Speculators believe the biggest point to be made at this event is that Apple will significantly lower its prices on all MacBook models. Apple is expected to revamp its entire notebook line at this notebook-only event, as all MacBooks models are due for an upgrade. The MacBook and MacBook Pro lines were last updated last February with Penryn processors and a multi-touch trackpad to the MacBook Pro. The MacBook Air was first introduced last January at Macworld Expo 2008 at a very high price-point. Apple is known for introducing first-generation products at a very high price point, then making significant price cuts on the next generation.

Apple has lately been straying from using plastic in its products and moving to more environmentally-friendly and high-grade materials, such as aluminum and glass. The MacBook is the last major Apple product line that has yet to transition away from plastic and this event will likely be the event where this transition will be made. If the MacBook models are to transition to an aluminum enclosure, the MacBooks will look simply appear as a smaller MacBook Pro. For this reason, Apple could consolidate the MacBook Pro and MacBook lines into one singular “MacBook” line with different models with varying screen sizes and internal configurations.

With this seed, Apple continued to polish Leopard’s user interface. New app icons, new desktop backgrounds, new welcome video, and UI elements polish.

An important change Apple’s made with OS X is now some of the more important CoreService applications, like Spotlight, Exposé, and Front Row can be launched through independent apps that are now available in the Applications folder, similar to the Dashboard app. Spaces can also be launched as an application.

Other minor tweaks Apple has made with 9A559 include:

• iCal displaying the date even when not active
• New music with the welcome video
• New icons for the Desktop, Spaces, and Front Row
• New desktop backgrounds. One of them is the iPhone’s default desktop background (which was taken by NASA), the other is a beautiful profile of the Earth.
• Further universal UI polishing

It looks like Leopard is really close to reaching Release Candidate stage. As Apple continues to push out seeds more frequently, it seems Apple’s making the final UI polishes before Leopard is finally declared Gold Master. So far, I’m really impressed with the improvements Apple’s made with the UI.

New Welcome Video

Let’s start small with the Shuffle.

New pastel colors. Still $79 and same memory capacities. Yep, that’s pretty much it. Let’s move on.

The New Nano

One of the biggest announcements at the Keynote was the new video-playing, “stubby” Nano. Now that the Nano has video, all iPods with a screen have video. The Nano is still offered only in 4GB and 8GB models. I have 4 hours of video in my library and thats 3Gb. So for me, the 4GB would not be able to handle my video and music library. Now let’s say I upgrade to the 8GB. This leaves me about 4GB of music. But why would i do that. For $50 more I could buy myself an 80GB Classic with a .5 inch bigger screen. I don’t understand why Apple added video to the Nano. They now have mixed all of their iPod customers into one type. Now your only buying screen size and capacity.

For me, the Nano is definitely not the iPod for me. For people who really plan on watching video, they need to consider the iPod Classic or iPod Touch. I think Apple just added video functionality for casual occasional videos – maybe video podcasts or music videos. However, I do think the Nano is still great for running, especially with the Nike+ iPod kit.

By the way, the new Nanos have games too, but I don’t look forward to playing games on such a tiny screen. If I want to game, I’ll buy a PSP or DS. However, it will be interesting what homebrew cooks up for the iPhone and iPod Touch for games. So far, we’ve got NES, “Lights Out”, Yahtzee!, Blackjack, Minesweeper, and more.

One of the bigger announcements was that the new iPod Nano now comes with a new user-interface (and possibly a brand new OS) that allows for Cover Flow and some more eye candy.

So the Nano. 4GB, only silver for $149. 8GB, silver, blue, green, black, and red for $199. Thinner, wider, and now with video.

iPod Classic

Honestly nothing revolutionary here. The biggest surprise was probably the name change. No longer can you buy simply an “iPod”. A big surprise for others is probably the amazing memory capacity available.

The new iPod Classics are now all metal. The front plastic from the 5G iPod has been replaced to the same metal Apple is using with the Nano. Apple has curiously kept the back the same metal as the 5G iPod. I believe this will raise appeal. Now the outside won’t scratch (at least it wont be as easy to) and the memory capacity is amazing for people with serious video and/or audio libraries.

The new iPod also comes bundled with the new OS Apple has written for the Nano. The iPod Classics are available in 80GB and 160GB models. They are $250 and $350 respectively. Silver has replaced white, and will probably now make the black model even more popular.

iPod Touch

The iPod Touch was probably the most exciting announcement. Well, you know the iPhone. Take away the phone and you’ve got the iPod Touch. It’s an iPod with a 3.5 in touch screen. It has Safari with Wifi, the whole thing. It also has YouTube, MobileCalendar, MobileAddressBook. However, Apple did not include a Mail application or the stock, weather, or Google Maps applications. MobileOSX includes Cover flow with the accelerometer.

The iPod Touch models are both a bit thinner than the iPhone. The iPod Touch does not have a microphone – which will make it hard for hackers to possibly turn the Touch into a VOiP iPhone. There is an 8GB and a 16GB version. Only $299 and $399 respectively.

iPhone

The iPhone’s price has been reduced to $399. It’s now only available in 8GB version. IMO Good move Apple. Anyone with a budget to buy the iPhone would buy the 8GB version for only $100 more. But now with only an 8GB model available and the price drop Apple has told us a lot. Plus anyone who bought their phone before this price drop gets a $100 rebate. The new smaller price difference between the iPhone and iPods will probably make potential iPod buyers consider an iPhone. Apple’s recent aggressiveness will really pay off with one of the best fourth quarters ever.

What else could there possibly be?

Actually, a lot. The biggest “side-announcement” was probably the new Wi-Fi iTunes music store. You can browse a full iTunes music store and download them straight to your iPod touch or iPhone. This is what people have been asking for since the first video iPods were released. I can see this significantly boosting iTunes music sales. Apple has setup a great convenience for people to buy that song they are listening to on the radio on impulse with just a few “taps”. Now Apple has caught the impulse buyer too. I think this will boost the iTunes Store to the next level in music sales.

What else could Apple do to please us? What about the iPhone owners who were extremely upset after the price drop? Steve Jobs personally acknowledged the dissatisfaction from early iPhone adopters and has written a short open letter to all iPhone customers. In the letter, Steve clarifies why they dropped the price and then apologizes that Apple hasn’t really taken care of its most loyal customers and announced a soon-to-be-available $100 in-store rebate. Isn’t Steve the best?

Apple is also taking advantage of the potential with custom ringtones? In iTunes 7.4, it is now (actually will soon be) possible. Once you buy a song in the iTunes Store you pick a 30 second section and apply fade-ins and/or fade-outs. It does cost $0.99 though. But $1.98 for a song and ringtone is cheaper than just a normal ringtone from your normal provider. Hackers have successfully circumvented this process by simply renaming m4a music file with an “.m4r” extension and then syncing their iPhones. It’s a relatively simple process, however it seems to have already been patched by Apple with iTunes 7.4.1. But software applications such as iToner ($15) and the free iPhone application “SendSong” are able to make ringtones without having to pay the extra 99 cents every time.

The 1.83 GHz combo drive model is available for $599 and the 2.0GHz superdrive model is available for $799. Each models have standard 1GB RAM, and the 1.8 GHz model has a 80GB HD while the 2.0 GHz model has a 120GB HD.

The new aluminum keyboards are also available for $79 for the wireless model and $49 for the wired model. Apple has discontinued the full wireless keyboard, replacing it with a wireless MacBook-sized keyboard. The decision has already brought on a lot of harsh criticism from bloggers and reviewers who miss the full-sized wireless keyboard.

The features in this productivity suite really do make it a fierce competitor with Microsoft Office. The new innovative features, user interface, and Apple-designed templates raise the application suite to a whole new level of productivity, compatibility, and functionality.

Key points from the website include:

Pages

• Two independent application modes, one for word-processing and another for page layout
• Easier text format manipulation
• 80 new Apple-designed templates
• New graphic tools, including “instant alpha” (removing backgrounds from photos)

Keynote

• New transitions and effects
• Voice-over recording
• Automatic “smart builds”
• 35 new Apple-designed templates

Numbers

• Complete compatibility with Microsoft Excel
• A number of Apple-designed templates and chart textures
• Advanced manipulation of tables, canvases, layouts, charts, maps, grids, etc.
• “Interactive Print View”. Scale and arrange layouts before printing.

The user interface on these new applications are stunning and fresh, and it truly does seem to be the biggest update to iLife ever.

Key points from the video include:

iPhoto

• Integration with .Mac’s Web Gallery
• New “Events” Library organization
• Themed-printing features
• New iTunes-eque UI

iMovie

• Supposedly recoded
• Brand new UI, project workflow
• Supposedly faster, easier
• New formats
• Export to YouTube, iPhone, iPod, .Mac
• Additional format support (video promotes AVCHD)

iDVD

• Ten new animated themes
• Improved slideshow features
• Improved performance

iWeb

• Integration with Google AdSense
• Integration with YouTube videos
• Integration with Google Maps (creating and sharing custom map views)
• Improved support for iWeb hosting on non-.Mac servers
• Better photo navigation and viewing

Garageband

• An automated song generator with custom interments and genres, featuring an innovative UI
• Improved track and sound manipulation (EQ, effects, etc.)

Today Apple released a new generation of iMacs that sport an exciting new design, with glass and aluminum as the primary case materials.

The new iMac models are much slimmer, have a glossy glass screen and an aluminum casing similar to previous rumors.

The iMac also comes with the new slim keyboard that was leaked on gadget websites a few weeks ago, with new button functions and low-profile keys.

The new iMacs are available at $1,199 for the 20-inch, $1,499 for the 20-inch with a processor and graphics upgrade, and $1,799 for the 24-inch iMac.

Today, new reports are describing a notification .Mac subscribers are seeing today on the .Mac homepage.

Due to scheduled maintenance, .Mac members might be intermittently unable to access some .Mac services from 10 AM to 12 PM PDT on 08/07/2007. We apologize for any inconvenience.

The notification describes the update to be issued somewhere between 10 and 12 tomorrow morning, which is the exact same time the special event is to take place. This leads to speculation that a new version of .Mac and some new features could also be delivered along with the other Mac product updates.

So, this brings me back to wondering if the WWDC rumors of a Google-Apple partnership are going to be announced tomorrow. Apple and Google worked together on developing great integration with online Google services; Google supplies the back-end and Apple develops the slick interface. Together, they could release an online services bundle that could be ad-supported, featuring productivity applications and integration with Google’s stable online services.

This strategy would benefit both companies, mainly because of their mutual competitor Microsoft, which plans to seek domination over internet multimedia. Together, they could offer a powerful line of web applications and services that are stable, easy-to-use, integrated with iLife and iWork, and offer a sleek “Apple-like” interface.

[Via AppleGazette]

• Aperture
• Apple Pro Apps
• Front Row
• iTunes 7 (including Front Row)
• Leopard Quicklook
• iPhone and AppleTV GUI

Well, now Steve has revealed the true user interface of Leopard will be, and it comes quite close to our speculation half-a-year ago. However, Apple did not rename OS X’s interface to Illuminous, as rumored. Supposedly, Aqua remains as the OS X interface, but now its evolved into a shiny, iTunes 7-like, animated, glassy user interface that we predicted for Illuminous.

The core of the new interface seems to be centered around the Desktop and Finder, both have been revamped in Leopard. The menu bar is transparent and the dock now has a 3D “block” look. The Finder now behaves much like iTunes 7, with a sidebar and CoverFlow navigation.

Other notable user-interface details concerning Leopard:

• The Finder can now has a large thumbnail view
• The top corners of the screen are no longer rounded
• Front Row now resembles AppleTV’s user-interface
• DVD Player now sports an “iPhoto full-screen mode” interface
• Quicktime movies can now be played fullscreen via Quicklook
• Developers can now build their own effects for Photo Booth
• iCal now has a revamped interface
• iChat features new effects for video conferences and a new sidebar/tabbed navigation

Safari 3 Public Beta is available for a free download from Apple at http://www.apple.com/safari/download/.