Apple announces cheaper iCloud storage plans, Photos for Mac coming in early 2015

Posted:
in General Discussion edited June 2014
Apple's dedicated Photos application will be making the leap from iPhone and iPad to the Mac early next year, giving users the ability to view all of their pictures synced with iCloud, which will also see a price cut with new, cheaper cloud storage plans.




Photos for Mac was demonstrated at Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference keynote on Monday. It was shown alongside the new Photos app coming with iOS 8, which will launch for iPhone and iPad later this year.

Photos on all platforms includes new editing capabilities, which were shown off by Apple's software chief Craig Federighi. In one demonstration, he showcased the ability to crop, adjust angle and improve colors on an outdoor photo.




With Photos devices will sync all photos as well as videos in their original format and resolution. Photos will sync with iCloud storage, which comes with 5 gigabytes, and files can even be viewed from a browser.

To help those who might have large photo libraries, Apple is also introducing new pricing for iCloud subscriptions. Users can access 20 gigabytes of cloud storage for 99 cents per month, or 200 gigabytes for $3.99 per month. Plans up to 1 terabyte will be available.

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Comments

  • Reply 1 of 55
    andysolandysol Posts: 2,506member

    Excited about this- now I need to clean up my thousands of pictures on my iMac

  • Reply 2 of 55
    woodbinewoodbine Posts: 87member
    Not for me, why not just go head to head with say Google Drive. I get 100GB for 99c per month. Cloud is cloud, I don't see apple really providing any better or worse experience than the rest, so why make it more expensive?
  • Reply 3 of 55
    andysolandysol Posts: 2,506member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by woodbine View Post



    Not for me, why not just go head to head with say Google Drive. I get 100GB for 99c per month. Cloud is cloud, I don't see apple really providing any better or worse experience than the rest, so why make it more expensive?

     

    Google Drive is nowhere near as intuitive.  This is baked into stock iOS Apps (Camera and Photos) that links automatically with all my iDevices and Macs.  Tell me how that's the same as Google Drive.

    $24 difference a year isn't a big deal to me for that ease of use.

  • Reply 4 of 55
    pendergastpendergast Posts: 1,358member
    woodbine wrote: »
    Not for me, why not just go head to head with say Google Drive. I get 100GB for 99c per month. Cloud is cloud, I don't see apple really providing any better or worse experience than the rest, so why make it more expensive?

    How about head to head with DropBox? They're the standard currently.

    Google is cheap because they're trying to buy into the market.
  • Reply 5 of 55
    woodbinewoodbine Posts: 87member
    I will agree it's not as seemless within the OS. I suppose it's more directed at the consumer not the professional. I use both Wuala and GD. I distribute large video files to some 30 countries. I have a folder of files ready to send out, drop them on Wuala or GD, set the distribution links and wait for the upload to complete. I couldn't think of anything less complex.
  • Reply 6 of 55
    andysolandysol Posts: 2,506member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by woodbine View Post



    I will agree it's not as seemless within the OS. I suppose it's more directed at the consumer not the professional.

    For sure- it won't be of any advantage for pros.  But being able to see pics taken on a DSLR of my family that I put on my Mac, and have seemless access to those pics from my iPhone/iPad wherever I am will be great.

    Def. consumer-based.  But hey, that's where the money is.  8-) 

  • Reply 7 of 55
    ppnewsppnews Posts: 1member
    How did you get 100GB for $0.99/mo for Google Drive? I thought the price is $1.99/mo which is about the same price of iCloud of 200GB @ $3.99/mo. I suspect they will have 1TB @ $9.99/mo (same as Google) or even drop to $7.99/mo.

    And obviously iCloud is targeted for Apple users. Finally people can backup their entire phone for somewhat of a reasonable price. Increasing iCloud storage tiers should also hint that a 128GB iPhone is finally up in the horizon.
  • Reply 8 of 55
    fizzyxfizzyx Posts: 2member

    What if I don't want my every photo, every edit, every album to live in the cloud ?

    In this day and age where storage is so cheap, why should we sacrifice internal storage for online storage ? In this time of a supposed lack of internet security and spying, why would I want to put photos of anything on the cloud.

    The storage on idevices are plenty for me, and I don't want to have to worry about being automatically billed for a feature that I not only don't want, but a feature I'm against having in the first place.

    If I take a picture on my phone, I want it securely only on my phone.

    If I take a picture on my 3rd party camera and sync it with iphoto, I want it to live only in my Mac's iphoto library.

    As I said before, internal storage is cheap, it's been cheap for a long time. There's no reason to transfer the hub of my information from something I possess to something in the cloud.

    If there is no option to solely sync with only your hardware devices and not have everything load to the cloud, then this trend could spell the end of my purchasing of Apple products.

  • Reply 9 of 55
    alphafoxalphafox Posts: 132member
    Why wouldn't you just creat a new iCloud photo stream which you can share with whomever you want, right now, and has zero size limitations?
  • Reply 10 of 55
    ronmgronmg Posts: 163member
    I would love to have the ability to photo search from my iPhone to my iMac photo library without having to sync to this new iCloud service. Will that be possible?
  • Reply 11 of 55
    hmurchisonhmurchison Posts: 12,419member

    Phew

     

    Photos for Mac looks pretty basic which is good and bad.   The good is that it'll mirror Photos on iOS.  It also means that Aperture 4 should be more ambitious but probably delayed until next year as well. 

  • Reply 12 of 55
    petripetri Posts: 118member
    So, um... what about iPhoto? That's the photo app already on every mac, why do we need this?
  • Reply 13 of 55
    plovellplovell Posts: 824member
    Will the 5 GB work for iTunes Match as well?

    The current limit is a real pain.
  • Reply 14 of 55
    ronmgronmg Posts: 163member
    ronmg
    06/02/2014 03:50 PM

    I would love to have the ability to photo search from my iPhone to my iMac photo library without having to sync to this new iCloud service. Will that be possible?

    I think that is what the new family sharing feature is for, but it doesn't specifically state if you need to use iCloud or not.
  • Reply 15 of 55
    saareksaarek Posts: 1,520member
    If you buy a 64gb iphone you should get 64gb of cloud storeage. Should incentivise people to buy the more expensive devices.
  • Reply 16 of 55
    pendergastpendergast Posts: 1,358member
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by petri View Post



    So, um... what about iPhoto? That's the photo app already on every mac, why do we need this?

     

    I hate iPhoto.

  • Reply 17 of 55
    nicwalmsleynicwalmsley Posts: 117member
    Hope there is simple way to control which photos go to the cloud.

    I want some but not all of my photos in the cloud

    I'd like it to be a sharing option, and to have smart albums that auto cloud.

    Shared photo stream is half arsed. Have you tried to import 1000 photos onto your iphone from a shared photo stream? One by one?!?!
  • Reply 18 of 55
    pendergastpendergast Posts: 1,358member
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by alphafox View Post



    Why wouldn't you just creat a new iCloud photo stream which you can share with whomever you want, right now, and has zero size limitations?

     

    Because the photos aren't stored in the cloud...?

     

    If you're storing them in iCloud backup, that eats at your storage. If you're not, it's just syncing them to various devices (but no iCloud copy).

  • Reply 19 of 55
    tallest skiltallest skil Posts: 43,388member
    Originally Posted by saarek View Post

    If you buy a 64gb iphone you should get 64gb of cloud storeage. Should incentivise people to buy the more expensive devices.

     

    Seems like the opposite would be the case.

  • Reply 20 of 55
    malaxmalax Posts: 1,598member
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by petri View Post



    So, um... what about iPhoto? That's the photo app already on every mac, why do we need this?



    Obviously Photo for Mac is a complete overhaul/replacement of iPhoto. 

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