So last night’s Apple Keynote went as everyone had expected. There weren’t any “One more thing…” moments throughout the night, just the usual stuff like new products, their goal of changing the world and how they’re conserving and preserving the planet. Apple turns 40 this year, so it was only apt for Apple to start off the presentation with a video entitled “40 Years In 40 Seconds”, which highlighted key moments and products through the history of Apple’s existence, from the Apple I to the colourful iMacs to the “I am a PC. I am a Mac.” ads.
Apart from the new products that Apple has to offer, they also announced advancements made to their open source ResearchKit™ framework that has helped medical researchers around the world in bringing genetic data and medical tests that are usually conducted in exam rooms to the iPhone apps. They also launched the CareKit™, a new software framework to help developers create apps to empower people in managing their own medical conditions.
If you don’t have the time to check out Apple’s hour-long keynote, here’s a quick rundown of what you need to know about the latest Apple products.
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iPhone SE
While most of us enjoy the larger screen that the iPhone 6S and 6S+ has to offer, there is still a market for a smaller iPhone. For Apple, their 4-inch iPhones are still important to them, especially since they’ve sold over 30 million of them last year. It took them two and a half years to sell that many iPhones when they first started, from their entire lineup. So if you’ve always loved smaller phones, Apple now has you covered. It even has a new name for it – the iPhone SE. Pre-order begins 24 March, and will be available in Singapore on 31 March.
• Design
– 4-inch Retina® display
– Bead-blasted aluminium design with matt-chamfered edges and colour-matched stainless steel inset Apple logo
• Camera
– 12-megapixel iSight Camera with f/2.2 aperture
– 4K Video recording (30fps)
– 1080p HD video recording at 30fps or 60fps
– 720 HD video recording at 30fps
– Slow-mo videos for 1080p at 120fps and 720p at 240fps
– Time-lapse videos with stabilisation
– Live Photos
– Panorama (up to 63 megapixels)
– 1.2-megapixel FaceTime HD Camera with f/2.4 aperture
– Front-facing Camera has Retina Flash: display momentarily becomes three times brighter with True Tone® lighting technology
• Hardware/Software
– 64-bit A9 chip & M9 motion co-processor, giving it the same processing and GPU performance as the iPhone 6S
– iOS 9
– TouchID
• Pricing
– Avail in Space Grey, Silver, Gold and Rose Gold
– 16GB: SG$658
– 64GB: SG$828
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9.7-inch iPad Pro
Introduced as the “second member of the iPad Pro family”, it’s pretty much a smaller, 9.7-inch version of its predecessor. Just like the iPhone SE, there has been a significant amount of sales of the original 9.7-inch iPads – 200 million in total to be exact. They’ve also identified that majority of these iPad owners are coming from users who use a Windows PC, and that more than 600 million PCs in use that are more than five years old, later adding that it’s really “sad”. A jab at Microsoft? Probably, but definitely uncalled for. Pre-order begins 24 March, and will be available in Singapore on 31 March.
• Specs & Hardware
– 9.7-inch Retina Display with greater brightness, wider colour gamut and lower reflectivity
– True Tone display, which uses new four-channel sensors to detect the surrounding and adjust the white balance of the display to match the light around you so that it’s better on your eyes
– 6.11mm thick
– 437g (Wi-Fi model), 444 g (Wi-Fi + LTE model)
– Powerful 64-bit A9X chip
– Four-speaker audio system
• Camera
– 12-megapixel iSight camera with f/2.2 aperture
– 5-megapixel FaceTime HD camera with f/2.2 aperture
– similar capabilities as iPhone SE
• Pricing for iPad Pro (Wi-Fi)
– 32GB: SG$898
– 128GB: SG$1,158
– 256GB: SG$1,418
• Pricing for iPad Pro (Wi-Fi + LTE)
– 32GB: SG$1,098
– 128GB: SG$1,358
– 256GB: SG$1,618
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