June 08, 2009, 9:07 PM — Apple CEO Steve Jobs did not make an appearance at the company's developer conference, but his influence was felt as Apple unveiled a new iPhone, new Mac notebooks and the Snow Leopard computer operating system.
There was much speculation that Jobs, who is expected to return from a six-month sick leave and treatment for pancreatic cancer, would at least make a cameo appearance at the Worldwide Developers Conference at the Moscone Center. But he did not and, in fact, none of the presenters event mentioned his name in their remarks.
As he did at last January's Macworld Expo, Philip Schiller, Apple's senior vice president of worldwide product marketing, filled in for Jobs as host of the event, a gathering for about 2,500 software developers who write applications to run on iPhone and other Apple products.
Ending months of speculation at various online forums, Apple announced the release of its 3rd generation iPhone, the iPhone 3G S. "The S stands for speed," Schiller explained. When it goes on sale June 19, the 3G S will boast a Safari browser that loads 2.1 times faster than the present iPhone, opens an Excel spreadsheet 3.6 times faster and is 2 times faster overall performing other functions.
"It's the fastest, most powerful iPhone yet," Schiller said, adding that it will also feature a 3 megapixel still camera with auto-focus and a video camera with auto-focus and the capability to edit and share video on the phone.
The iPhone 3G S will sell for $199 for a 16GB (gigabyte) model and $299 for a 32GB model, sold only through AT&T as the carrier in the U.S. Apple will continue selling the existing iPhone 3G but reduced its price to $99, effective today, for an 8GB model to offer an entry level iPhone.
Robert Mullins
The iPhone will also feature a new operating system, iPhone OS 3.0, which will be available as a free upgrade for present iPhone users effective June 17th. Among the new features in the OS is a Cut, Copy and Paste function that enables the user to move copy from one application to another, such as from a Web page to an e-mail. Also new is a mobile messaging system MMS that enables the user to send an instant message along with a photo, video or a PDF. The MMS is available now in 29 countries, not including the U.S. Scott Forstal, Apple's director of iPhone software, provoked groans from some in the audience when he said AT&T would begin providing MMS "later this summer."
Apple also freshened the Mac Book Pro line, with new 13-, 15- and 17-inch screen models. The Mac Books all feature the aluminum unibody frame first introduced last year on the Apple Air laptop. Most Macbooks add an SD card slot to transfer photos stored on the SD card in a digital camera to be loaded onto the laptop. The new models also boast a 40 percent improvement in battery life to seven hours.
The Mac Book Pros start at $1199 for a 13-inch model, the 15-inch model starts at $1,699 and the 17-inch starts at $2,499. Schiller noted that the new Mac Book Pros cost $300 to $700 than existing models.
Apple also introduced, as expected, Mac OS X Snow Leopard, the operating system for laptop and desktop computers. It includes refinements on 90 percent of the applications it contains, said Bertrand Serlet, senior vice president of OS software for Apple. He couldn't help but give a dig at rival Microsoft which has had problems with its Vista operating system. He didn't think the coming Windows 7 OS is much of an improvement.
"Microsoft has a big hole to dig themselves out of with Vista," Serlet said.
The Apple WWDC is a weeklong forum for Apple software developers. "For us, our job is make developers successful," said Forstall.
Since the iPhone came out in 2007, Apple's App Store has a library of 50,000 applications for free or for sale. On April 23rd, App Store recorded its 1 billionth download. Apple's 50,000 apps compares to 4,900 for Google's Android mobile platform, 1,000 for BlackBerry and a mere 18 for Palm, which last weekend introduced the Palm Pre, a new smartphone touted by some as the "iPhone killer."
