At one o'clock in the morning on October 17, Beijing time, Apple held a new product launch in the Town Hall Hall of Infinite Loop Park, the headquarters of Cupertino, California. This time, Apple brought iPad Air 2 iPad Mini 3、 The new iMac, new Mac Mini and other hardware devices have also released the official OS X Yosemite operating system.
OS X Yosemite Official Edition
The main updates of the official version of OS X Yosemite are:
·ICloud drive can support seamless cross platform file synchronization, including between Windows devices;
·The new version of Safari browser is 6 times faster than other browsers using JavaScript;
·Connect to Apple TV through AirPlay without Wi Fi;
·You can directly use MailDrop to change attachments. You can upload up to 5GB attachments, which will be automatically encrypted;
·With Continuity, Apple devices can be better connected seamlessly.
From today on, users can update to the official OS X Yosemite system.
In addition, Apple also announced that it will push the official version of iOS 8.1 next Monday, and Apple Pay service will also be officially launched on the same day. The latter has signed 500 new cooperative banks, and supports more businesses, including Sephora and Starbucks.
iPad Air 2
The biggest difference between the iPad Air of the previous generation and the iPad Air 2 is that the iPad Air 2 completely eliminates the air interlayer in the middle of the screen, which not only greatly reduces the screen glare, but also reduces the thickness to 6.1mm in one fell swoop - a full 18% reduction in thickness compared with the previous generation, making it the thinnest flat panel computer in the world at present. In addition, as rumored, the iPad Air 2 has also added Tuhaojin's color matching, and is equipped with Touch ID fingerprint recognition technology and support for Apple Pay.
In other aspects, the iPad Air 2 weighs 437g; The screen size is 9.7 inches, and the resolution is 2048 * 1536; Equipped with a new A8X chip, it is 40% faster than the previous generation, and its graphics capability is also 2.5 times higher; The rear is upgraded to an 8 million pixel iSight camera, which has a f.2.4 large aperture lens and 1.12 μ m large pixels, and supports high-speed continuous shooting, 1080P video camera, time delay camera, slow motion camera and other functions; The front camera has also been improved. It adopts f.2.2 large aperture, increases the light input by 81% than the previous generation, and supports HDR photography.
The price of the iPad Air 2 is $499 for 16GB, $599 for 64GB, and $699 for 128GB. The 4G version is $629, $729, and $829, respectively. Reservations will be accepted from October 17.
The official website of Apple China has also updated the page. The price of the iPad Air 2 is 16GB 3588 yuan, 64GB 4288 yuan, 128GB 4988 yuan. At present, only the Wlan model is available in Apple's China store, and the 4G cellular network version is not available.
iPad Mini 3
In contrast, the upgrade of the iPad Mini 3 is not outstanding, but it just adds Touch ID fingerprint identification technology and support for Apple Pay, as well as the same local luxury gold color matching.
The iPad Mini 3 is priced at $399 for 16GB, $499 for 64GB, and $599 for 128GB. The 4G cellular version is priced at $529, $629, and $729, respectively. Reservations are accepted on October 17.
According to the Bank of China, the iPad mini 3 16GB is 2888 yuan, 64GB 3588 yuan, and 128GB 4288 yuan. Like the iPad Air 2, BOC has no news of 4G cellular network version for the time being. (It is worth mentioning that since there is no built-in NFC chip, the iPad Air 2 and iPad Mini 3 only support in app shopping, not shopping in stores.)
New iMac and Mac mini
As there is almost nothing new about the iPad, the new iMac may be the biggest surprise in this conference, because the screen resolution of the new iMac has reached an amazing 5K level, 67% more pixels than 4K, the thinnest part is only 5mm, and only 27 inch models are available. The price is 2499 US dollars, about 15300 yuan.
In terms of configuration, the new iMac uses an "Oxide TFT" screen, which can reduce energy consumption by 30%; The CPU is Intel Core i5 3.5 GHz quad core processor, which can be upgraded to Core i7 4GHz processor; In addition, it is equipped with 8GB memory, 1TB hard disk, AMD Radeon R9 graphics card, and supports Thunderbolt 2 interface.
At the same time, Apple has also brought updates to the Mac Mini product line that has not been updated for a long time. The new Mac Mini is equipped with Intel's fourth generation core processor HD Graphics 5000 graphics chip, dual lightning 2 interface, PCle based flash memory, 802.11ac Wi Fi support. The price is 499 US dollars, about 3055 yuan.
The new iMac and the new iMac mini will also accept reservations from October 17.
Awkward iPad
This may be the shortest press conference in Apple's history, and most of the information has also been exposed before this, but we can still get surprises from it, especially the iPad Air 3 and the new iMac once again demonstrated Apple's strong strength and accomplishments in industrial design.
However, we also see that the iPad business really gives Apple a headache. Even after Apple makes it equal to the iPhone 6 in terms of processor and camera resolution, as well as some feature functions, it still looks so inconspicuous. In fact, many users' attention to the new iPad is only due to the inertia of their interest in Apple, rather than their real purchase intention, because the main market and consumers of the iPad are facing saturation, while the enthusiasm of old users is not high.
This is not the first time that the iPad has felt ironic. "Durability" has indeed become a major problem in the upgrading of the iPad. In addition, most people do not often take it out of the house or use it as a productivity tool. Therefore, while the entertainment of the iPad has been greatly explored, its appeal has become relatively simple, and ultimately users will stick to one device for a long time, Instead of selecting replacement.
Tim Cook has two plans for this. One is to cooperate with IBM to help him dump iPads on the enterprise market. The other is to start developing large screen iPads, which will be launched sometime next year. However, Apple may need to accept the fact that the iPad Mini is rising and falling very quickly, and it is becoming one of the entry devices for the public to experience the iOS ecosystem - before that, most people chose the iPod Touch as the stepping stone to the Apple ecosystem.
At present, it seems inevitable that the iPad with a large screen will have a comparison or even competition with Macbook, because after the screen increases, Apple will certainly add more iPad like functions to it, but limited by the use scenarios and people, so the improvement of productivity direction will be the focus. Although there is a hard gap between the tablet and Macbook in terms of product form and ecology, the tablet is only one keyboard away from the notebook, and at the moment when OS X is increasingly aligned with iOS, what choice Apple will make is obviously the most interesting point.
