davidmalcolm

seantheman said:

magman1979 said:

Imagine how barren and ugly the IT industry would be, without Apple around to show everyone how it's done...

Well I would say that since this new Echo Studio is not only cheaper, but offers a lot more.  This Echo Studio supports 3D audio, Dolby Atmos, surround sound.  Plus it can run 3D party apps, play games, and a lot more than any HomePod could ever dream of.   Plus this Echo supports more conectivity options, where as the HomePod only supports AirPlay.

Honestly I believe this Echo Studio is hitting the final nail in the HomePods coffin.

i suspect that Amazon is going to have egg on their face when Apple finally unveils a HomePod mini. They’ll point out that for 150 you get a device that’s half the size of the Echo studio and sounds better. 

I was thinking I might get a series 5 but I've learned to always get the best processor you can and given that they didn't beef it up this year, I'm thinking that means that next year is going to be a good year to buy. For now I'll keep rocking my series 1 that is still in pretty good shape. As far as people thinking they should make the watch work with Android, I could see them allowing the cellular models to work agnostic of the phone, I think the non-cellular watches will probably always require an iPhone. They might then make a version of the Health App for Android, though they might not want to put that data on Android devices given how easy it is to swipe information from those. I know Linus of Linus Tech Tips has actually stated he's going to try switching back to an iPhone as one of his phones so he can get a new Apple Watch. It's funny, the other day somebody asked me what I use my Watch for and I was like, "Well it's a fitness tracker, not that I use it for that much. But I use it to do things like turn off lights, switch music tracks, get notifications, mostly I just don't have to pull out my phone as often."

Hoping for an iPad Pro update as my 9.7 inch Pro is getting long in the tooth and I'm looking forward to handing it off to my Dad as an Apple Arcade device. The mini could use an upgrade too (and maybe see last year's i3 model come down in price as an entry level device.) The rumoured 16 inch MacBook Pro still hasn't been announced. They also haven't announced the tags that they're supposed to be working on. Add to that, they can now use these events to show off new titles that are coming to Apple Arcade similar to how Nintendo does with their directs. (Actually Apple might be smart to start having little internet only videos that the press aren't invited to to show off new games for the service similar to Nintendo's Directs.)

Maybe the A10 in the new iPad is a die shrunk version? It seems weird that they'd claim it's faster, I'm guessing maybe it's significantly higher clocked? As far as the S chip in the Watch, I was leaning toward getting a new Watch this year, but I think I'll keep my Series 1 for another year. It's served me well, still gets pretty good battery life for what I use it for, and I'm not going to upgrade on a year without a processor bump. I suspect that they're either saving a big bump for next year, or they might have hit some major limitations in terms of making the watch's processor faster. (Though who knows, maybe they've already got it to a point where they're happy with it and will need somebody to design a really intense watch App to push it past its limits.)

I'm hoping the price on this comes down. I have 12 hue bulbs right now (6 of which are full on colour changers) and I've genuinely been wanting something like this for a long time. But this is about three times the price that I'd be willing to pay for it. I feel like maybe it's so expensive because ir probably has a decently powerful ARM SOC inside that's doing some stuff. But damn 300 USD is kind of insane. If it drops down to around 150 CND on sale I'll totally buy one. I feel like this could be amazing for Smash Bros. (Though I'll also have to check what kind of latency it has.) But 300 USD puts it so far out of the range of normal people and firmly into the range of people who are massive home theatre buffs and who have spent more on their seating than I make in a year.