Watched it all because for some reason my body decided to wake up at an ungodly hour.

Not gonna lie a lot of it was somewhat exciting. New MacBook Air is very much on the agenda. The early 2011 MBP 15 inch has certainly done it's job. Still hate how a lot of the more useful stuff is focused in the US.

I am quite excited about Watch OS 9. The new running metrics like stride length and vertical oscillation will be really useful for me, and it's great to see them catching up with Garmin on their sleeping tracking technology.

The new Macbook Air looks cool, but the entry level Macbook Pro is a bit of a disappointment. I thought the touch bar was supposed to be being phased out. 

Probably the best feature for me is the iPad OS ability to finally extend displays - i.e. what Windows has been doing for a really long time. 

I can finally plug my iPad mini into my external display and get true full-screen extended display, not just 4:3 mirroring. 

I also like the updates to the iOS home screen. The new MacBook Air looks good too! But it's overpriced, of course. 

Probably the best feature for me is the iPad OS ability to finally extend displays - i.e. what Windows has been doing for a really long time. 

 

I can finally plug my iPad mini into my external display and get true full-screen extended display, not just 4:3 mirroring.

Well...on further investigation, it appears that Apple have "Appled" this feature. 

Only available on M-chipped iPads. So the brand new iPad Mini is not going to be able to extend to a monitor - it'll just continue to mirror in 4:3, despite runnning:

 

• A15 Bionic chip with 64‑bit architecture
• 6-core CPU
• 5-core graphics
• 16-core Neural Engine

Really poor form on Apple's part, in my opinion. 

Handsomedan:

 

Well...on further investigation, it appears that Apple have "Appled" this feature. 

 

Really poor form on Apple's part, in my opinion. 

 

The generous explanation for this is that overlapping windows etc, require the larger shared memory architecture you get with SoC

The other is the apple just want to give you another "nudge" that they rely on people buying their new stuff to be one of the largest companies on the planet..

Apparently there is a better files app as part of the upgrade too. depending on how it turns out it might be enough to finally think about an M-spec ipad..  

The Air really is a bit of a beast. I looked after a fleet of them in the UK with the last of the Intel processors, they were a dog of a laptop. Many failures on a zoom call on hot summers day. The M1 (and i'd say M2) blows them out of the water. For most people who just want a Mac laptop for a general daily driver, its pretty hard to find reasons to get the Pro over the Air nowadays.

If you need to spec up an Air on the other hand, by the time you add 512GB SSD and 16GB ram you're not too far off a 14" Pro, where you're getting a better display etc.

I recently bought a 14" Pro and I actually think it's probably better value for money than the Air when you consider the cost of ordering the latter with 16Gb of RAMM. 

Having said that, the 14" Pro is very heavy and bulky so that would be a consideration for some people. 

alasta:

 

I recently bought a 14" Pro and I actually think it's probably better value for money than the Air when you consider the cost of ordering the latter with 16Gb of RAMM. 

 

Having said that, the 14" Pro is very heavy and bulky so that would be a consideration for some people. 

 

My kids have both got slightly older 13" Pro's and to be honest, they are heavy. 

I'd be happy with an Air (the new M2 one). I just don't think I'll give Apple any more of my money any time soon. 

alasta:

 

I recently bought a 14" Pro and I actually think it's probably better value for money than the Air when you consider the cost of ordering the latter with 16Gb of RAMM. 

 

Yeap, as I said depends on your use case. Most users would be fine with 8GB Ram.

The ios updates are a bit underwhelming, especially as they are dropping two generations of iPhone with this update. Although I did expect them to do this, as they did the same thing a few years ago. It looks like the lockscreen change is the big thing, and guessing they are getting ready for the AOD on new models, but guessing only the new gen iphones will get this.  Haptic keyboard has also been missing. The AOD is something I do like about my android and it has had it for years. 

I’m kinda excited to see how the new multitasking on iPad works.. honestly with proper external monitor support I could probably do 90% of my computing needs on an iPad now…. And spin up an Unraid VM for the remainder. 

What’s been holding me back is Apple’s multi window system has always been a bit janky and requires so many swipes etc to actually use.