2008/01/10

What's new at MacExpo Jan 15th

What are Apple going to announce at MacExpo?

* New Cinema displays? Probably in-line with the new iMacs with glass screeens.

* MacBookUltra? Seems on the cards, an ultra portable MacBookPro which touch sensitive screen, gesture/handwriting support/etc. Probably solid-state disk for fast boot-up. MacOS X has already been ported to small devices, this could extend that so as well as using technologies such as Quickview to read documents on the go, they can be edited too.

* UltraDock? A docking system for the MacBookUltra that turns it into an iMac for use in the office etc.

* 3G iPhone? It's been on the cards ever since Apple launched the original version. Supporting HSPA it will also have push-email allowing corporate users to ween off their Blackberries.

* iTunes 7.6? Well it turns out that some DVDs have already been released that have versions of the film in WMV (Windows Media Video) and H.264 (the format the iPod uses). Insert this into a Mac and a dialog pops up saying "iTunes 7.6 required". iTunes is also likely to support downloading/renting videos from the iTunes store.

It's all rumour of curse, but the keynote is on Jan 15th about 5pm UK time.

BT bets its future on broadband 20 times faster than now | Technology | The Guardian

BT bets its future on broadband 20 times faster than now | Technology | The Guardian

BT is to fibre 10,000 homes as part of a trial in Ebbsfleet next August. The system will support speeds of 100Mb/s (though this could probably be increased). It's a new build area so fibre will be part of the build-process and used instead of traditional copper telephony, presumably directly into BT's 21CN.

The service will be put in by BT Openreach meaning it will be available to other ISPs and media players as well as BT.

Though copper is currently the norm, fibre for all new-builds should be thought about. Unfortunately this doesn't cover existing infrastructure so current homes will be stuck with DSL services for a while. It's been estimated to replace the current copper would cost around £10bn and if BT did it, it would lead them into a regulatory nightmare.

Apple released new Quad Core MacPros

Ahead of next week's MacExpo in SanFran Apple have updated their MacPros with new Quad Core CPUs. Each machine can take 2 processors (so that's 8 cores), 4 hard disks (SATA or SAS), 1 or 2 16x SuperDrives, an Airport (WiFi 802.11n) and a SAS RAID controller.

The stock video card is an NVIDIA 8800, but this can be downgraded to an ATI card. However the system can now hold 4 of the ATI cards allowing a MacPro to drive 4 cinema displays simultaneously. The top of the range card is an NVidia FX4600.

If buying one, wait until Apple announces their new Cinema displays which should be at MacExpo.

telecoms.com

telecoms.com

It had to happen and now T-Mobile is offering unlimited WiFi with it's Web'n'Walk Plus and Max for £12.50 per month. Users can use any of T-Mobile's HotSpots at Starbucks, Texaco service stations and other locations.

O2 have already bundled free WiFi into their iPhone plans using The Cloud's WiFi network and BT bundle WiFi with their Internet access products.

WiFi isn't particularly good for large widescale networks, but is cheap for high speed data access compared to 3G, so it should save T-Mobile money in the long run.