This was the first Apple in-person event after more than two years, and it was held outside on the Apple Park campus, with press seating in the cafeteria, where the invited guests watched the same show, you can watch from the comfort of your sofa. This is usually followed by access to new devices in a hands-on area and small group briefings.
An in-person non-live event is a first.
The presentation was like drinking from a fire hose with tons of details, starting off with a presentation of a new iPhone lock screen. Yay. I spare you all the details and jump right into the important stuff.
- Apple launched a new generation of silicon. M2 takes the M1 and lifts it up even higher. No M2 Pro, M2 Max or M2 Ultra, yet.
- The first two devices to get the M2 is a brand-new MacBook Air and the 13″ MacBook Pro (old design with large bezels). 14″ and 16″ MacBook Pro keep the faster variants of the M1 chip. The new MacBook Air is a sexy beast. This is the MacBook I would want.
- iPadOS on M1 iPads (current Air and Pro models) get a new window manager and full support for external displays. They also get access to virtual memory, which enables “real” applications on the iPad Pro. You can have four overlapping windows on the primary and another four on an external display. Bottom line: The M1 iPads are even sexier.
These are the three biggies. There is a ton of evolution, interesting new apps, iPhone as web cam in macOS etc. What I can say today is that I will run to install iPad OS first beta as it becomes available next month, bugs be damned. Everything else can wait.
The big no-show was mixed reality. Every pundit who pretended to know something has been pushing mixed reality, but the silence was deafening. It proves once again that you just wait for Apple to announce things and avoid talking about things they might announce.
Still waiting for the Mac Pro or a large iMac. And any, any plans for audio gear.
I’d add another, long-overdue biggie: The ability to mark a message as unread. Finally! [Yes, I’ve used the term finally. :-)]
Agree, even if it sounds ridicolous to be happy about something that simple. Should have been fixed years ago.
Passkeys.
About time. If developers pick this up…. my time with 1Password might come to an end.
I miss in your list the sneak preview for the future of CarPlay. “First vehicles late next year” and not all manufacturers on board …….
As a victim (Volkswagen, MIB3), I advocate the mandatory addition of a side cutter. 🙂
Disappointed that the changes on iPadOS are only for the M1 iPads. I bought a non-M1 iPad Air last year (tbh, with the current pricing of the Air, not sure if I would have bought an Air or just would have gone with the low-end iPad).
On the other hand, I don’t need full external display support for the iPad because that’s not how I use it.
But I would have wanted the better window manager.
Support of Matter with hopefully already iOS 16.0 was good news, too.