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[Desktop computers]
Tuesday 6th January 2009
Live announcements from Apple's keynote 4:55PM, Tuesday 6th January 2009
MacUser's live coverage from the Moscone Center in San Francisco will appear here shortly. The keynote is running slightly behind schedule but will begin soon.

Note: announcements are posted in reverse order (latest at top).

One last thing... iTunes
In just less than six years, have sold over six billion songs. Over 10 million songs available, the largest digital music library in the world. Now have over 75 million accounts with credit cards. It's the number one channel for music in the US.

New for 2009 are:

Price changes
Flat pricing model in past but the music companies wanted more flexibility, which comes in April. There will be $0.69, $0.99 and $1.29 price points. Schiller affirms that more songs will be sold at $0.69 than $1.29.

iTunes Plus
Starting today there will be 8 million songs from all the major labels that are DRM free, and iTunes entire library will be DRM free by the end of this quarter.

Reminds us that upgrading DRM-protected content can be done with a single click.

iTunes Music Store on iPhone
Can now download all songs on Wifi and 3G networks, and it's the same selection as on a Mac or PC, at the same price and the same quality.

Preview and purchase any music on your iPhone at anytime and anywhere, and it syncs back to your computer. This starts today.

Why we do this...
Affirms same sentiment as Jobs at latest iPod launch, that Apple loves music. Introduces Tony Bennett to the stage to mark the end of Apple's final keynote at the expo on a positive note. He performs The Best Is Yet To Come followed by his signature song, I Left My Heart in San Francisco to a standing ovation.

10:10am - 17in MacBook Pro
MacBook has been the number one notebook in the US for the last eight months. Shows the 17in model.

0.98in model, the world's thinnest 17in notebook.
6.6 pounds, the world's lightest 17in notebook.

LED backlit display
1920x1200, 133dpi

140 degrree horizontal and 20 degree vertical viewing angles
700:1 contrast ratio
60% greater colour gamut than previous models.
Some of highest end customers

$50 Anti-Glare Option, which removes the glass front and replaces the black bezel with a metallic one.

All ports are on the left-hand side, like the other MacBook Pros. This one has three USB 2.0 ports.

Also has the new glass trackpad. 39% larger, multi-touch for gestures.

2.93GHz Dual Core and 8GB Memory at 1066MHZ DDR3.

Has the same integrated GeForce 9400M processor, and the 96500M GT with 512MB memory.

320GB HDD as stardard, or a 256GB solid-state drive.

The most innovative feature is Apple's longest battery life ever, without compromising on size and weight. Plays a video explaining how it was done.

Lasts 8 hours on a single charge and can be fully recharged up to 1000 times.

Competitors batteries waste a lot of space with cylindrical shapes, but Apple's are custom designed Lithium Polymer technology that extends the lifespan to three times the industry standard.

Adaptive charging reduces the wear and tear on a battery, hence the increase in the number of possible recharges. A chip in the battery reports the state of each cell in the battery to the system.

Also touts the environmental credentials. The number of recharges means each a typical lifespan of 5 years, so fewer will end up in landfills.

The convergence of technologies means Apple can deliver on the goal of a useful day's work from a single charge.

7 hours with the 9600 and 8 hours running with the 9400M graphics processor.

3 hours longer than previous model, a 60% increase.

Comes in one configuration but with build-to-order options.

4GB of memory as standard, and the same price ($2799 in the US). Shipping late January.

Again touts the environmental credentials with an Epeat Gold rating, then shows a new TV ad dedicated to the 17in model.

10:03am - iWork.com beta
Collaborative office software that lets you easily upload and notify others on your team. View your documents online, add comments and notes, and download a local copy to work on.

A new button in all iWork applications creates and uploads online versions and sends notifications to the relevant people.

Person receives a link that opens their browser, where they can add notes on the document or in the right-hand column, where the document can be downloaded as iWork and Microsoft Office formats.

Works with multiple browsers: Safari, Firefox and IE.

New item in Share menu shows shared documents online. Multiple people can work on a document at once. Blue dot next to a document indicates there are new notes. In page thumbnails on the left, an orange tab indicates a page that contains new notes.

It's free to sign up for the beta, which launches today. It will have a cost attached after the beta ends. Schiller says it's more convenient than emailing documents back and forth. Customers will be able to send feedback and feature suggestions.

9:49am - iWork 09
Starts shipping today. In the US, it costs $79, or $99 for a family pack, and $49 if bought with a new Mac. Requires Leopard.

Mac Box Set
$169 gets you the Mac Box Set, which contains iLife 09, iWork 09 and Mac OS X Leopard.

This is the second version of Numbers.

Table categories allow you to reorganise a table just by clicking on the column rather than by name, as before.

Easy formula writing includes a dictionary of all the functions that you can use in a formula along with details of their parameters.

New chart options.

Linked charts to paste into Pages or Keynote, and you can update the original Numbers spreadsheet and click a single button to update it in those applications.

Next up is Pages 09 and demonstrates the full-screen view, with menus and other elements still accessible by moving the cursor to the screen edges.

Dynamic outlines allow you to reorganise content and it's automatically rejigged when you return to page view.

There's also Mail merge with Numbers.

Mathtype and EndNote to help with creation of mathematical equations and bibliographies for professional documents.

There are also 40 new templates.

This presentation was made in Keynote 09. There are new tools in it:

Magic Move does all the hard work to move objects between your slides. You set up static slides with common elements, and some removed. Animation is generated by Keynote for you. Shows an example using a scattering of cards that are then

Object transitions allow objects on two slidesto be animated automatically at different speed for a very natural feeling.

Shows the swing transition to
 
 
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show the change from Bush to Obama. Also anagram transitions to retain only those letters that are common in consecutive slides.

Chart animationsRotate and grow, zoom and other transitions, along with new themes and textures including wood.

One new feature is Keynote Remote, an application for iPhone and iPod touch. Portrait mode shows slide with speaker notes beneath, while landscape shows current and next slide. Flick in either mode to advance to the next slide.

9:07am - iLife 09
Brings people to the Mac and it's the best suite available.

There's also iWeb 09 and iDVD 09, but they aren't demonstrated today. Begins shipping at the end of January.

GarageBand 09
Only going to talk about one new feature that's a breakthrough: Learn to Play.

The feature has a different user interface with a video instruction and, in this example, a fretboard of the guitar. Buttons at the bottom of the screen give you control over the speed at which you're working. Plays a short segment of one lesson's introduction, then shows a sample of a lesson playing a piano. Shows the treble and bass staves alongside the video so that you can learn notation as well.

9 basic lessons for guitar and 9 basic lessons for piano and download extra ones to learn them.

Artist Lessons from famous musicians including John Fogerty, Colbie Callair, Patrick Stump (Fall Out Boy) and Sting on guitar, and Sarah McLachlan, Ryan Tedder (One Republic), Norah Jones on piano. All teaching you to play versions of their own songs.

Tell you the story behind the song, view lyrics and notation, practice with original tracks, create your own mix, and slow down any part until you've mastered it.

Plays a lengthy segment of John Fogerty teaching his song, Proud Mary.

iMovie 09
The previous version of iMovie removed features that some customers needed. Now they've added much more depth and power to blow users away.

New Precision editor with an expanded view of the timeline.

Advanced drag and drop of clips onto the timeline reveals a pop-up menu with various options such as

Dynamic themes
Animated travel maps to show 2D and 3D maps of your travels as part of a video.

Automatic movie stabilisation to salvage footage that would otherwise be too shaky to use.

Schiller welcomes Randy Ubillos, Chief Arthitect of Video Applications, to the stage. He came up with iMovie's new editing tools

Can select between a standard and advanced mode in preferences. In advanced mode, pop-up menus have even more options.

Can mark part of a video clip in the library, drag it onto the timeline and use the pop-up menu to use only the audio portion of the marked clip.

The Precision Editor appears across the bottom of the screen, with footage before the edit on the top row and footage after it on the right. Shows unused footage as well, to make refining a video edit much easier.

Audio track can be edited separately by revealing the audio tracks, so that audio can extend beyond edit points.

Next demo is video stabilisation using footage from a moving vehicle and it's very smooth. Vehicle is moving alongside wildlife but shakiness makes it hard to see the gazelle. It's much more obvious with stabilisation applied.

Video effects are applied live and all you can roll over each one to see the results in real time.

Next he shows the animated maps. Just type in the location names and iPhoto creates a high-quality 2D or 3D map. It's a lot like the transitions used in the Indiana Jones movies.

Shows a finished project and it certainly appears very professional. He has only shown a subset of the feature list. Leaves the stage and Schiller returns. Says everyone will love the new iMovie, both old and new users.

iPhoto 09
Could previously look at photos in events based on time. Has turned out to be very useful and popular with customers.

Events will be joined by Faces, which appears in the sidebar. How does it work?

It uses Face Detection technology. Go into an event, click on an picture and name the person. It finds the face in the photo and that's all you have to do. That person appears in the Faces list.

Complemented by Face Recognition techonlogy. Go into a person's snapshot and you see the original photo at the top. Beneath are all the photos that iPhoto thinks are a match from your photo library.

Third way to find photos is Places, which also appears in the sidebar. Click it and you see a map with pins where photos were taken.

It uses GPS Geotagging, as GPS tags are in more cameras. Quotes a recent Nikon Coolpix and the iPhone.

iPhoto reverse encodes geotags and works out the place and even the name of the location. It doesn't matter that older photos have no geotags as you can click on a photo and click on a map to assign one and adds the geotag information to the older photo.

The map technology comes from Google Maps and works exactly the same, with double-clicks to zoom in all the way down to see either a street map or satellite imagery. Flip an even over in the main window and you'll see a map with red pins to mark all of the photos in the event, and rolling over the thumbnail highlights the current picture with a blue pin.

Also added support for Facebook and Flickr built directly into Flickr without the need for plug-ins. Facebook allows others to name people in your photo, and these changes are synchronised back to iPhoto. Flickr supports this along with geotagging.

Also new is Slideshow themes. Shows a series of ballet photos in which iPhoto uses the Face Detection technology to automatically center on people's faces during a slideshow.

The Shadow theme produces cutout transitions on the fly, so that people in photos are lifted out of the picture as

They can be synchronised to the iPhone, too. The updated book feature also lets you place maps of where photos were taken so that they appear alongside in your printed books.

Schiller is giving a live demonstration of these features.

While demonstrating the map view, he switches to a column view, much like the browser columns in iTunes. Columns let you find photos by country in the left-most column and more refined locations.

9:03am
Phil Schiller appears on stage to applause. Declares his excitement to deliver this year's keynote and appreciates everyone showing up.

Talking about how much buzz there is about Apple around the world, thanks to its stores around the world. Shows photos from China, Munich and the huge store in Sydney.

He's really happy to see the Apple logo glowing on the store front, and he can't imagine any other company delivering something like that.

With the resurgence of popularity of the Mac, today will focus upon it.

Fiscal year grew twice as fast as rest of industry thanks to the hardware, Mac OS X Leopard and the fantastic applications.

He has three new things to tell us about.

3.4m customers visit an Apple store around the world each week. Equivalent to 100 expos each and every week.

8:55am
Waiting for keynote to begin.

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