“The” Steve Jobs had his keynote at Macworld yesterday, along with bringing a few new Apple branded goodies to the table. The biggest of which is the new MacBook Air. All I can say is this, Hotness. I couldn’t bring myself to buying one to replace my still going strong MacBook Pro (albeit it’s on it’s third battery in less than two years.), I still ordered one on behalf of my sister, as she was holding out for something thin and lightweight. I know she’s pumped to get it, and I’m pumped to get a chance to play with it before she gets it.
My next Apple purchase will be a new desktop, since my existing PC desktop is starting to feel sluggish. It might also be me looking for a reason to get a new computer, as well as the fact that Apple had just refreshed the Mac Pro line a few days before MacWorld. A bit disappointed there was no sign of blu-ray support, but that isn’t a decision maker for me.
Of all the announcements at MacWorld, there was a couple of low points, at least to me. The first of which is the new Airport/NAS combination called Time Capsule. It works just like the old Airport, but with a built in HDD that can be used for network based Time Machine backups. The issue I, and others it seems based on discussions I’ve read on Apple’s own support board is that people understood the ability to do a network backup was possible using the AirDisk functionality of the Airport Extreme basestation. The information to do so was on Apple’s own website before Leopard was released. To cut to the chase, the information was pulled around the time Leopard was launched, and “officially” speaking, AirDisk Time Machine backups are not supported at present.
These events left customers (including me) with both an USB hard drive that was purchased for the sole purpose of backups. I wouldn’t be too bothered by it, but AirDisk support in Leopard is pretty flaky, so I can’t even rely on it to store and access data on it over a network. There are workarounds, but none I find acceptable for production level software.
As of yet, no official word if there will be future, official support for this type of backup, but I’m not holding my breath. If they fix the AirDisk/Leopard problems, I’ll be happy, and down the road maybe replace the router with a Time Capsule.
The other low point is the iPod Touch apps, it has been creating a buzz all over the Mac community. At first I was amazed Apple would pull a stunt like that, charging for apps that iPhone users got for free. After some reading, I can see why they do charge for the applications (my guess is the a combination of the Sarbanes-Oxley compliance, much like they had to do for the 802.11n enabler a few months back, and testing the waters for seeing how many people will actually shell out money for a few iPod apps. Both of those guesses are out there, considering what they are charging it). In the end, I did purchase it today because I really wanted e-mail support.
The only part that I found odd is that the application package actually had core functionality attached to it that isn’t really documented anywhere. I’m talking about the wobbly moving icons, multiple page home screens, and creating links from Safari to the home screen.
I don’t know if this was intentional, but it brings up a question, are iPod Touch users going to have to pay for new, functional, non-application features that are added to the iPhone as the platform evolves? I’d hate to have to pay more for a copy and paste feature, although an extreme possibility, is it any different than paying for the ability to reorganize icons?