I just downloaded Firefox 3.5 on both of my computers and am very happy with it. It does feel significantly faster than the previous version but didn’t blow me away quite like Safari 4 did.

When I upgraded only two of my six current extensions were compatible. So, even if you are anxious to get your hands on the latest version make sure your essential extensions are compatible with 3.5 before upgrading.

Update 6/30/09: Mozilla has already over one million downloads of Firefox. Mozilla has also launched a real time Firefox download tracker so users can watch as downloads occur.

AppleInsider is citing sources “familiar with the company’s thinking” (so take it how you will), saying that Apple will be lowering the price of their iMac line.

If true, this would come just a few months after Apple dropped the prices on their MacBook line as well. It is clear to me that Apple wants to sell more Macs and dropping prices on their mainstream desktop computer would be a logical next step.

The sourcing in this article is a little strange though. “People familiar with the company’s thinking,” what does that even mean? Any guy with a rudimentary understanding of economics would understand that dropping the price of your product will inevitably sell more units.

Sony Corp is considering developing a cellphone-game gear hybrid in a bid to better compete with Apple Inc’s highly popular iPod and iPhone, the Nikkei business daily said on Saturday.

It’s pretty amazing that it has taken them nearly two years before they finally got around to doing this. It’s almost as if they completely forgot what the iPod line did to Sony’s Walkman business.

Then again, I have a strange feeling that if Sony attempted a cell phone that was also a handheld game console it would turn out a little bit too much like the orignal Nokia N-Gage, I’m sure most of you remember that piece of crap.

Last night Birdfeed was released to the App Store. I had been following the client for a few months now through Twitter but until last night I really didn’t know anything about it other than that it was an upcoming Twitter client.

I downloaded the app immediately once I heard that it had been released and am glad I did. Although Birdfeed uses chat bubbles, which is one of my least favorite Twitter user interfaces, everything else about it more than makes up for it.

The new client has everything I need in a Twitter client. At first I was worried that it didn’t have trends built in, but I then found it in a slightly hidden yet very intuitive place, the saved searches section.

Other notable features include posting shortened URLs with tr.im integration, loading older tweets using infinite scrolling, navigating reply chains, Favrd and FollowCost integration, and local tweet caching for catching up on tweets while offline.

I haven’t found any bugs in the application, remember it is a 1.0 release. I suggest everyone at least check out the screen captures I’ve posted below, it is well worth a look.

Twitterrific stole my heart from Tweetie but I can definitively (at least for the next month or two) say that this has become my new Twitter client of choice. But, it does amaze me to see consistent improvement among all Twitter clients, it just proves that competition creates better products for the users.

Birdfeed – $4.99

Update 6/30/09: I underestimated just how wonderful the local caching and infinate scrolling is. As soon as you reach the bottom of your list of tweets Birdfeed automatically starts loading more. This automatic loading is a beautiful thing but what is really amazing is that the local caching doesn’t just keep the most recently loaded tweets (options for 20, 50, or 100) it also keeps even older ones. I’m not sure how many Birdfeed is actually capable of caching (I’m sure there is a limit) but I was able to reload over 200 tweets while my device was in airplane mode (it cached user avatars too).

I spent the week or so leading up to the launch of the iPhone 3GS trying to convince my girlfriend to get a white model. I was going to get the black one (the black model suites me much better) and I wanted an easy way for us to tell each others apart. I failed, and we ended up both getting black models. But, luckily hitting the home or lock button to check the wallpaper isn’t to difficult, and in a few days she’ll be getting a Gelaskin in the mail.

But, now that the dust has settled I am quite happy that she didn’t get the white version, not because I prefer the look of the black model but because of this report on Nowhere Else (Google translated) of the white version overheating and discoloration occurring on the back.

Apple has had similar problems in the past, everyone who follows this sort of thing remembers all of the discoloration issues with the white MacBook, I experienced it, and practically every other white MacBook owner did as well.

It’s difficult to say how widespread this discoloration issue is with the iPhone, I haven’t seen any other reports about it. But, at this point I don’t know why anyone would take the chance and buy the white model.

SURCHAUFFE IPHONE 3GS | GEEK WEBZINE HIGH-TECH Nowhere Else.

Update 7/4/09: According to Engadget it turns out the cause of this browning on white iPhones may have to do with leaving it in a hot car.

Update 7/5/09: frenchiPhone (Google Translated) is claiming that the discoloration of white iPhone 3GSs may be caused by some third party cases. The solution is to clean the back with alcohol. I haven’t found anyone talking about what cases actually cause this problem but it is nice to know that if you do experience it the fix isn’t too difficult.

Yesterday Apple updated both the Apple TV and the iPhone’s Remote application. The new Remote app now supports multitouch gestures for controlling the Apple TV.

Navigating menus is much more comfortable, flicking or dragging the finger across the screen will scroll through menus and tapping will select an item.

The controls when playing back content is a little bit more complicated but very intuitive, it didn’t take long for me to be fast forwarding, skipping back, and pausing like a pro. The full list of controls can be seen in the gallery below.

Apple has also posted a list of the new features in the Apple TV update which, other than adding support for the new Remote app, include:

• Flickr Search: Search Flickr photo tags to find recently updated photos of interest. Save searches to quickly find new photos or use as a screen saver for Apple TV.
• New view options: View movies By Genre, By Movie, or Unwatched. View TV Shows and Podcasts By Date, By Show, or Unwatched.
• Updated transport and chapter modes: During video playback, click right or left to fast forward or rewind. Additional clicks increase the speed. Click down to show chapter markers.

AppleInsider | Apple updates Apple TV, Remote app to allow multi-touch control [u].

It turns out that the iPhone is capable of installing network profiles from MobileSafari. Since all of the recent tethering hacks have used a modified network profile to enable tethering, BenM.at has created a pretty easy to use page to enable this feature, and supports practically every iPhone provider out there.

The process is very simple, go to http://help.benm.at/help.php, scroll down to Tethering & Internet Settings, tap on the Mobileconfigs download link, choose your country and then your provider. The network profile installer will launch and allow you to update your iPhone settings which will enable tethering.

To enable tethering just go to Settings, General, Network, tethering should now be an option.

I currently have a first generation iPhone, and since it doesn’t support tethering or MMS I wasn’t able to try this myself. But, Jason Chen of Gizmodo says that they have been testing it for about a day and it has worked fine for them.

I haven’t dug very deep into the MMS enabling features, since they are currently beta and the method to install it is a little complicated. I really wouldn’t advise anyone to enable MMS until they make things a little bit easier.

Gizmodo – Enable Tethering On Your iPhone 3G and 3GS With Only Safari MMS, VV Fix – Iphone tethering.

Update 6/25/09: I dropped by an AT&T store yesterday and installed tethering on one of their demo devices. I wasn’t able to test tethering but I can say that everything else on the phone worked just fine after installing the network profile.

Update 7/14/09: There are some reports that downloading the mobileconfig files (as explained above) still works (@andrewe) with iPhone firmware 3.1 beta 2 but there are also some reports that the IPCC tethering trick no longer works. I can’t confirm whether or not either one of them work because I don’t have access to the beta firmware.

Update 7/31/09: Firmware update 3.0.1 hasn’t broken this tethering hack. We already know that 3.1 will, so 3.0.1 might be the last firmware that will allow you to easily enable free tethering.

Update 8/3/09: According to iPhone Alley firmware 3.1 beta has already enabled MMS, so it is likely that MMS will be enabled for all iPhone 3G and 3GS users with the final 3.1 update.

Rob Pegoraro of the Washington Post quotes Greg Jozwiak as saying “we just feel it looks better with the 3GS all together.”

Currently the iPhone 3G S’s product page still uses the space but recently the PR section on Apple’s website has been displaying the name as iPhone 3GS (no spaces).

I have to admit that although it may be easier to search for and not dealing with ugly line wrap issues would seem to make “3GS” more favorable, I personally like the “3G S” spelling better. I think the space keeps it from looking too clunky, it keeps it a little more elegant.

For many I’m sure it doesn’t make much of a difference but for journalists and bloggers who like to pay attention to how products are specifically spelled in regular text (not logos) this is a big deal. And seriously, who really wants to have to go through and change ever instance of “3G S” to “3GS” on their website?

Twitter / Rob Pegoraro: @saschasegan No space, as ….

Update 6/24/09: Although I still would rather see the “3G S” spelling, Apple has officially changed the spelling to “3GS” on the product page, and as a result I have changed every instance of “3G S” on this website to “3GS,” except for this article, of course.

Rapid Repair decided to take their iPhone 3GS apart to see what made it tick. They found an 833MHz ARM processor which has been underclocked to 600MHz and a PowerVR SGX graphics chip from Imagination Technologies.

According to AppleInsider, Apple is saying that it could take some customers up to 2 days before their brand new iPhones are activated.

John Gruber has posted a video on his Flickr page comparing PCalc launch times between the iPhone 3G and iPhone 3GS. To go along with that AppleInsider has posted a handy table showing various tests made comparing app launch times and web page load times.

The launch of the iPhone 3GS seemed to go significantly smoother than last years launch of the iPhone 3G. I would attribute that to the ability to pre-order the device online combined with the fact that they have two of these huge launches under their belt already.

Overall it was very successful, I just wish I would have considered iPhone 3G returns when deciding what time I was going to stop by my AT&T store.

Update 6/30/09: If you still haven’t purchased your iPhone 3GS you might want to check out Apple’s online availability page. With it you can make sure that your local Apple store has one in stock before you head out to pick one up.

That’s right folks, I underestimated the demand for the iPhone 3GS and because of that not only did I go to the AT&T store before 3pm, but I was also unable to get my device today.

But, I have a pretty good explanation for it. I didn’t factor in all of the recent iPhone 3G customers who would want to exchange their device for the new iPhone 3GS.

When I talked to the AT&T representative that I pre-ordered my device from she told me that most of their stock was depleted by people exchanging their 3Gs for the 3GS. It’s possible that this wasn’t the case in other areas but it sure was where I live.

But, as I said in my previous post, no harm done. I’ll be getting a call and an email when a device is available in my local store, which shouldn’t take too long (hopefully).

Update 6/27/09: I did finally receive my iPhone 3GS on June 25, it is fantastic. Although most people have been focusing on the camera as the main feature to upgrade for I personally think that the faster processor and larger amount of memory are the most drastic changes. I don’t really take very many pictures but the ability to load web pages significantly faster is changing my life.

I do plan on stopping by my local AT&T store to pick up an iPhone 3GS but don’t expect me to show up any earlier than 3pm. I have a pretty good feeling that supply will be able to keep up with demand this time around.

I think most people are expecting it to be a mad house at AT&T and Apple stores but I don’t see it that way. Not only is the iPhone 3GS not that big of a jump from the 3G but the people who would be waiting in line early in the morning to get their hands on one probably pre-ordered theirs. And, if that’s the case I expect the store to be a little crowded early in the morning but later on in the day I think they will still have devices in stock and crowds will have subsided.

But, honestly, if I’m wrong it isn’t that big a deal. Although I’m excited about the 3GS I’m not launch day excited, if I pick it up a day or two later there’s no harm done, I’ll still get the device and will be just as happy with it then as I would be to get it on launch day.

Here’s a quick recap, I’m going to stroll into my local AT&T store at around 3pm and see if they have any left in stock, if not I’ll probably just reserve one to be picked up at a later date.

Update 6/19/09: Erica Ogg, writing for CNET, seems to agree with me about the crowds for the iPhone 3GS.

Appmodo managed to convince an AT&T representative to shed some more light on when MMS will be launching and how much tethering is going to cost.

MMS is said to be coming in July and tethering is said to be $55 per month. The question still remains however, whether this pricing is on top of the $30 a month we are already paying for unlimited data or if this $55 plan includes unlimited data and tethering.

$55 seems absolutely perfect, not only is it slightly cheaper than most carriers charge per month for a notebook data plan but it is also only a slight bump up from the already a little expensive $30 for unlimited data. But, if the pricing is going to be $85 a month total for data and tethering it is outrageously expensive. So long as tethering is so easy to enable I don’t see how they can justify an $85 per month price point.

Update 6/19/09: The Loop is pointing to AT&Ts Facebook page where they have said that the rumored $55 extra per month for tethering is false. They didn’t make any indications about how much it will cost but it is likely to be around $60 for both tethering and data. $30 extra per month for tethering is the same pricing they offer for BlackBerry tethering.

Update 8/3/09: According to iPhone Alley firmware 3.1 beta has already enabled MMS, so it is likely that MMS will be enabled for all iPhone 3G and 3GS users with the final 3.1 update.

Today was the official release of iPhone firmware 3.0. The masses have now had time to download it and are able to enjoy all the new features. But, one big feature of OS 3.0 still isn’t available, tethering. Luckily it doesn’t seem to difficult to enable it. 9 to 5 Mac has a quick guide showing you how to enable it on your iPhone.

Although UPS had previously been displaying June 17 or June 18 as delivery dates for those who pre-ordered the iPhone 3GS early on, MacRumors is saying that Apple has requested that UPS hold the device until Friday.

AT&T has also caved to the many complaints and is now offering early iPhone 3G adopters the fully subsidized iPhone 3GS pricing. If your upgrade eligibility would come in July, August, or September AT&T will allow you to upgrade to an iPhone 3GS now for the fully subsidized price. There was some question as to how AT&T would deal with customers who had already pre-ordered the iPhone 3GS, Gear Live says that they have already began sending out refund notifications to affected customers.

Not only did iPhone firmware 3.0 get released today but the major journalists have also posted their iPhone 3GS reviews today. Pogue, Mossberg, Engadget, Gizmodo, Sun Times, TimesOnline.uk, CNET, and USAToday all have reviews up. Andy Ihnatko has posted a gallery on his Flickr account showing some images taken with the iPhone 3GS. I have to say the images look really good.

I have all day Friday off and although I won’t be waiting in line at 8am I do plan on stopping by some of my local stores to see if it is even possible to purchase an iPhone 3GS later in the day. That is, as long as internet reports indicate that it is still possible, otherwise I’ll just wait a couple of days, I’m in no hurry.

Update 6/20/09: Touch Arcade found a very interesting bit of information on Apple’s iPod touch product page, it now lists third-party game accessories as one of new features with firmware 3.0.

Apple has posted a new knowledge base article regarding iTunes syncing with third-party digital media players saying:

Apple is aware that some third-parties claim that their digital media players are able to sync with Apple software. However, Apple does not provide support for, or test for compatibility with, non-Apple digital media players and, because software changes over time, newer versions of Apple’s iTunes software may no longer provide syncing functionality with non-Apple digital media players.

I might be reading between the lines a little bit differently than others are. I don’t see this as Apple admitting that they are going to break compatibility, just that they will not make any effort to ensure compatibility. But, then again, I wouldn’t be surprised if iTunes 8.2.1 is being developed right now to kill the Pre’s iTunes syncing.

Update: 6/17/09: All Things Digital reached out to Palm on Apple’s article. Lynn Fox, a Palm spokesperson had this to say:

Palm’s media sync works with the current version of iTunes. If Apple chooses to disable media sync in a future version of iTunes, it will be a direct blow to their users who will be deprived of a seamless synchronization experience. However, people will have options. They can stay with the iTunes version that works to sync their music on their Pre, they can transfer the music via USB, and there are other third-party applications we could consider.

I don’t think it is very smart for Palm to begin advising their customers to stay with older versions of iTunes. Not only is this a clunky way of dealing with things it is also potentially a security issue, iTunes could in the future have a security vulnerablity. If Palm suggests you stay with that version it could mean trouble for those Pre users.

Update 9/9/09: According to forum members over at PreCentral, iTunes 9 breaks media sync on the Palm Pre.

Customers who purchase a qualifying new (list of models) or refurbished (list of models) Mac on or after June 8, that does not include Snow Leopard can upgrade to it for $9.95. If you purchase multiple Macs on a single invoice you can either order multiple upgrade kits at $9.95 each or purchase fewer of them and request the right to copy for the remaining qualifying products.

Once Snow Leopard becomes available in September, Apple will ship your upgrade discs within 24 hours of receiving a customer’s completed order form and payment.

This is a great deal for potential Mac buyers but I’m loving the idea of using Apple’s back to school promotion to purchase one of those brand new MacBook Pros to get a free iPod touch, printer, and now a cheap upgrade plan to Snow Leopard. But, I’m also considering the possibilities of waiting until new iPods come out in September to get a new iPod instead of the current models.

That would truly be taking advantage of all offers. A brand new MacBook, iPod, printer, and OS for the cost of a MacBook. I’m not actually going to take advantage of the offers though, it’s just wishful thinking. I’m actually quite happy with my current systems and the $29 Snow Leopard upgrade cost sounds fine to me.

If you already have firmware 3.0 installed on your iPhone you’ve probably had enough time to check out all of the features in it, but now you can add check another cool feature out before the rest of the world gets it on Wednesday, Push Notifications.

Early this morning an update to Tap Tap Revenge was posted that (if you had firmware 3.0) enabled push notifications.

When you launch the app for the first time you get prompted with this:

Once you choose OK checking your Settings shows that a new “Push Notifications” option has been added. It also allows you to choose what notifications you receive from what applications (which currently only lists one app).

Push Notifications in Tap Tap Revenge allows you to challenge another user to beat your score. When a challenge is made an alert displays on your device letting you try to beat the score. Tap Tap Revenge does icon badges and alerts but does not currently use sounds (which is nice).

Palm has some really smart developers on their hands. They managed to do something that no one else has, make task management a legitimate feature.

That’s right, you don’t get a list of apps with each of their CPU usage, instead you get cards that you can flip through and toss away when they are using too much resources. Windows Mobile is a perfect example of how not to do task management. In Windows Mobile you literally have a task manager that lists all of the apps you have open and tells you the CPU usage of each one. This will let you make an intelligent decision about what application you should close but isn’t very user friendly. Apple has also done it all wrong, users want to be able to multitask on their phones and Apple is making that impossible. They at least have a good reason for it though, it keeps battery life high and doesn’t burden users with the task of choosing to close certain applications to maintain performance. But, that doesn’t make up for the inability to load a web page over EDGE while typing out a text message.

Palm on the other hand has done it perfectly, how simple is it to tell users that if they are experiencing poor battery life or performance issues just toss some of your cards? Really simple, arguably a better solution than Apple’s.

Apple is trying to fix some of these problems with push notifications but honestly this will probably only confuse users who may be tricked into thinking their apps are actually running in the background. This false impression won’t last very long though, when they do figure out that AIM isn’t actually running in the background they will either be impressed by how cool that is or be distracted by the fact that they can’t listen to Pandora while surfing the web. Either way it isn’t necessarily the best option for tech-savvy consumers.

For the geeky smartphone user the Pre is looking more and more attractive. If they could just get some more apps for their platform.

At the WWDC keynote Apple announced that their 13-inch aluminum MacBook’s were getting a name change, they are now joining their 15 and 17-inch siblings and are now MacBook Pros.

Everyone. including Apple, explains this by saying that these aluminum MacBooks were similar enough to the MacBook Pro to join that line of notebooks. They have higher end CPUs, tons of RAM, large hard drives, backlit keyboards, and 9400M graphics. But, I believe one of the main reasons for the name change is to keep the perception that Apple is a high end brand. Not because the word “pro” makes you think of high end but because the word “plastic” makes you think “cheap.”

Before the name change the majority of journalists and users would differentiate between the aluminum and plastic 13-inch MacBooks by referring to them as “the aluminum one” and “the plastic one.” It was very clear that Apple was unhappy about that because they refused to refer to the plastic one with any word other than “poly-carbonate.” In fact, Apple would even correct some members of the press if they referred to it as plastic in front of an Apple representative.

Apple would rather have users differentiate between different MacBook Pro models by naming the screen size than they would have users differentiate between MacBooks by naming the material they are made out of.

Of course this isn’t the only reason Apple is now naming them MacBook Pros, they are in fact of a high enough quality and speed to be referred to as pro level notebooks. But, now they can also talk about how well the MacBook Pro line of notebooks is selling. Which also helps them appear to be a higher end brand, if the majority of notebooks you sell are part of your high end line it’s clear that the perception is going to be that you’re a high end brand.

For those of you who have waited to pre-order the iPhone 3GS (like me) your probably going to be a little frustrated to hear that AT&T has sold out of launch day iPhone 3GS pre-orders. That means that if you want to get your device on the day of release you’re going to have to wait in line at 8:00 am at your local AT&T, Apple store, or head over to your local Wal-Mart or Best Buy during their regular store hours.

If you are still interested in pre-ordering the device from AT&T you may have to wait until as late as the June 27 to get it. Anyone who pre-orders from now until the release date will receive an email when their device is in stock.

I’m not exactly sure what I want to do now, I was planning on pre-ordering my device but I’m now considering just waiting and attempting to purchase it in a store without the pre-order. Although stock might be a little low early on I’m sure Apple has managed to bring manufacturing up to a point where they will have devices in ready supply just a few days after the initial rush.

Update 6/16/09: Best Buy has also sold out of iPhone 3GS pre-orders but Apple’s online store still claims that if you order today you will recieve it by June 19.

Update 6/16/09: Some MacRumors readers are pointing out that UPS is claiming June 17 as the delivery date for their iPhone 3GS orders.

Recently the root image of the Palm Pre leaked. Some cleaver fellows on the PreCentral.net forums managed to find a couple of references to “Pixie,” the code name for the rumored Centro-like WebOS based handset. Some of you may know Pixie from its supposed launch name, “Eos.”

The device has been said to have a smaller display and a full size QWERTY non-slide-out keyboard. There has been no real word from Palm on this, only what has been found in the root image, but it is looking very promising.

Update 9/8/09: Michael Arrington writing in TechCrunch claims to have heard that the Palm Eos will be unveiled this week.

If you follow me on Twitter than you know I did the unthinkable today, I upgraded my iPhone to firmware 3.0. I refer to it as the unthinkable because I am not an iPhone developer and didn’t download the firmware from Apple’s website, instead I acquired it from bittorrent. This may terrify many of you and I’m sure most would rather wait until June 17 to get the official download from Apple but for some of us that is just too long to wait.

I actually downloaded it last night but didn’t muster up the courage to install it until this afternoon. The update process only took about 10-15 minutes and once finished all my settings were restored from the backup I had created by syncing just before the firmware update.

I’m not going to post links to the firmware or explain exactly how to install it because I can’t find the torrent page that I downloaded it from and if you don’t know how to choose an ipsw file to restore from you probably shouldn’t be doing this anyway. But, if you remember that it is firmware version 7A341 I’m sure you’ll be able to find it, the instructions are usually posted in the description of the torrent.

Everything seems much faster, I don’t think it is just a placebo effect either, I noticed a significant increase in page loads on some web pages and haven’t experienced the very common keyboard lag while typing. Copy and paste is great but I still haven’t found any real use for it and Find My iPhone is pure genius.

I am running the first generation iPhone so there are some features that I haven’t been able to experience but what I have I love.

One feature that doesn’t get talked about often enough on many of the blogs out there is the 30 second jump back button while listening to podcasts and audiobooks. It is a life saver. When listening to long podcasts it is very difficult to just skip back 10-15 seconds just to re-listen to something that you missed. The best option was to hold down the previous button and wait for it to rewind, but this 30 second skip makes it so much easier.

Getting 3.0 on my current iPhone hasn’t changed my mind about purchasing the iPhone 3GS though. I know that other’s situations are going to be different, having to pay an extra $200 or so to upgrade from a standard iPhone 3G will help sway you one way or the other but as I said above I’m using the first generation iPhone. 3G and GPS are becoming features that I really long for (my area didn’t have 3G until about 6 months ago). 3.0 is fantastic and I’m really going to enjoy it on my old hardware until I get my iPhone 3GS. I still haven’t pre-ordered it yet but I will be doing so in the next couple of days.

Here’s all the screenshots I’ve taken with my newly updated iPhone:

Update 6/12/09: I have begun experiencing keyboard lag again. I’m not sure why Apple can’t fix this problem. I know for sure that this problem wasn’t as prevalent back in the 1.0 days, why this isn’t on the top of Apple’s priority list is beyond me. On the other hand, with the faster processor in the iPhone 3GS this problem might not even exist.

Update 6/12/09: 9 to 5 Mac has posted an article showing how to enable tethering on the iPhone 3.0 Gold Master. I haven’t tried it myself but for those who are willing to risk bricking your phone head on over and try it out.

The WWDC 2009 keynote was yesterday and it had some solid announcements. Here’s a rundown of everything interesting:

MacBook

The new 15-inch MacBook Pro now has an integrated battery. This new battery will give users up to 7 hours of battery life with over 1,000 recharge cycles. They say a typical notebook user would be able to go about 5 years without having to get a battery replacement. It is also losing the ExpressCard slot but gaining an SD card slot.

The removal of the ExpressCard slot in the 15-inch MacBook Pro is a smart idea, very few people used the ExpressCard slot and an SD card slot is going to be used much more frequently by customers.

This is the fastest notebook they have ever sold, with up to 3.06GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor and 6MB of L2 cache, up to 8GB of DDR3 memory, and up to 500GB hard drive or up to 256GB SSD this thing is a screamer.

The pricing has changed a bit, the entry level 15-inch MacBook Pro is now $1,699, which is $300 cheaper than the previous model.

The 17-inch MacBook Pro, now at $2,499, is seeing a bump in specs but still has the ExpressCard slot.

The 13-inch MacBook is now being called MacBook Pro. It too has an integrated battery with up to 7 hours of battery life and 1,000 recharge cycles. It also supports up to 8GB of memory, up to 500GB hard drive or up to 256GB SSD. The backlit keyboard is now standard on all 13-inch models and now has an SD card slot and FireWire 800. All this starting at $1199, $100 less than the MacBook it replaces.

The MacBook Air is also receiving some speed bumps and now starts at just $1,499.

Every MacBook, MacBook Pro, and MacBook Air meets EPEAT Gold and Energy Star version 5.0 standards, because of this Apple is calling them the “world’s greenest lineup of notebooks.”

Lower prices on all of their notebooks is going to be a lot easier on customers and will undoubtedly help keep Mac sales up.

All of these updates to the MacBook family are available now.

Snow Leopard

There isn’t anything new with Snow Leopard, instead just confirmations on what we’ve already known or at least assumed.

Finder has been completely rewritten in cocoa. With this rewrite they been able to add some useful features to it, put back from trash, enhanced icon previews, a new services menu, faster icon drawing, and more. None of these are going to blow anyone away by themselves but when you put them all together you get something that should really impress.

Expose is now built into the dock, clicking and holding on an icon in the dock will show you all the windows open from that application.

Installing Snow Leopard is 45% faster than the Leopard installation and when you upgrade to Snow Leopard you get back about 6GB of disk space. A great change of pace from the usual drop in spare hard drive space with each new OS upgrade.

Safari 4 is now out of beta and is shipping for Leopard, Tiger, Vista, and XP now. Safari 4 is 7.8 times faster at rendering javascript compared to Internet Explorer 8 and fully passes the Acid 3 test. Crash protection is now a new feature of Safari 4, only available in Snow Leopard, if a crash is caused by a browser plugin your whole browser doesn’t crash, just the plugin itself, all of your tabs and open windows are left intact.

QuickTime X (pronounced “QuickTime ten”) is now official, it is getting a new icon, a modern foundation, hardware acceleration, ColorSync, and HTTP streaming. The user interface is exactly what we’ve seen in screenshots around the web, when you start playing a video the controls and title bar fade away until you scroll over the window again. Trimming sections of your video is much easier and is done similar to iMovie. Sharing is built right in, allowing you to upload to YouTube or MobileMe right from the app.

Microsoft Exchange is fully integrated into Mail, iCal, and Address Book.

Snow Leopard will be available for all Intel based Macs, $29 for Leopard users, $49 for a family pack. But, Tiger users will have to shell out $169 for a Snow Leopard and iLife box set.

Snow Leopard will ship in September (regarding my prediction, summer officially ends on September 22).

Mac OS X Snow Leopard

iPhone OS 3.0

AT&T will not be supporting MMS at the launch of iPhone OS 3.0, they won’t be ready until later this summer. When this was announced at the keynote there was a mixture of laughter and groaning heard from the audience. I did my own complaining at home, but it turns out that AT&T went through and opted each iPhone user out of MMS, manually, so that iPhone 3.0 beta testers couldn’t use MMS, they now have to go back through and turn all of those opt outs off.

It has been confirmed that OS 3.0 users will be able to purchase TV shows, music videos, audiobooks, and rent and purchase movies right from your the device. iTunes U is now integrated into the iTunes app as well.

Tethering is now official, you will be able to share your iPhone’s internet connection with your computer over USB or Bluetooth. But again, AT&T will not be supporting this on launch. It turns out that this will in fact be coming later but the announcement isn’t ready yet. Word on the street is that AT&T is readying a $70 unlimited data and tethering plan, compared to the current $30 unlimited data plan, for customers who want to tether.

Autofill is now part of Safari, allowing you to easily fill in web forms without having to type out your username and passwords.

A new MobileMe feature called “Find My iPhone” is being launched, it lets iPhone users see the location of their lost phone on a map. You can also send your phone messages to display or have your phone play a sound, this alert sound will play even if you left your phone in silent mode. If your phone is truly lost you can send it a remote wipe command, erasing all of the data on the phone.

OS 3.0 will be free for all iPhone users and $9.95 for all iPod touch users. Available worldwide June 17.

TomTom

TomTom wasn’t the only developer that talked about their application on stage, but they stood out as having arguably the most interesting and exciting demo of them all. The navigation application has an easy to use interface, it let’s you choose your destination from your iPhone’s built in address book contacts. The app can be viewed in both landscape and portrait mode, and has an optional TomTom car kit.

The car kit secures your iPhone to either your windshield or your dashboard holding your iPhone in either orientation. Using OS 3.0′s new dock connector features the car kit can actually enhance your accuracy of the GPS. The kit also allows you to do hands free calling and it will play your music over your car stereo.

I have a good feeling that TomTom will make a lot of money with this car kit, and even more on the app itself.

TomTom for iPhone

iPhone 3GS

The “S” stands for speed. The new iPhone 3GS has the same design as the iPhone 3G, all of the improvements are under the hood. Loading applications and web pages are about 2 times faster on the new device, most likely the culprit of a faster processor and larger amount of memory. The 3GS supports 7.2 Mbps HSDPA and has a 3MP autofocus camera.

You can choose fine tune the focus by tapping on the object you want the iPhone to focus on.

The new camera is, just like the rumors said, capable of recording video, 30 frames per second video at 640×480 with audio, and just like the still camera has auto focus, auto white balance, and auto exposure. But Apple didn’t stop there, you can even trim your video and share it to MobileMe, YouTube, MMS, or email it.

A long missing feature from the iPhone is voice dialing, it is now coming to the iPhone 3GS in the form of “Voice Control.” All you do is hold down the home button for a couple of seconds and a new user interface pops up with a wave form across the screen. Make commands like “call james,” “play playlist workout,” or “play more music like this.” Unsure of what commands you can make? All of your available commands are scrolling through the background behind the waveform.

Nike+ is now in the iPhone 3GS, a feature that has been in the iPod touch for almost a year now and finally making it to the iPhone.

With all of the these new features Apple has still managed to improve battery life, 9 hours of Wi-Fi internet browsing, 10 hours of video playback, 30 hours of audio playback, 12 hours of 2G talk time, and 5 hours of 3G talk time.

The iPhone 3GS will be priced at $199 and $299 for 16GB and 32GB respectively. The current 8GB iPhone 3G will now be sold for $99 starting today and the 16GB iPhone 3G is now priced at $149 (presumably for only a limited time). The iPhone 3GS will be hitting stores on June 19 and you can pre-order it online now.

It is a brilliant move to continue to sell the iPhone 3G at $99, not only will it help them get rid of old stock but it will also help them reach a much larger number of customers. Let’s face it, there are only so many people willing to pay $199+ and switch to AT&T for a phone and unless they added a second carrier in the US this really is their only option to increase potential customers.

Another note on pricing, if you are currently in a contract or don’t want to sign a 2 year contract with your new iPhone 3GS you are going to have to pay a $200-300 (depending on eligibility) premium on the device. This includes owners of the iPhone 3G, AT&T doesn’t have a cheaper upgrade plan for you.

iPhone 3GS Ad
iPhone 3GS Guided Tour

Conclusion

Overall this was a great keynote. I know that some were a little disappointed by the announcements but I really don’t understand why. We got pretty much everything we wanted and more. iPhones are shipping earlier than most of us expected, we finally have a release window for Snow Leopard and great pricing on new notebooks all make for a good keynote in my mind.

WWDC 2009 Keynote Stream
Pre-Order the iPhone 3GS from AT&T
Pre-Order the iPhone 3GS from Apple

Update 6/9/09: TomTom has posted a video to their official YouTube channel demoing the upcoming car kit.

Update 6/10/09: From Apple’s  iPhone cleaning page:

“If your iPhone has an oleophobic coating on the screen (iPhone 3GS only), simply wipe your iPhone’s screen with a soft, lint-free cloth to remove oil left by your hands and face.”

Oleophobic basically means that the iPhone 3GS’ screen will be resistant to oils, this should make it much easier to clean off the new iPhone compared to the old one, which would often times get covered in oil from your face and fingers after just a few days of regular use.

Update 6/10/09: CNET, Engadget, and Gizmodo have all posted MacBook Pro hands on articles. Apple has also posted a knowledge base article about the SD card slot in these recent MacBook Pros saying that you can boot from them.

Update 6/10/09: T-Mobile Netherlands has posted both the RAM and processors specs for the new iPhone 3GS on its specifications page. The iPhone 3GS has 256MB of RAM and a 600MHz processor which is exactly what the rumors were stating.

Update 6/10/09: AppleInsider is saying that Navigon and TeleNav are also going to be building iPhone apps for the iPhone. Garmin on the other hand has no plans to do so. Ngmoco is saying that they have no plans to release games exclusively for the newly announced iPhone 3GS.

Update 6/10/09: Apple’s technical specifications page for Snow Leopard shows that Snow Leopard requires an Intel processor and 1GB of memory. QuickTime H.264 hardware acceleration requires a Mac with a NVIDIA 9400M graphics card, OpenCL requires a NVIDIA Geforce 8600M GT, Geforce 8800 GT, Geforce 8800 GTS, Geforce 9400M, Geforce 9600M GT, Geforce GT 120, Geforce GT 130, ATI Radeon 4850, or Radeon 4870.

Update 6/12/09: Michael Flux has posted a Snow Leopard screenshot gallery.

Update 6/12/09: Michael Schade says the iPhone 3GS is capable of graphics surpassing the PSP.

Update 6/13/09: AnandTech has taken a look at the recent 15-inch MacBook Pro and saw 8 hours of battery life in their tests. This makes the integrated battery look significantly more attractive to heavy users.

Update 6/15/09: 9 to 5 Mac is pointing an AT&T PDF saying that AT&T will be offering iPhone users MMS for free with a texting bundle.

The WWDC keynote is today and although I won’t be able to write about the results until later tonight or tomorrow morning I thought I would share my predictions for the event.

iPhone

I expect the new iPhone to receive a faster processor, more RAM, and twice the storage of the current model. It will also have an improved still camera, video recording capabilities, and a July release date. These new models will have the same price points as the current iPhone, $199 and $299 for 16GB and 32GB respectively.

The current 8GB iPhone 3G will be sold at $99, at least for a limited time until the current stock runs out.

Snow Leopard

The new Marble interface won’t be fully implemented in 10.6, instead this change will be pushed into 10.7. There will be some hints of it in certain applications, QuickTime is a perfect example, but the majority of the OS will have the exact same design as Leopard.

I expect Snow Leopard to gain a late summer release date.

Update 6/10/09: I am happy to say that all of my predictions came true except for the July release date on the iPhone 3GS and it is possible that my late summer prediction about Snow Leopard won’t come true. Apple is saying that Snow Leopard will be coming out in September, summer ends on September 21, it’ll be close.

Obviously there was quite a bit that I didn’t predict that came, specifically the MacBook announcements but overall I did pretty well. Here’s full rundown of all the interesting things that happened at the WWDC Keynote.

Update 8/21/09: Snow Leopard Coming August 28, the last day of Summer is September 21 so my prediction appears to be right on track.

Update 8/24/09: Snow Leopard is officially coming on August 28, which means that my prediction is right on track.

NoWhereElse.fr originally posted these images depicting what might be the next iPhone. They show the matte black casing, lack of chrome border, and front facing camera that have been rumored.

It is worth mentioning that, as MacRumors points out, there haven’t been any valid sources claiming that the iPhone will be getting video chat (which is presumably what the front facing camera would be for) it is possible that this “rumored” video chat feature is nothing more than wishful thinking that got a little out of hand, somehow managing to morph into (what many, possibly misguided, people believe to be) a legitimate rumor. It is something that a lot of us would find very useful. But, the amount of power necessary to capture video and push it over the network would certainly take a toll on the battery, so much so that Apple might not want to even go there. At least not until they can get an efficient enough battery to do it right. Baby steps, isn’t standard video capture and MMS enough?

If this video chat actually is the real deal though, TUAW wouldn’t be too out there by bringing up the possibility that the next iPhone could be named the “iPhone Video.”

I do want to go on the record saying that I believe these images are actually fake. Not just because it wouldn’t take a rocket scientist to fake them, but also because when you blow the image up there appears to be a line across the phone at roughly the top of the bottom four icons. This line marks a sudden change from fuzzy to significantly less fuzzy, not just on the screen but on the bezel around the screen as well. This change doesn’t appear on the surface around the phone, only on the phone.

I’m by no means an expert at analyzing images but if I was to give you my best educated guess, I would say that this image is fake.

NoWhereElse.fr (Engadget currently mirroring the images).

Update 6/7/09: Gizmodo posts some more images (with iSpazio watermarks, I can’t find the original post they appear on), most likely from the same source as the images above, showing more of the next generation iPhone in action. The video chat interface looks very cluttered and honestly, what is the likelihood of him being able to convince someone else with the next iPhone to talk with him while he takes a picture of the device?

Update 6/7/09: Gizmodo has done some more extensive analysis on these latest crop of supposed iPhone images. They come to the same conclusion as I did, but for different reasons.

Update 6/8/09: Gizmodo has confirmed that the iSspazio images are fake. The picture showing video conferencing in action is just an iPhone with a screenshot from the Skype app. The terrible part is that the image’s watermark obscures the Skype icon.

Update 6/10/09: Obviously all of these images were fake. WWDC Keynote 2009.

Remember all the cries of outrage that were heard shortly after Apple announced the third generation iPod shuffle? Well, they have all calmed down a bit and now everyone who was outraged can breathe a sigh of relief. Scosche has announced the TapSTICK. Set for release the first week of July, this $29 accessory adds three buttons to the otherwise buttonless iPod shuffle. These three buttons are designed to mimic the functionality of the three buttons that would normally be found on your headphones.

The primary function of this accessory will be the use of it in your car but I’m sure a lot of you out there will use it specifically for third party headphones.

The price is a little steep though, a $29 accessory on a $79 iPod. But, at least the option is now out there.

Update 7/30/09: Both iLuv and Belkin have announced headphone adapters for the iPod shuffle. With on of these adapters you are free to use whatever headphones you like.

Update 7/30/09: Scosche has announced their new “Increased Dynamic Range earphones with tapLINE control technology.” Basically they are relatively cheap third party headphones with iPod and iPhone compatible remote and mic.

You hear stories about how Google employees have hundreds and hundreds of new email to go through each and every day. It’s a curious thought that maybe Google Wave was invented by a group of employees who finally got fed up and wanted to create a more efficient alternative.

Google Wave is a very interesting tool but I see it more as a collaboration tool for decent sized teams rather than a consumer based email replacement. The fact is that the majority of email users might never be able to wrap their head around Wave, potentially the only people who can are engineers.

Hold on, I know what your thinking, “what about the young kids, they understand computers.” Well, don’t expect the younger generation to understand it any better than the adults do. Here’s an example, I was just talking with a 13 year old cousin who has had a computer in his house since he was in first or second grade. He recently got an iPod and doesn’t even understand how to add music to iTunes. Because of experiences like this, I find it very difficult to believe people who talk about the younger crowd being able to do practically anything on a computer. Usually this is only said by someone who knows absolutely nothing about computers, so even the child’s rudimentary knowledge is significantly greater than the one talking about it.

I’ve sat through the entire Google Wave presentation and found it very difficult to get through. I’m lead to believe by many technology journalists that this is going to change the world but I really can’t think of many uses for it in my life.

I walked away from the presentation wondering why users can’t just pick up the phone and talk. I know that some might think that the phone is a little old fashioned, it doesn’t have hyperlinks, images, etc. But the ability to convey an idea and get instant feedback from the person your explaining it to, including questions about areas that they don’t understand is why the phone is such a useful tool.

Google Wave has similar functionality by live updating the text as you type it to the Wave user on the other end of the conversation but in all honesty I would rather have this turned off for fear I would end up typing something that makes me look like I don’t know what I’m talking about. I would rather have a little bit of time to collect my thoughts and take the time to write them down in a way that precisely explains my thought, IM and email is fine for that, Wave doesn’t bring anything to the table to make that easier.

The feature that probably demoes the best (in my opinion) is the playback feature, which lets you take the message thread back to its beginning and step by step moving it forward in time to see each reply and edit happen in the order that it did, but wouldn’t it just be easier not to edit the quoted text and instead put your reply above the quoted text (possibly using quotes in your own section to give it some context, if it is really necessary).

If I was to pick one feature that might actually be useful to the regular home user I would have to choose the photo sharing features. Letting users drag and drop their photos into the browser to share them works very well and the ability for other Wave users to drag and drop their own photos into the same Wave to build a photo album of an event is incredibly useful. Everyone has about 5-10 friends that bring their camera with them wherever they go, but if multiple friends come to an event with their camera, being able to bring all those photos from everyone’s camera into one place is something that many people find very difficult. Google Wave has made that easy, it is just unfortunate that all of the other Google Wave features are most likely going to scare users away.

All of the extensions that they demoed were very cool, but again, this does nothing more than add more and more functionality adding more confusion to the service and ultimately make it more intimidating.

The only glimmer of hope I have for Google Wave is the use of it by other companies. Google is open sourcing the majority of Google Wave so that anyone can implement their own version, and change it how they want. This adds a tremendous amount of potential to the service. Someone could easily build a version of Google Wave that was a little friendlier to the non tech-savvy crowd. What’s even better is that Google has made it easy for different implementations of Wave to talk to users on other implementations of it.

Google Wave is certainly a tremendous engineering feat but I don’t think that it will ever become used as commonly as email and IM is.

Google Wave

Update 6/4/09: Yes, I did see the real time translation feature, which is great, I’m sure that many people who have friends that primarily speak foreign languages will use the heck out of Wave but I don’t know very many people in that situation (do you?) and honestly, wouldn’t it be nearly as easy just to use Yahoo Babel Fish? Is copy and paste so difficult?

Update 6/4/09: Another thought has crossed my mind about Google Wave. Why hasn’t anyone been discussing the possibility of scaling issues with this service? I know that Google is essentially the king of scaling but all of this constant real time updates makes me wonder if this thing is actually going to work when they start dealing with millions of users.

Of course the ability for Google to build multiple implementations of Wave on their own servers that can easily talk to each other will help quite a bit, throwing more servers at the problem seems like a simple answer, but just remember how often Gmail has been down in the past year, and I would venture to guess that the amount of messages in Gmail is significantly lower than the potential amount of messages that would be dealt with by Wave (this is assuming that it really takes off).

I don’t have a background in scaling web services but it seems to me that Google may end up having some trouble scaling Wave, and if they don’t (since they can throw tons of servers at it), imagine how tough it is going to be for a small startup to deal with if their public implementation of Wave starts to accumulate a lot of users.

Update 6/4/09: To clarify further, I have not actually used Google Wave. I am excited for it and do want to use it. I hope I will be able to get a lot of use out of Google Wave but am worried that I won’t be able to convince any of my non tech-savvy friends to actually use the service, and that is precisely why I don’t expect it to do well.

Update 7/22/09: PC Magazine says that so far Google has restricted Wave to only 6,000 or so developers but on September 30 Google plans to invite around 100,000 users to join the beta.

Update 10/14/09: Gina Trapani has published a list of Google Wave’s best use cases on Lifehacker. An interesting list but after reading through it I still don’t know why I or any other average home user would use it. The only items on the list that would apply have better options available, e.g. for updating loved ones on health issues you’d be better off just using email and/or text messaging or for organizing a busy schedule you’d probably be better off just using an online calendar.

Today on TechCrunch Michael Arrington revealed the conceptual drawings for the CrunchPad. Also, saying that the industrial design of the device is almost done.

The enclosure is now made of aluminum instead of plastic, which is more expensive but makes the whole device much more sturdy and allows them to cut the overall thickness of the device down to 18mm.

The device runs Linux and boots directly into a WebKit based web browser. They have posted a video to YouTube showing the devices software off including various gestures that are used to navigate. I’m not too fond of the gesture idea but I am getting really excited about the device.

There hasn’t been any more news about pricing but Arrington did say in his post today that the next time they talk publicly about the CrunchPad will be at a press and user event sometime in July.

Here it is folks, this is the beginning of WWDC 2009. I know it doesn’t technically start until Monday but this is when all the action starts happening. This marks the first bit of actual news that we’ve received from Apple at WWDC, “news” being used a little loosely.

From the image above we see the main banner in Moscone West which reads:

“One year later. Light-years ahead.”

Which everyone assumes to be referring to the App Store, but it is also possible that this will become the theme of the event. Not only does the App Store feel like it is light-years ahead of what it was last year, but maybe even the new iPhone and Snow Leopard will feel the same way.

WWDC kicks off this Monday June 8, 2009 and runs through June 12, 2009. The keynote begins Monday morning at 10:00am PT, 1:00pm ET.

Engadget has heard from a “trusted” source that the new iPhone will be coming in 4GB, 8GB, 16GB, and 32GB capacities, or at least those capacities seem to have been approved by the PCS Type Review Certification Board. This standards body certifies handsets for use with some carriers, AT&T included.

Adding more validity to this rumor, a Boy Genius Report tipster took some pictures of Fido’s 2009 hardware lineup, which includes a $99 4GB iPhone. The Boy Genius hasn’t been able to confirm the information in the images so there is currently no reason to believe that they are real, other than the fact that they exist (the images that is).

The most interesting part of the Fido images is the listing of “Video Calling (iChat)” as a feature. Could that front facing camera finally be coming to the iPhone?

Update 6/3/09: The Green Room has posted a single image with a rundown of every 2009 iPhone rumor. A great reference for what to expect on Monday.

Update 6/6/09: Joseph Menn of the Financial Times says:

“Apple plans to introduce a cheaper version of its popular iPhone as soon as Monday, in a move that could dramatically increase the company’s share of the market for web-surfing devices, people familiar with the initiative said on Thursday.”

Update 6/10/09: Although the 4GB and video chat parts of this rumor were fake, there is now a $99 iPhone. WWDC Keynote 2009.