Everything Apple Announced at Today's iPad and Apple Watch Event in Just Seven Minutes

[ThunderSkunk]

The tech isn’t new anymore. It’s very mature.

Only if you draw the finish line at your own two feet. Five thousand years from now, no one will look back on 2020, and say there was no need to innovate any further because technology was "very mature" at that point. If you can't think of anything between what an iOS device does today and teleportation, I can see why you went to the "The Tech has Matured" defense. ...which, in every industry, especially tech, might as well be shorthand for "I'm out of ideas", & is a very risky position to take.

The iPad... a $1500 cellular & GPS enabled iPad Pro can't even handle being the base device for the Apple Watch. The iPad mini, the most portable, useful and for the longest time popular iPad, hasn't seen a meaningful upgrade since 2015, and just today they updated the base model iPad to its chipset. The progress being made is slow as molasses here. The watch team has been busy on the 6 and that's great, but the business end of the watch is still a klugey mess and the only other thing Apple had to show off this year are a budget iPad & budget Watch, as if there weren't already a glut of old cheaper models of both to get into. That entire iOS line is headed into in the same logjam the notebook line was in for years...

Compared to the duo of an iPad and Watch, the iPhone is an unnecessary redundancy, sitting in a dock costing a hundred dollars a month while serving no real purpose. It has neither the real estate, power & stylus of the iPad, nor the mobility & sensors of the watch. Apple is putting off the inevitable bifurcation as long as possible, milking the profitability of the phone's waning popularity, but it hamstrings the other two, and effectively makes all three products worse.

 

[ThunderSkunk]

I dislike that "diversity quota" thing, you have to flash a big smiling face of every race on the planet or something to include everyone, or as good as everyone.

I guess they could just show Asian people only, since most people in the world are, and it would actually reflect the prime demographic in the world at this point.

 

[ian87w]

Quite disappointed with this Apple event.

Apple seemingly started with an understanding of the upcoming challenging market with the $399 iPhone SE. But I guess the margins gotta come from somewhere.

Apple Watch S3 is old and dated. The AW SE should've been the replacement at $199, not marked up to be $279.
iPad Air, as I was expected, becomes an iPad Pro lite and up in price to $599, leaving the $499 slot empty. Way to monetize the demand for home computing with Covid lockdown...

The biggest reason I'm quite disappointed, especially with the price increase, is that the pricing in my country will be marked up even more. The old $499 iPad Air was already $700 in my country. This new iPad Air will probably be closer to $900, making it ultra ridiculous.

 

[Jony Ive and Co.]

I miss Phil Schiller. Please come back 😢 😢
The other presenters are so comical and just lack that charm (except Craig who was in the way of the video)

 

[123]

where is the innovation gone; they spend more time talking about the environment than give up great hardware

The innovation is the new plan to save the environment: release only boring products so people won't buy them.

 

[nitramluap]

I know they're trying to keep it simple but 'pulse oximeter saturation != blood oxygen levels'.

Pulse oximetry measures Hb oxygen saturation, and more specifically *functional* Hb oxygen saturation - ie. Hb that *can* bind oxygen (ie. not carboxy-Hb, Met-Hb, etc). You can have normal oxygen saturations and actually be hypoxaemic.

'Blood oxygen levels' can only be truly known with a laboratory co-oximeter and the patient's haemoglobin level.

</PENDANT>

 

[DocMultimedia]

I can give you the summary in much less than seven minutes. 1) updated iPads. 2) updated Watch.

That's a wrap.

 

[mashdots]

I thought Federighi had the best lines.

his hair is really going nuts these days, too

 

[jozeppy26]

Plethysmograph-based pulse and pulse oximetry have been around since at least the 1960s.

Oximetry likely was a feature on Apple's Watch roadmap right from the beginning, as was pulse measurement, which came out sooner, but Apple chose to roll out the oximetry function later rather than sooner. Not a big deal. I'd be shocked if there weren't excellent reasons for doing so.

One major reason: the FDA. Every single Apple Watch can perform pulse oximetery, it’s just not enabled until now. I’m disappointed in Apple for not pursuing approval and enabling this feature in all watches, especially during a global pandemic when a drop in resting O2 sat might trigger someone to seek medical help sooner rather than later.

 

[AE_stc]

While I appreciate it, I dislike that "diversity quota" thing, you have to flash a big smiling face of every race on the planet or something to include everyone, or as good as everyone. I like the older Apple ads when they just focused on the product, not whoever might use it.

Agreed. The “one of each!” Nonsense just for the sake of having them is so disingenuous

 

[patent10021]

Is it Emma Thompson's voice in the iWatch 6 ad? Great ad!

Helena Bonham Carter

 

[ivladster]

Millions will be sold. Good job, Apple on riding the wave of mature product lines.

 

[nitramluap]

Every single Apple Watch can perform pulse oximetery

No they absolutely cannot. It requires the differential absorption of infrared AND red light to determine that. Only these new devices have the required red LEDs.

 

[katbel]

**UNDERWHELMING**

Apple hasn't wowed me in a few years now... Still waiting for something worthwhile from Apple. Miss Steve 😥

I'm so with you. Boring like an empty gift box wrapped in fancy paper and ribbon!

 

[MrkJensen]

Like watching laundry!!!

 

[Biu_miu]

Well that’s the final nail in the coffin for Prosser’s reputation. Let’s never mention him again.

What? Why? I think the is a snake and bad person on the inside, but this presentation was literally what he predicted- Air, iPad 8, AW 6, AW SE, maybe AirTags

 

[0924487]

I will try out Huawei this year. It seems 2020 is not a big year for Apple. Also, the iPad lineup is so fragmented.

 

[skitidetdu]

I remember when Apple used to present new cateogies and innovative products vs. painting pretty colors on usual tech. Apple has gone from a computer company to a technology company to a services company.

Flame on.

Every company needs services to complement its tech nowadays. It adds value for the customer and cash flow fit the company. If they don’t do it themselves someone else will.

 

[BuddyTronic]

Confirming there's no need to upgrade anything.

The blood oxygen monitor will save more lives than the ecg feature I think. Lots of snoring sleeping people probably have sleep apnea and I think this would have abig chance of catching it. Think how many people you know who snore. Those guys need this oxygen

Worth upgrading? I think so.

 

[ErikGrim]

I will try out Huawei this year. It seems 2020 is not a big year for Apple. Also, the iPad lineup is so fragmented.

This isn't an airport, no need to announce your departure.

 

[BuddyTronic]

You can tell that the iPhone supply chain wasn't ready so they pushed the fall iPad updates to this month.

I really wanted a new watch and ordered the 6 today. Then I watched the presentation of the SE watch and now I'm having second thoughts! It's the blood oxygen sensor that puts me over the edge as I have some health issues. Gotta stop second guessing myself!!

no brainer - get the oxygen monitor I’d say. It’s worth a few steak dinners more in price to get the latest tech.

 

[swagi]

I agree with you to a degree but don't think it's true of the Apple Watch. It felt like the year it became stale and hasn't had a real update for a couple of years. There is plenty of room for improvement for the Watch:
- Needs to be significantly thinner
- Needs to have a significantly better battery (1 day vs Fitbit's 6)
- Needs to remove the black bezel from the edge of the screen

Almost all of what was announced in terms of functionality could be achieved with a software update to existing devices. The watch has not seen a serious update since Series 4.

Thanks for your post as it demonstrates very well to which audience Apple is catering.

There are two kinds of people using a watch. Group 1 is the fashionistas. In Group 2 you will find the people that actually see the watch as a tool.

I could give a hoot about device thickness - as a matter of fact I'd rather have a thicker and in respect to that more durable device with longer battery life. I don't need decent, fancy, colorist. I need a watch to be a tool. Especially when it's main job is doing everything it can (most of the time measuring time - you know, a watch) precisely and reliably.

I'm in no way a watch person - but if I'd ever consider a watch again a daily reload cycle is an absolute dealbreaker for me. Wake me up when Apple has achieved a weekly routine (which will never happen, as the device itself actually has to get bigger to fit more battery).

But hey - those fashionistas get Emoji watch faces. If that's not enough to tip you over to buy a new watch then Apple marketing dropped the ball.

 

[Mr. Dee]

Remember Apple sold desktop and laptop computers for decades with each year being mostly updates to the design and spec bumps. Eventually after 13 years (19 if you count the iPod) in consumer electronics versus 23 years for the Mac by 2007, things would run out of steam; and be on an iterative journey going forward.

This is why the company has moved aggressively on services because they know that the hardware innovation has been exhausted. There really isn’t much left to corner: cars, tv, what else really?

For me, I’ve had very little reason to upgrade since I made big purchases in spring 2018. The current pandemic has also caused me to reevaluate my purchase decisions. Typing a Word document and reading Politico on a Apple Silicon Mac vs my 2015 MBP won’t be that different.

Apple at the end of the day has certainly changed my computing habits. Would I want to go back to 2007 style computing? No, I can’t fault the company and believe even if Steve lived to this point, he would have stumbled into the same innovation brick wall, too. Guess what, he would have accepted it, too and likely would have already retired by iPhone X by concluding the company is in good health and makes products that are good enough being on an iterative path.

Even Jony Ive himself reached that point of enlightenment that many said he checked out years ago. His only remaining obsession being Apple Park, which was basically completing a final piece of Steve’s legacy.

 

[Peperino]

Another disappointing Apple event that could have just taken 5minutes, or have simply been a press release.
Quite lame that Apple is doing an event to present a meh upgrade for just 2 products.
What a waste of money, time and resources...

This event clearly shows what Apple has become. A simple consumer product company that forgot how to innovate.

So sad.

 

[ds2000]

That was a pretty painful watch. Very dull, very loud (almost crass) at times too, un apple-like.
This event should have been 25 mins max