GadgetDotRed

Apple is holding it’s 14th Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) on June 8th to 12th 2009. The event brings together apple engineers and developers as well as fans and enthusiasts interested in the latest developments in Apple. Apple also releases news on upcoming products as well as uses the event to launch new products. Here’s a summary of the announcements made during the June 8th keynote.

New MacBook Pro Lineup

Apple® updated the aluminum unibody MacBook® Pro line to include 13-inch, 15-inch and 17-inch models featuring Apple’s innovative built-in battery for up to 40 percent longer battery life. Each MacBook Pro includes an LED-backlit display, the innovative glass Multi-Touch™ trackpad, an illuminated keyboard, an SD card or ExpressCard slot, a FireWire® 800 port and state of the art NVIDIA graphics.

The interesting thing about this update is that Apple managed to bump the specs of the notebooks, and in the case of the MacBook Pro 13-inch, the new price was lower than the MacBook it replaced. Another noteworthy tidbit is that on the 13-inch Macbook Pro, there is only one audio jack, which is user selectable for either line in or line out with one exception – it supports the Apple Headset with Microphone – The same one which comes with the iPhone!

Snow Leopard’s September Release

Apple® also unveiled Mac OS® X Snow Leopard™, an even more powerful and refined version of Apple’s Leopard operating system. Snow Leopard builds on OSX innovation and success with hundreds of refinements, new core technologies, out of the box support for Microsoft Exchange and new accessibility features. Snow Leopard will ship as an upgrade for Mac OS X Leopard users in September 2009 for USD$29.

There’s way too many features in Snow Leopard to go into detail here, but here’s 2 groundbreaking features.

64 Bit System - The OS has a 64 bit core, with nearly all system applications rewritten in 64 bits. This enchances the performance as well as future proofs the OS for “whatever computing enhancements might arrive in the future“

Grand Central Dispatch – This built-in technology allows full use of every core in multi core systems to be used by applications. This offloads thread management from the application to the OS, resulting in more responsive apps as well as full utilisation of modern CPUs.

iPhone 3G S

Last but not least, Apple® introduced the new iPhone™ 3G S, their fastest, most powerful iPhone yet, with improved speed and performance, longer battery life,a 3 megapixel autofocus camera, video recording and hands free voice control.

There is no news on Singtel’s apple-inspired site as of today on any informatioon regarding the new iPhone, possibly hitting the region in July. It would be interesting to see if current iPhone users get any upgrade options, and most importantly, at what price.

Images Courtesy of Apple. For more details, do check out the Apple® Website or you can catch the WWDC Keynote posted online as well.

Back in September, we reported that the G1 had launched. Well, the G1 has finally hit our shores and is now available via Singtel

Looks like Singtel managed to score a hat-trick, fielding both the G1(Singtel has rebranded it as the Singtel Dream; ugh!) and the iPhone, giving it the leg-up againast the local mobile competition.

Finally, the iPhone plans are about to be announced. Lets hope we dont see another Canadian Rogers local episode. Here’s the link.

Preparations for Apple’s 3G iPhone are underway in Singapore, with the initial training sessions for Singtel’s support staff almost complete. According to sources, Singtel will be handling the customer support except for hardware and iTunes store support, which Apple will be handling through the usual channels. All training sessions are being protected with NDA’s (in Singapore?!) which is to be expected from Apple, with the Singapore launch date still kept a closely guarded secret, although rumours are being whispered of an early August launch.

As for pricing details, available information is still very sketchy, although MacRyu has posted what is probably most thorough based on the limited information available.