iLounge

Logitech’s QuickCam Vision Pro Makes iChat Awesome [updated]

By Jeremy Horwitz | 07.01.08 | 7 comments |  tell-a-friend |  digg this story

I am genuinely excited. Very excited. Following Apple’s abrupt discontinuation of the iSight web camera—and its lack of a replacement option—I’ve been struggling to find a good iChat-ready desktop video camera to pair with my Apple Cinema Display when my MacBook Pro is closed and docked on my desk. Though I have temporary use of an old iSight, I was planning to just replace the Cinema Display with a newer, bigger one as soon as Apple got around to releasing a model with an integrated camera. That may just have become unnecessary. Logitech’s new Mac-specific QuickCam Vision Pro ($130) web cam just arrived at iLounge, and it so completely puts the iSight to shame that my monitor replacement plans are now on hold. I’ll summarize the difference in two photos, then continue with a bunch more (and details) in the full story. Click on the headline for the rest.

The difference is stark. Jesse Hollington told me in a video chat that my stream looked “great.” No one ever says that about the iSight—including the newer version built into my MacBook Pro. Updated: I’ve run the QuickCam Vision Pro through a collection of new audio and video tests, with results at the end of this article.

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A UK Perspective - Weighing iPhone 3G’s Cost

By Bob Levens | 06.27.08 | 5 comments |  tell-a-friend |  digg this story

When I read that Apple’s iPhone 3G was going to be made available on a contract-free O2 Pay & Go tariff in the UK, I thought that perhaps I would finally climb aboard the iPhone train and discover whatever I had been missing.

But after a little ‘research’ and number crunching, it appears that as an option to the original iPhone on an O2 contract, things don’t seem to be that much cheaper. I won’t go again into the details as to why I want to avoid a contract—I already have commented on this—but cost wise, the Pay & Go tariff appears to be almost as expensive as an iPhone on a contract.

O2 let the cat out of the bag regarding the Pay & Go tariff earlier this week, by mistake it would seem, as the page was taken down quickly, shortly after we reported on it. It was online long enough for me to get some figures to work on. Looking at the 16GB iPhone 3G, O2 wants £359.99 ($715) on the Pay & Go tariff with six months unlimited browsing and Wi-Fi with an option to continue after the six months for £10 ($20) a month. On top of this, there is a minimum monthly “top-up” of £10 upwards which gives an allowance of X number of minutes, depending on which of the many tariff packages you opt for—calls, texts or a mix of both. I personally find the O2 tariffs confusing. If you use 18 months as a period to add the cost up, it works out to approximately £659.99 ($1,311). It could be more if you decide to add one of the O2 “Bolt-On” packages; for example, £10 a month for the calls, then £7.99 ($16) for texts, then £10 for unlimited browsing/wi-fi - that’s £27.99 ($56).

For the same model of iPhone on the £30 ($60) a month contract, the phone would cost £159 ($316) and with 18 months at £30 a month the total cost of ownership would come to £699 ($1,389). That’s only £39 ($78) more than on the Pay & Go option.

From calling into my local O2 store today, it seems that the iPhone 3G on the Pay & Go package will not be available until September. I wonder if by then O2 will have had a rethink and changed the tariffs again due to lack of interest?

Or maybe I will have had a rethink and will have opted for a contract. We’ll have to see. The prices certainly aren’t going to get me to queue for the launch, that’s for sure.

On John McCain and the iPod

By Jeremy Horwitz | 06.26.08 | 7 comments |  tell-a-friend |  digg this story

Democratic Party Presidential Nominee Barack Obama has an iPod, and he’s not afraid to tell you what’s on it—nor were George Bush, Laura Bush, Hillary Clinton, U.K. Prime Minister Gordon Brown, or other iPod-loving politicians. But how about Republican Party Nominee John McCain? He hasn’t been quite as enthusiastic. Since iLounge’s editors include some Republicans and some Democrats, we were curious enough to contact Mr. McCain’s campaign with a couple of simple questions: does he have an iPod or iPhone? If so, what’s in his personal playlists? Thus far, there’s been no answer.

According to CNN today, Mr. McCain is a self-described computer “illiterate,” and iLounge reader comments seem to assume the worst about how out of touch he must be because of his age: a couple of readers suggested that he needed to “reveal the contents of his 78 rpm record collection,” and that “he wishes Hollywood would stop making talkies and go back to silents.” But as CNN’s video shows, age isn’t the issue; it’s the desire to be in touch with technology. Some long-serving politicians—and even grandmotherly Queen Elizabeth—have apparently asked for iPod assistance from more tech-savvy family members, and the CNN interview shows that the Republican Nominee leans on his Blackberry-toting wife for computer support, so it wouldn’t be impossible for the man to have and use an iPod even if computers are too challenging.

There seems to be some evidence that he does. One report placed him on a campaign bus in South Carolina telling reporters that he has an iPod with ABBA on it, while a separate Time Magazine report suggests that he unsuccessfully tried to get a voice-commanded Ford iPod system to play ABBA tracks. Perhaps it’s not a distaste for computers or a lack of an iPod, after all—maybe he’s said as much as needs to be said on the topic of his musical preferences.

A Brief Aside on Screen Size and Resolution

By Jeremy Horwitz | 06.24.08 | 0 comments |  tell-a-friend |  digg this story

Until recently, Apple’s approach to third-party iPod game development was characterized by two concerning trends: a closed, “we invite you” system of partnerships, and games that were built for specific models and didn’t work on others. With the release of the iPod classic and third-generation iPod nano, for instance, every past “iPod Game” needed to be rewritten and repurchased for these models—a huge amount of wasted time and money. OS X iPhone appears to be substantially different and better, allowing developers to get virtually complete access to Apple’s tools, and suggesting that a game built for OS X iPhone will run not just on the original iPhone, iPod touch, and iPhone 3G, but on future OS X iPhone-based devices as well.

The question we’ve been mulling for months is this: what happens when Apple introduces an iPhone with a different screen size? Or resolution? Does the interface just shrink, as it did from the 2.5” iPod classic screen to the 2.0” iPod nano screen, or does Apple offer a hobbled device with different features and limited software compatibility? Alternately, might Apple split the current big touchscreen into a foldable two-screen design like the Nintendo DS, with one screen possessing touch capabilities and the other just serving as an extra display?

No one knows for certain, but history suggests that Apple will—despite the present appearance of a single “iPhone platform”—continue to make obvious and non-obvious changes to future devices that will create compatibility issues for unprepared developers. Screen sizes could shrink, or even grow. Resolutions and pixels per inch could go up or down. And aspect ratios may change. As a result, a game that looks great on today’s 3.5” screen might be hard to see on a smaller future display, or look chunky on a bigger one. Smart developers should probably start to consider ways to create graphic assets and interfaces that would work on a scaled-up or scaled-down iPhone or iPod touch, rather than just creating pieces that work on today’s models.

If your artwork is purely polygonal and you’re not using any on-screen text, you’re probably safer than most—apart from texture and initial object size considerations, resizing polygonal art for a smaller or bigger display isn’t too hard. But having to redraw all of your fonts and bitmapped art, such as backgrounds and sprites, can be seriously prohibitive. To illustrate just some of the challenges involved in this process, here are some screen shots from Taito’s recent Space Invaders Extreme for the Sony PSP and Nintendo DS, taken on the same stages, showing just how different one game can look on different sizes, shapes, and resolutions of screens. We picked this title because it’s super cool, and because it sells for $20 per platform—affordable enough that any developer can pick up both versions and see our spotlighted (plus other) differences firsthand.

On the PSP’s 480x272 widescreen, which is most similar to the iPhone’s 480x320 screen, you could have plenty of real estate on the left and right sides for text boxes, but in many games, using only part of the screen for gameplay feels less immersive and compelling. On the Nintendo DS, the key notification elements are overlapped on the main 256 x 192 screen, rather than placed on the sides of the playfield. Taito mostly wastes the top screen as a scoreboard, but brings it into play during boss stages and bonus rounds, which actually doesn’t add much if anything to the widescreen experience you get on the PSP. The single, bigger screen is almost always better.

A major issue in trying to use the same assets on screens of different sizes and resolutions is spacing. Just as with the transition from the iPod 4G to the iPod 5G, when Apple tried to keep the same text menus on an increasingly empty white screen, the bigger Nintendo DS pixels place the same characters much closer together, while the smaller PSP pixels see them spaced dramatically apart. Not only do the two versions of the game look different, but this change materially impacts elements of the gameplay. A shot that might have hit an adjacent Invader on the DS version slips through on the PSP version thanks to the gap. Taito could have scaled the PSP’s characters upwards to make them mimic the DS ones, but didn’t, and the result is two games that look the same on the surface yet vary a bunch when you’re actually playing them.

Ultimately, developers will have their own approaches to creating in-game assets and interfaces, but as the screens above show, consistency for future devices will either demand a truly resolution-independent OS X iPhone gaming environment, or artwork that’s easy to update in the event of a new device release. A little advance planning can go a long way in improving the speed and quality of your future updates.

How the iPod + Macs Appear in Metal Gear Solid 4

By Jeremy Horwitz | 06.20.08 | 2 comments |  tell-a-friend |  digg this story

Last month, we mentioned that Konami’s Metal Gear Solid 4 for Sony’s PlayStation 3 was going to feature an iPod as an in-game item; now that the game is out, we’ve had a chance to see how both the iPod and Macs were used. It’s actually sort of surprising.

As you may or may not know, Metal Gear Solid 4 is the latest in a series of military espionage and action games featuring a character named Solid Snake. The developers at Konami, led by Hideo Kojima, have spent years creating realistic guns, vehicles, armor and environments for the various games in the series, modeling them to an impressive degree of reality, and in some cases abstracting them into next-generation versions. So it’s no surprise that the company’s emulation of an iPod is fairly accurate—the only unusual part is that the device is a well-since-discontinued fifth-generation iPod in a world where nanomachines, night vision eye patches and genetically engineered battle machines are all apparently more common than iPhones or touch-screen iPods.

You actually use the iPod by holding down one of the top left triggers and then spinning the right analog joystick around in a circle to scroll on the Click Wheel. A yellow beam indicates how your finger is currently sweeping the Wheel. Pressing the joystick inwards is the iPod’s central Action button; you can select items on the Wheel by sweeping the Wheel and pressing the X button on the controller as something’s overlaid with the yellow beam. It’s all an attempt to make the experience as much like using an iPod as possible on a PlayStation 3 joypad, with menu options that are familiar but stripped down for simplicity’s sake. The only setting under “Settings,” for instance, is “Repeat,” and both songs and podcasts are found under “Music.”

The in-game iPod’s collection of songs consists of tracks that are pre-added by the game, as well as ones you find lying around in the warzones you walk through. Konami has included songs from past Metal Gear games, both console and handheld, as well as podcasts that break down the fourth wall and let you listen to the developers talking about the game. You’re supposed to use the iPod to listen to audio if you get tired of the default minimalist background music; it’s not a mandatory part of the game, but playing certain tracks can relax Snake or improve certain of his performance characteristics.

While it’s cool to see the iPod in the Metal Gear universe, it’s also a little off-putting. By attempting to replicate the Click Wheel rather than just using a simpler joystick-style selection interface, Konami actually makes it more difficult to pick tracks than it would have been with just a simple menu. Apple understands this completely in its own design of TV- and computer-based interfaces—Apple TV and iTunes don’t try to use faux scroll wheels. The inclusion of the iPod appears to have been more for fun or stylistic reasons, or perhaps paid product placement, than anything else.

Leaning in the “product placement” category are some of the cutscenes with your assistant, Otacon. He sits at a desk with a suspended Apple Cinema Display floating in the air, and a Mac Pro under the desk—or at least two items that look a lot like them. The Apple logos on both devices are unmistakeable, though, and Otacon even asks how you’re enjoying your iPod in one scene. “If you’re feeling run down, why not take a break?,” he asks. “Listen to a few tunes...?” Something about that just says “product placement,” or at least “thanks for letting us include the iPod, Apple.”

The presence of Macs, iPods, and Apple logos in the game is especially interesting given how many TV shows and commercials we’ve recently seen with the Apple logos intentionally covered up: the Food Network’s Iron Chef America has a conspicuous collection of Cinema Displays near Alton Brown, but their Apple logos disappeared after the first season’s episodes. Commercials now include more Apple notebook machines (current model MacBooks and MacBook Pros) than ever before, but they tend to appear with purely white or silver lids, minus only the Apple markings. For Metal Gear’s fictional characters to be Apple users clearly required some sort of permission from the company—we just wonder how much.

A Tangent on 1921 Tequila Cream

By Jeremy Horwitz | 06.19.08 | 6 comments |  tell-a-friend |  digg this story

There are only two alcoholic beverages that I would go out of my way to find. One—a beer called La Bécasse Gueuze—is basically impossible to purchase in the United States. The other was given to me as a Father’s Day gift last weekend: 1921 Tequila Cream, also known as 1921 Crema de Tequila. I’m sharing it on Backstage mostly because I wanted to spread the word about something that I consider to be pretty special and hard to locate, and also because I was inspired by John Gruber’s Tequila link today.

I’m not going to claim to be a tequila connoisseur; actually, I probably had more of it on my honeymoon last year than at every prior time in my life put together. But when my wife and I came across a shop that was selling 1921 Tequila Cream, which shouldn’t be confused with the other three types of pure tequila sold by the small Mexican company Corporacion Licorera 1910 S.A. de C.V., we were enthralled. Introduced in the United States only a few years ago, 1921 Tequila Cream is to tequila what Baileys Irish Cream is to whiskey, a softer, universally palatable version that could as easily be found in a dessert as in an after-dinner drink.

Yet, just like comparing standard tequilas to standard whiskeys, the 1921 has fire and spice that beg to be enjoyed quickly, rather than stored away; hints of caramel, coffee, and cocoa are also evident in the light brown, sweet and creamy drink. Bottles we bought in Mexico, and later in California, always seemed to disappear within a day or two of the cork coming out.

Finding 1921 in Western New York is basically impossible, which is why my wife had her family bring a bottle cross-country from Southern California as a gift. You might be able to find it where you live—the company has a non-comprehensive store locator, as well as a variety of Internet merchants selling it for around $24 a bottle—and if so, it is most definitely worth trying. Let me know what you think if you can rustle some up. And better yet, if you can find La Bécasse Gueuze (aka Belle Vue Gueuze) outside of Belgium or France, let me know; we might just have to arrange a trade.

Tim Russert, 1950-2008, R.I.P.

By Jeremy Horwitz | 06.13.08 | 4 comments |  tell-a-friend |  digg this story

I normally don’t post things of this nature on Backstage, but I wanted to take a moment to lament the death today of Tim Russert—best known as the host of NBC’s Meet The Press—a journalist who I considered inspirational. Opinionated, well-informed, honest, and willing to speak truth to power, Russert set the gold standard for political journalism, and his untimely passing will leave a huge gap in both American news and politics. Rest in peace, Mr. Russert, and may those you leave behind be better for the lessons you taught us.

Is This the New iPhone’s Touchscreen?

By Jeremy Horwitz | 06.05.08 | 23 comments |  tell-a-friend |  digg this story

Apple almost never confirms its component suppliers, and for various reasons, the suppliers only rarely confirm that they’re working with Apple. That’s the only major reason that we’d normally be skeptical about what’s shown below: the first pictures and diagrams of a touchscreen display that a Taiwanese company claims is being used in an upcoming iPhone. It’s a 2.8” display—shown here alongside a newer 3.2” version—two sizes that would enable Apple to start shrinking both iPhones and touchscreen iPods from the current 3.5” screen size found in its first-generation models.

The developer of these displays, Host Optical, has shown what it describes as a “projected capacitance touch panel,” complete with a collection of characteristics that it suggests are superior to the ones being used in the original iPhone. According to the company, the displays have “no significant” aging effect—they don’t get progressively less sensitive over time—and are claimed to be more durable than alternatives, waterproof, plus resistant to high humidities and temperatures. Since one of the major concerns over current-generation iPhones is the continued touch sensitivity of their screens, Host’s version could be a nice step up.

Also significant are the sizes the display comes in. The 2.8” screen is shown as having a 52.6mm (2.1") by 67.7mm (2.7") component footprint, with an actual viewing area of 45.6mm (1.8") by 60mm (2.4"). An additional 15-20mm (0.6"-0.8") of height is added by the black frame with Home button hole, providing a place for the screen’s control circuitry and connector to rest as well. A newer 3.2” version is closer in size to the current-generation iPhone’s front face.

To be clear, we believe that there is zero chance that a 2.8” screen is going to be in Apple’s first 3G version of the iPhone, but as a component for an iPhone mini/nano, as well as a fourth-generation iPod nano, it makes a lot more sense. Notably, Host’s displays place two and only two sensors off to the right of the ear speaker, a detail that doesn’t track with what we’ve heard about the 3G model. Another difference is the size of the black frames, which have significantly more space between the screen and Home button than current iPhone faceplates. Changes such as these would be precedented in Apple portable designs—the initially unusual rebalancings of iPod nano screen and Click Wheel locations relative to the iPod mini and full-sized iPod, for instance—and might also be necessary to give future iPhones enough ear-to-mouth distance to be functional as handsets.

While any company can claim that it’s supplying parts for a new iPhone, to the extent that Host is doing so, and has both samples and diagrams to offer as proof, we’re intrigued. As we’ve previously noted in Backstage, we’re still not sure how Apple will pull off the tricky act of downscaling the current iPhone OS to a smaller display, as typing on a 2.8” screen’s keyboard would be one of a few real challenges, but between UI changes and the prospect of a slide-out keyboard, nothing’s impossible for future iPhones. Seeing how it ultimately all plays out will be very interesting.

The Vaja Mouse Pad

By Jeremy Horwitz | 05.29.08 | 4 comments |  tell-a-friend |  digg this story

Since my job at iLounge involves reviewing products rather than trying to sell them, I am not going to attempt to convince you that Vaja’s new Mouse Pad is something that you’re going to spend $60 or $70 to purchase. I can count the number of mouse pads I’ve purchased on one hand, with two fingers, and mention that both of them came from the same Apple Company Store two years ago. They’re circular, black with a gray Apple logo in the center, and cost something like $10 or $15 a piece. Because of that gray Apple logo, mice tend to get completely confused and skip locations when they’re run over that surface, but I liked how these pads look and kept using them anyway. They replaced a free mouse pad that came from Ofoto (remember them?) years earlier; in fact, most of the mouse pads I’ve used were given away with purchases I made.

For obvious reasons, I like Vaja’s Mouse Pad better. As one might expect from both the company and the price, this is a beautiful design relative to most of the forgettable alternatives out there: rounded at the corners, it’s completely covered in the company’s classically impressive colored leather, which you can hand-select in two tones from a variety of choices. One of 37 colors becomes the frame, complete with a metal Vaja logo, while one of 10 colors becomes the mousing surface, slightly elevated over the frame thanks to soft padding.

Flip the pad over and you’ll see the company’s classic brown leather is used to create a hard bottom surface. Ours arrived with a bit of scuffing on the bottom, which isn’t a huge issue given that it’ll basically never be seen on a flat surface, and probably will accumulate additional marks from desktop grime as time goes on. By comparison, the top surfaces were perfect—extremely clean, and a really sharp match for the Apple hardware they sit next to.

Other than the price, which like Vaja’s cases screams “luxury” rather than “necessity,” the only major question a leather mouse pad raises for me is this: how long will it last before scratching or scuffing to a different patina? Obviously, your color choices will have some impact on this—picking Apple-matching light colors rather than darker ones might make damage more visible—but ultimately, it’ll be up to you to keep it clean. The plasticy top surfaces of other mouse pads have lasted many years without showing marks, so it’ll be interesting to see how this one holds up, but I can say with some certainty that I’m looking forward to continuing the testing.

Updated June 26, 2008: After almost a month with the Vaja Mouse Pad, I wanted to update this story with some conclusions on its durability and utility. My suspicion in late May was that the Mouse Pad wouldn’t be able to stand up well to some of the stresses of use at my desk, such as occasional freshly-washed hands grabbing my mouse, exposure to a little dirt, food, or drinks nearby, scratches, or so on. So I’m glad to report that the Pad looks basically the same today as it did out of the box; the white rim is still white, the gray center is still gray, and there’s only one little difference: small, generally unnoticeable areas of the gray leather are starting to lose their texture in favor of a softer patina. In terms of utility, the Pad is great except for one thing: it could use a little rubber on the bottom. While it stays generally in place, it’s not as sticky as the typical mouse pad, so you can either add something like double-sided tape yourself or hope that Vaja updates the design a little to make this Mouse Pad as firm on a flat surface as a freebie alternative. That aside, I’ve found the Mouse Pad to be a great little addition to the desk—another cool “luxury gift” option from Vaja.

Mirror’s Edge

By Jeremy Horwitz | 05.09.08 | 4 comments |  tell-a-friend |  digg this story

First, watch this:

Then, read this: Parkour.

Then, if you’re still intrigued, watch this:

The controls could be a real issue. And it’s possible that the gameplay, like so many other “total first-person” experiences, ultimately won’t work in the end, despite how impressive it looks right now. But as a real demonstration of what the PS3 and Xbox 360 hardware can do, EA and DICE’s Mirror’s Edge is now one of my most anticipated titles for whenever it ships in 2008. 

Same-Day iTunes Movies Are Worth More Than a Golf Clap

By Jeremy Horwitz | 05.01.08 | 5 comments |  tell-a-friend |  digg this story

It might not be the flashiest press release that Apple’s put out in the last two years, but today’s announcement that U.S. customers will be able to buy movies* from the iTunes Store on the same day they’re released on DVD is huge. “Walmart and Amazon and Target and Best Buy are probably freaking out right now” sort of huge.

This particular omission from the iTunes Store was, to our eyes, seriously crippling Apple’s ability to compete with the big boys on video sales. Imagine what iTunes would have looked like for music buyers if it couldn’t sell or pre-order new releases—well, you don’t really need to imagine it, as the video section of iTunes used to look that way, filled largely with films you’d all but forgotten about and had to search to find something interesting. There was also that daunting question: why pay $15 for a “new release” today when you could have gone to Target and gotten the DVD for around the same price a week or more ago?

When iTunes movie rentals—both SD and HD versions—are truly available on the same day as DVD releases, Netflix and Blockbuster have a lot to worry about. And that asterisk above? Apple still needs to bulk up its video catalog, a lot, before it can truly compete with DVD stores. But there’s no doubt; Apple’s finally on the right path with video, and anyone who doubts that it’s driving a bulldozer would be well-advised to bulk up or get out of the way.

The Other New iPhone?

By Jeremy Horwitz | 04.30.08 | 18 comments |  tell-a-friend |  digg this story

Remember last year, when a little-known company named Uniea announced new iPod nano cases—with correct physical dimensions—before the new iPod nano was ever shown? As we mentioned shortly afterwards, readers were quick to slam Uniea and its mock-ups, but the cases proved perfect fits when the new nano was released. Now, there are all sorts of friend-of-a-friend stories swirling around about the second-generation iPhone, and perhaps not surprisingly, they contradict one another. Yesterday, a Taiwanese newspaper claimed Hon Hai/Foxconn was making an iPhone with a 2.8” screen, which would present certain major interface challenges given the way the current iPhone works, and might well be a “mini” iPhone rather than a full sequel to the current model. Additionally, like you, we’ve heard about another model that is supposedly coming soon, and sounds more like a true next-generation iPhone. Companies overseas have already started working on products for this one, which is basically the same size as the current iPhone, but has slightly different curves, coloration, and materials. Specs for either or both of these models could be nothing more than disinformation put out to burn developers, but they could also be correct. In any case, here are the details they’re working from.

Developers believe that the “glossy black plastic iPhone” details that have been circulating are partially accurate. When you first hear the word “plastic,” you tend to think “cheap,” but the premise here appears to be to approximate the look of metal through automobile-style gloss, while eliminating the presence of matte plastics and metal found in the original iPhone. The rear shell becomes larger, with the hard aluminum casing disappearing entirely, but a silver metallic bezel remains on the front—just much thinner than before. Once flat on both the back and front, the enclosure now is tapered like a MacBook Air, thicker at the center than at the sides. From the side, top, or bottom, the curves and proportions look more Blackberry than iPhone, but from the front, the new model looks basically unchanged from its predecessor. Perforated bottom speaker and microphone grilles have been transformed into larger shapes alongside the Dock Connector, as well.

While the screen size stays the same in this model—3.5” diagonal, with 3” height and 2” width, some currently unexplained changes are made around the ear speaker. On iPhone, a proximity sensor and ambient light sensor sat above this speaker; the new version has what appear to be three separate sensors, or two sensors and a tiny second camera—the original camera stays where it was. Though it would be great to picture this new dot as a video iChat-ready camera location, it’s entirely possible that this is nothing more than a rearrangement of the proximity sensor array. And colors? Glossy black or white backs are apparently locks, with a red version possible, too. Each would have the same silver bezel on front, and substantially black material surrounding the screen.

Of course, only Apple and its key partners know if any of this is correct, but some companies are assuming that it is. It’ll be interesting to see whether they’re right, and new cases begin to appear immediately after iPhone’s launch, or whether a multi-month delay is in store.

Shrinking iPhone, Shrinking Interface: The Issues

By Jeremy Horwitz | 04.29.08 | 6 comments |  tell-a-friend |  digg this story

When Apple created the iPhone’s touchscreen interface, it also created a fundamental “going forward” challenge—how can the size-obsessed company keep making its devices smaller without over-compromising their usability? Steve Jobs, after all, dismissed with a “yuck!” the idea of using a stylus with the touchscreen, noting that a finger was the best possible way to interact with the device. Apart from shrinking users’ fingers, how can the screens of future iPhones and touch-based iPods fall in size without making the icons and other buttons too small to use?

Today, a Taiwanese newspaper claimed that the new iPhone’s screen will be reduced from its current 3.5” diagonal size down to 2.8”—a compromise which will necessarily require Apple to do one of three things: shrink the current interface down, crop it, or shrink it and crop it. If this measurement is accurate, to merely shrink the interface would require a higher pixel density screen, and the user’s indulgence for icons and keys that would lose around 20% of their current size. Cropping the current interface would eliminate some of the icons and keys, while a combination of cropping and shrinking could preserve more icons and keys than the pure crop, making them more than 80% of their present size, but you’d still have to lose some size and white space to make it work.

The picture above shows how icons currently fit on an iPhone screen, and how they’d fit on a purely cropped or a purely shrunk screen. In the crop scenario, the 20-icon main menu becomes capable of holding 12 at full size; the shrunken version preserves all 20 but shrinks them down to around 0.3” per icon in width.

The next picture shows what might happen on a 2.8” screen with the current vertical orientation keyboard. Apple’s already too-small keys would drop to baby finger-sized 0.2” by 0.1” keylets. Those who already find the iPhone’s keyboard marginal would find the miniaturized one useless unless new predictive software was developed to make it smarter at guessing the words they were trying to type.

Another option would be to restrict the keyboard to operating solely in widescreen mode. Here, the keys would remain substantially usable even on a 2.8” screen, falling to roughly 0.2” by 0.2” in size. While not as large as the .25” by .25” keys of the larger iPhone, these would have twice the surface area of the vertical keys.

Does any of this really matter? Yes. What Apple does with successive iPhones’ interfaces is literally all-important. Should the screen size shrink at the same size pixel density increases, Apple’s applications—and third-party ones—will need to be updated to be sure text and buttons aren’t too small to be used by most people. Should Apple cut screen size and preserve pixel density as-is, such that you might get 12 icons on the main screen rather than 20, third-party applications may need to be developed in separate versions for old and new screen types. (Apple might even fully redesign the interface for its “mini” or “nano” devices, or lose the current iPhone operating system altogether, but the iPhone SDK wouldn’t be much good then, would it?) Of course, similar issues will also crop up if the mobile OS X (aka iPhone/iPod touch) platform winds up on larger-screened devices, as screen real estate will increase while pixel density either goes down, stays the same, or goes up; they’ll also happen if Apple goes with a higher-density, miniature 720x480 display… all of this assumes, of course, that it doesn’t just decouple the touch interface from the display in some way, such as adding a slide-out or plug-in keyboard.

What do you think will happen? Will Apple preserve the current iPhone interface as-is for the entire next round of iPhone and iPod touch devices, or are smaller screens, icons, or keys the likely near-term future of the family? We’re anxious to see your comments below.

MacBook Air Sales, Decoded: “Successful,” Not “Thrilling,” Means…

By Jeremy Horwitz | 04.24.08 | 7 comments |  tell-a-friend |  digg this story

Those accustomed to hearing Apple executives discuss sales performance of new products are familiar with certain restrictions: the company rarely breaks out model-by-model sales for individual new releases, instead issuing only broad sales figures for categories such as “Mac desktops,” “Mac portables,” “iPods,” and “iPhones.” Then, in quarterly conference calls with financial analysts, its executives talk about the figures with enthusiastic code phrases that might sound “smug” to casual listeners, but sometimes subtly signal how well the products are actually performing in the marketplace. Apple’s sale of 1.1 million iPhones during its first full quarter on the market? The company was “thrilled,” according to CFO Peter Oppenheimer. Apple’s opinion on the beginning of the iTunes Wi-Fi Music Store and then-new relationship with Starbucks? “Very pleased,” said Oppenheimer, in a phrase that is used with great frequency. Underperforming products? They tend not to get mentioned at all.

So where does the MacBook Air sit on this spectrum? It was “successful,” Oppenheimer said yesterday, and “customers have responded very well.” That sounds more like the light, standard enthusiasm Apple exhibited for the Starbucks deal than the “boom!” enthusiasm for the iPhone, right? Further quantification came around the 26:40 mark in the call, when an analyst from Goldman Sachs asked about potential revenue shortfalls for the next quarter.

“Our Mac channel inventory this past quarter did increase by about 60,000 in the March quarter,” revealed Oppenheimer, “as the result of the MacBook Air launch and accelerated sales velocity.” This is quite telling. Because of both the MacBook Air’s launch, and the growth of Mac sales in general, Apple—now increasingly good at conservatively managing its Mac inventory to respond to projected demand—has added 60,000 machines that are just waiting to be sold. Since Apple aims for approximately 4 weeks of channel inventory for Macs (3-4 weeks or 4-5 weeks is typical), if the MacBook Air alone had added 60,000 projected Mac sales in 4 weeks, that would suggest that Apple’s prepared to sell around 180,000 Airs per quarter.

However, that number is probably too high. Oppenheimer mentioned that the 60,000 unit bump also includes “accelerated sales velocity” for additional other Macs, both desktop and portable. Notably, though Mac sales grew both seasonally and from the year ago quarter, they were almost flat from Q1 2008 to Q2 2008 - 2.319 Million Macs versus 2.289 Million, or -1% growth from the prior quarter. In other words, total Macs manufactured and shipped into the channel were pretty close to the same from the prior quarter, even taking the launch of MacBook Air into account. We could guesstimate that 50,000 of Apple’s 60,000 increase came from MacBook Airs being added, which would put the Air at 150,000 per quarter. That’s probably still a little high, but maybe not, if the 60,000 number was closer to 3 weeks of channel inventory than 4.

Since Apple sold 1.433 million portable Macs during the quarter, and had MacBook Air on the market for only two of the three months in the quarter, 50,000 units per month would put estimated sales in the 100,000 range, with 60,000 units per month in the 120,000 range. That’s 7% to 8.4% of total portable Mac sales. For obvious reasons, such numbers would be “successful,” but not “thrilling.” Estimates of the size of the ultra-portable computer market peg it at around 10% or less of the total portable market, putting Air in line with expectations, not above it, with future growth expected to come from small, cheap machines like the Asus EEEPC.

There are two other related things worth noting. First, Apple’s television advertising campaign for the Air was extremely vigorous during the past quarter, with commercials airing multiple times during individual American Idol episodes, as well as across many other popular (and ad-expensive) shows. We’ve been wondering: how much could Apple have shaved off the price of each Air sold if it wasn’t advertising so aggressively, and would a lower price have alone triggered more sales?

Finally, we found it interesting that the iPod touch was described in the same terms as MacBook Air. Oppenheimer described the touch as a “success” and said that Apple is “very pleased,” without going into much greater detail about the flatness in iPod unit sales during a time when Apple has said that it’s shipping its best iPod lineup ever. Ten million more iPods in the quarter is fantastic by our yardstick, but we’re still crossing our fingers for “thrilling” new products in the near future.

Your thoughts, readers?

iChat Video Problems + Solutions, or Don’t Return Your New Mac Yet

By Jeremy Horwitz | 04.22.08 | 11 comments |  tell-a-friend |  digg this story

I love Apple’s iChat. Currently in version 4.0.2, and once known as iChat AV, this single, simple-looking program enables even novice users to quickly establish video, audio, or text chats, and is one of several key reasons that I repeatedly hear that people are switching to the Mac. But iChat has a serious problem: more than any other program most people use on the Mac, it depends on a properly set up network to work, and if your network’s not set up properly, it doesn’t provide detailed error messages or a troubleshooting wizard to help you trace what’s wrong. So when I heard that a family member just bought and almost returned a Mac because he couldn’t get video iChat to work properly, even after searching for help in Apple’s Discussions boards, Help menus, and Google, I realized that I might be able to share a few solutions that could help other people get iChat video chats to work as expected.

The problem: everything else on the Mac worked, but iChat would not connect for video chats. You’ve probably seen the generic error messages before: “There was a communication error during your chat.” “No data has been received for 10 seconds” timeouts. “User cancelled the connection.” “Did not receive a response from user.” And so on. My family member spent five or so hours with the MacBook’s integrated help system and people on the telephone trying to figure out what the issue was. Was it port forwarding? No. A lack of general Internet connectivity? No. User error? No. Nothing seemed to help, and the computer was literally moments away from being boxed and sent back to Apple.

What ultimately worked in this case was a solution that, in my view, should be your starting point: the wireless router was removed, and the Mac was connected directly via a wire to the cable modem via its Ethernet port. Suddenly iChat began to work perfectly—no mysterious errors. This single step demonstrated that the Mac was capable of working, and that the cable modem was doing everything it should be doing, too. There was something wrong with the wireless router. Maybe.

At this point, I will tell you a little something about wireless routers. People have really bad experiences with them, and the companies that sell them. Unfortunately, these problems actually come from numerous sources: existing wireless home phones, microwave ovens, other wireless devices, poorly made routers, poorly written wireless software and firmware for both the routers and wireless computers—the list goes on and on. Because there are so many ways that wireless networks can hiccup or fail, router makers often throw up their hands and leave customers to troubleshoot their own problems. They point to Apple and other computer makers. They point to the cable modems, DSL systems, and their providers. And then, when you call your computer or cable modem company, these companies point somewhere else. It’s nobody’s fault.

I can’t tell you for certain that the iChat problem you’re having is going to be the exact same one as discussed here, but I can tell you this: eliminating the wireless router as a cause is a critical first step. Once your computer is connected directly to your broadband modem, and you confirm that your web browser can connect with a web site, you can then test your connection with one of three little-known Apple iChat test buddies. These are added using the + icon on iChat’s buddy list, keeping the Account type as AIM, and creating 3 separate buddies by entering one name at a time into the Account name: field, hitting the Add button, and repeating that process until all 3 are added.

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The next step is to click on the bright green camera icon next to one of these names, the first two of which run Apple commercials on non-stop loops (below), the third of which is supposed to mirror back your video to you. If one of the three names is grayed out, someone else is testing with it now, but if it’s bright green, you can connect and do a test right away. If it works and runs stable, your machine’s just fine and your connection is just fine. If it connects but runs sluggish, your Internet connection is probably to blame if you’re not running any other programs and using a recent (G5 or Intel) Mac.

If it doesn’t connect, run your Mac’s Internet diagnostics, found under System Preferences > Network, with the “Assist me...” button at the bottom of the screen. This process should sort out whether the problem’s in your Mac, your broadband connection, or the wireless router, and it’s probably going to be the router. If everything works, you can try to reconnect the router again and work through the problems.

When my family member reconnected the router, it was obvious that the issue was tricky to diagnose. The correct next step, and one that worked immediately to solve his problem, was to temporarily turn off wireless security altogether: once WPA was turned off, iChat worked perfectly. But what about the need for wireless security? Ultimately, experimenting with this feature—trying WPA2 security, for instance, making sure that both the router and the computer were set up to use the newer, apparently more reliable WPA2 standard—was something that solved an iChat problem I had long ago.

The ability to talk over video or voice chat with family members, friends, and/or business associates is a killer feature of the Mac platform, but it’s obvious that people who have iChat problems can find their new Mac enthusiasm killed instead. Until a troubleshooting wizard for iChat or better diagnostic error messages appear, the steps above should help you figure out what’s really wrong with the most serious iChat failures. I hope they’re as useful for your family as they were for mine.