With a slew of product releases, Apple has made it very difficult for its competitors to survive in the market with its state-of-the-art products and software. It will be interesting to see how competition answers with their upcoming products.
The word Apple no more brings the red-coloured fruit to our mind. Rather it reminds us of innovation, conceptualisation, quality, style and cutting edge technology.
You can say that Apple products are amalgamation of what human mind thinks and demands in the area of technology.
A few days ago, Apple launched a bunch of gadgets that claim to be the path breakers in their own right. The California based tech giant announced six new products at its event: iPhone 6S, 6S Plus, iPad Pro, iPad Mini 4, Apple Pencil (Stylus), iTV and new software iOS 9.
Apple iPhone 6S and iPhone 6S Plus
These latest iPhones iterations come with several new features that put them way ahead of their siblings. The new iPhone 6S and 6S Plus boast of a sparkling HD Retina display made out of toughened glass, providing it all round protection from scratches and liquid splashes.
These new handsets also feature 3D Touch that allows you a better interactive experience with phone’s content and applications by just feeling the force of your touch on the display.
The displays of these mobile phones can differentiate between soft and hard touch to bring out different features of an application or new windows on the home screen.
The design of both these phones is the like iPhone 6’s, but this time Apple has used an alloy called Aluminum 7000 that is used extensively in the aerospace industry, thanks to its unique combination of strength and lightness.
Apple has been a late bloomer if we talk about the photography features of the earlier iPhones as opposed to its rivals like Samsung that provided powerful cameras in its flagship and even mid-range smartphones.
However, of late, it has focused on providing powerful snappers that take high quality pictures, selfies or shoot videos. The newly introduced iPhone 6S and 6S Plus come with a 12MP iSight primary rear camera and a 5MP secondary camera.
The new shooters feature 50 per cent more pixels as well as 50 per cent more focus count to give you better shots. The camera applications of these two handsets include a new feature called ‘Live’ photos.
This app will collate all the still photos you have taken and make it into a movie, thus allowing you to see your journey as a continuous process rather than abrupt, single stages captured by a collection of photos.
Moreover, these two handsets now have the ability to capture your precious moments in a real life-like 4K resolution.
Apple has also used the most powerful processor available in the market to run these two devices. The A9 processor, designed in-house by Apple, is insanely faster than the previous A8 processor.
According to Apple, the CPU and GPU performance of the A9 processor is 70 per cent and 90 per cent faster than its predecessor, the A8 chip. This will allow the user to experience top of the line performance accompanied by low power consumption.
In addition, the second-generation touch ID is much faster than the one found in earlier iPhones.
Apple iPhone 6S is likely to cost $199 for the 16GB model with a two-year contract. The 64GB and 128GB ones will be available on retail for $299 and $399, respectively.
On the other hand, Apple iPhone 6S Plus will start at $299 for the 16GB version, while the 64GB and 128GB will be available for $399 and $499, respectively.
These prices are with a two-year contract with AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile, or Sprint networks in the US. However, there is no word on the availability of these two devices in the Indian market; rumours that these two are expected to hit the Indian shelves somewhere around Diwali rule the roost. The launch price will be Rs 53,500 for the base version, as per tech blogs.
Apple iPad Pro and iPad Mini 4
In the tablet market, nothing can beat the iPad. To keep up with the trend, Apple launched two models in the tablet category: iPad Pro and iPad Mini 4. Apple has not shared much detail about iPad Mini 4, but we guess that it will replace iPad Mini 3 and is likely to have an A8x processor with finger-print sensor. It is likely to be rolled out in November and will have a price band starting from $300.
However, the focus seems to be on the revolutionary iPad Pro. The Apple iPad Pro sports a huge 12.9-inch display that supports 2732 x 2048 pixels resolution to give you a pixel density of 264ppi. Apple packs this big device with a new and powerful A9x chip, which is much faster than the earlier A8x processor (twice the memory bandwidth of A8x, twice the flash storage speed, 1.8 times better overall performance and twice the GPU processing power).
For a better audio experience, iPad Pro has four speakers that can automatically balance the sound output depending on how you hold the tablet.
Apple has also provided it with an 8MP iSight camera to take good quality snaps and videos. Apple iPad Pro will be up for sale in the US market in November and will be priced at $799 for 32GB and $949 for 128GB storage variants.
The LTE model will be available in 128GB memory only and will cost $1079.
Again, no official info is provided at the event regarding the availability of iPad Pro in India, but you can expect it in the month of November with iPhone 6S and 6S Plus, or early December.
Smart Keyboard and Apple Pencil
For providing Apple users a better overall experience, the company has come out with two new accessories that when teamed up with compatible Apple iPad, give you a better and smoother experience. One of these accessories is the Smart Keyboard.
It looks like Apple tried to bring something akin to Microsoft’s Surface type cover.
It is basically an external keyboard that offers users the experience of typing on a regular keyboard that is attached to the Apple iPad magnetically through the new magnetic smart connector.
The inclusion of this keyboard will leave the entire display, free for your apps. The price of this keyboard is $169.
The second interesting accessory that Apple has unveiled at this event is the Apple Pencil. This is similar to the Galaxy S-pen Stylus of Samsung. This smart pencil allows you to draw on documents, emails, and add notes to word/excel documents.
Apple has collaborated with Microsoft to make it compatible for using Office documents on iPad Pro. The price of this smart pencil is $99.
Apple TV
At its San Francisco event, Apple unveiled the Apple Smart iTV to take on Sony and Microsoft in the highly lucrative gaming segment of the market. The new Apple TV is a highly interactive gaming device that can be controlled by the new voice assistant SIRI.
The voice command given to this TV allows it to search and play films and TV programmes. Apple has put in a new operating system called tvOS that will integrate Apple Music.
he new OS will allow developers to create apps for Apple TV, besides opening up major opportunities for gaming. Apple has also launched a new redesigned remote for Apple TV that will help the user in playing games (it supports multiplayer feature) on this TV. The TV will cost $149 for a 32GB model and $199 for a 64GB model.
iOS9
Regardless of how high tech the hardware is, without its comparable software the user experience will not be up to satisfaction. For this, the new iOS9 is so important in the Apple scheme of things and it performs admirably on this front.
The new OS is revamped significantly and has several features that make it different from the earlier iOS8. The new OS provides a better interface and the new SIRI provides a better response, for it can now understand more requests.
The iOS 9 provides a new low power mode to save your battery by switching off unwanted apps that are running in the background. It allows multi-tasking on the big display of iPad through features such as split windows, slide over and picture in picture.
The new spotlight search with SIRI helps improve in finding out contacts, location and apps. The Apple pay service gets a boost in iOS 9 by the inclusion of Discovery pay services.
The new platform allows you to store both debit and credit card details along with reward and loyalty cards. The Apple maps now allow you to see the timings -- be it by train, bus or just walking -- similar to what is available on Google Maps.
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