows, Netflix, Vimeo, photos and more, and all in HD! With iTunes in the Cloud, users can get hands on their favorite movies and TV shows right from the iTunes Store instantly, enjoying them in HD. Despite the huge speed and simplicity, the new Apple TV features humbler, advanced user interface making it easier than ever to access your purchased movies, TV shows and music with iTunes Match right from iCloud. Streaming or mirroring your favorite content from the rest of iDevices including iPad or iPhone is also available. On the other hand, you can buy movies and TV shows on Apple TV and watch them on your iPhone, iPad, iPod touch, Mac or PC too, with incredibly high speed, no matter which device you choose to use.

Apple TV will be available on March 16th for a suggested retail price of $99 (US) through the Apple online store, Apple’s retail stores and Apple Authorized Resellers and requires iTunes 10.5 or later, 802.11g/n Wi-Fi network or Ethernet network, a broadband Internet connection and a HD TV capable of 1080p or 720p and an HDMI cable that is sold separately.

Now let’s move on to iLife apps for iOS. To complete this bundle, Apple introduced iPhoto for iPad and iPhone and major updates to iMovie and GarageBand. The following improvements were made:

• iPhoto now features revolutionary Multi-Touch abilities so you can use simple gestures to sort through hundreds of photos and find your best shots, augment and retouch your images using fingertip brushes and share spectacular photo journals with iCloud. To list the whole new improvements would take us far away, so to cut the long story short, so just imagine Photoshop mating with Instagram- to fully analyze the new capabilities.

• With the advanced iMovie you now are able to create amazing Hollywood-style trailers as you record HD video on your iPad and iPhone, even as you’re recording. The new Theater view lets you screen and pick from nine patterns in a range of categories including Superhero, Romance and Fairy Tale. Trailers feature soundtracks written by legendary composers such as Academy Award-winner Hans Zimmer and performed by world class musicians like the London Symphony Orchestra. 

• GarageBand introduces Jam Session, a groundbreaking and really cool feature that allows you to invite up to three friends of yours to wirelessly tie the iOS devices together for playing instruments and record live music. Jam Session spontaneously orchestrates the tempo, key and chords of your Touch Instruments so one and all sound great.

And the last and the most important- the new iPad! The third generation device of its category defining mobile device, featuring a fabulous new Retina display, Apple’s new A5X chip with quad-core graphics and a 5 megapixel iSight camera with progressive optics for capturing amazing photos and 1080p HD video. iPad with Wi-Fi + 4G connects to fast networks worldwide, including AT&T’s and Verizon’s 4G LTE networks, and still delivers the same all-day 10 hour battery life- just like the iPad 2, while remaining amazingly thin and light. Beginning today, iPad 2 will be offered at an even more affordable price starting at just $399!

As for the further details about iPad 3, read through:

• Retina display: delivering four times the number of pixels of iPad 2, so compact that the human eye is incapable to differentiate individual pixels when held at an ordinary distance, making web pages, text, images and video look extremely sharp and lifelike. The 3.1 million pixels in the Retina display are more than one million more pixels than an HD TV, and with 44% increased color saturation the new iPad displays colors that are astonishingly richer, deeper and more vivid.

• A5X chip – this powerful chip with quad-core graphics was specially designed by Apple to deliver a fast, receptive user experience while supporting the incredible Retina display. With double the visuals performance of the A5 chip, the A5X delivers a superb equilibrium between performance and power efficiency so you can enjoy all the benefits of the stunning new display while experiencing a smooth Multi-Touch interface, intensive gameplay, unbelievable visual depth and all-day battery life that iPad is known for providing.

• iSight 5 MP camera features progressive optics for taking fabulous pictures and recording full HD video. Backside illumination is available, allowing you to shoot great photos in low-light environments and a new video image maintenance feature eliminates the bumps and shakes naturally seen when filming with a hand-held device.

Despite the features above, iPad Wi-Fi + 4G with built-in next gen 4G LTE has the most all-inclusive support for fast networks internationally including HSPA+ and DC-HSDPA, and now both CDMA and GSM iPad users have the ability to easily roam internationally.

So much rumored Japanese Siri was also introduced, together with iOS 5.1 and iTunes 10.6 free software updates!

Pre-Orders for iPad are now available. Despite the US, iPad will also be available in Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Japan, Puerto Rico, Singapore, Switzerland, UK and the US Virgin Islands on Friday, March 16 for a suggested retail price of of $499 (US) for the 16GB model, $599 (US) for the 32GB model and $699 (US) for the 64GB model. 

The new device is available in black and white colors and wills hit Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Macau, Mexico, The Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain and Sweden by the end of March!

Upcoming iOS 5.1 Secret Features

The recent reports claim that Apple has finalized quality assurance examination on iOS 5.1 and will announce it together with the iPad 3 in just several hours’ time. The new version of iOS is said to comprise an augmented lock screen that gives easier admission to the camera, Japanese support for Siri – as previously rumored - and two more new features that have yet to be exposed.

A seep-out kind of the new OS was testified last month, featuring both – Japanese Siri and a ‘slide up to access camera’ gesture on the lock screen too. However, these two innovations does not account for “at least two other new features that have not been publicly leaked.” 

Although there are no actual evidences about what remains to be seen, the rumors have spread that there is at least one major feature of the iPad 3 that is yet to be unveiled and that was causing a delay in the launch of new beta versions of iOS 5.1.  There have even been some attempts at guesstimating what it might be here. Will it be Siri, Retina display requiring additional work to be ready or any new feature – will be unveiled soon, very soon.

On the other hand some reports claim that the build number of iOS 5.1 Gold Master is 9B176, which surprisingly has soon been signed by Apple yet. This confirms that any leaked screenshot would have to come from an official device authorized for testing. However, suspends our belief to see any glimpses till the actual event… As soon as iOS 5.1 is allegedly planned for release in the ‘coming days’ it is quite rational to conjecture that the update will be rolled after the iPad 3 announcement, but before it goes on sale.

iPad 3 Latest Headlines – Final Roundup

The world’s most anticipated device, Apple’s next generation iPad, which is said to officially be introduced tomorrow, is still encircled with numerous rumors about the design, name, specs and so on…

The most unexpected thing we’ve heard so far concerns the name of the next gen iPad to be iPad HD instead of iPad 3.  As Apple has a long practice to surprise us (remember the long anticipation of iPhone 5 and we got iPhone 4S after iPhone 4instead, as well as iPhone 3GS after iPhone 3G) and considering the fact that Apple is rumored to be doubling the resolution of the current iPad 2, it is quite possible that we’ll see iPad HD Tomorrow. But if Apple does go with iPad HD, what would the further next generation iPads be called - iPad HD 2, iPad HDS or what?

The next big rumor concerns the screen size. Apple is once again rumored to be purchasing respectively smaller, 7.1-inches, screens for iPad mini type device- according to multiple sources. But why would Apple, which sold 15.43 million full sized, full priced iPad 2 tablets last quarter alone, would complicate the app development process for developers or create yet another UI size for developers to target? Just to compete with Amazon’s Kindle Fire? It leaks logic a bit, but nothing is foreclosed at all…

And the last thing that sounds incredible- Ten One Design – which has a great reputation when it comes to accessories, has just announced that it is working on a pressure sensitive Bluetooth 4.0 stylus for the next generation iPad 3. However the question is whether the stylus will be coming with the next iPad in the box or will it be sold separately…

This is all for now- not to mention some minor tweaks about the huge resolution, unbelievable speed and so on. So guys, call for just a little patience and wait for tomorrow to unveil the truth!

This is all for now- not to mention some minor tweaks about the huge resolution, unbelievable speed and so on. Whatever there should be introduced, the recent study shows that 42% of iPad owners are ready to buy an iPad 3! So guys, call for just a little patience and wait for tomorrow to unveil the truth!