Jennifer Mack

The Apple Spring Forward Event

I watched the Apple event this morning so you wounldn’t have to. Tim Cook covered a lot ground in the 90 minuite event. The last half-hour was devoted the Apple Watch.

Apple TV

HBO GO coming to Apple on April 12th, for $14.99/mo.
Apple TV price cut to $69.

Miscellanious

Apple Pay coming to Coke vending machines.
CarPlay has every major car maker committed to using it.
- 40 new car models with CarPlay coming in 2015/2016.

HealthKit & Medical research

Problems in research
- Lack of subjects, data problems, subjective assessments, infrequent data, and overall lack of communication between researchers and study participants.
ResearchKit
- Researchers can make apps, iPhone users can participate.
- 5 diseases
  - Parkinson’s disease
    - The App evaluates hand twitches, voice, and walking.
    - Can pull in exercise data from phone or watch.
    - User graphs for feedback
  - Diabetes
  - Cardiovascular disease
  - Asthma
    - Mount Sinai to give away connected health devices.
    - In NYC collecting location data to chart asthma attacks in environment and compare with participant data.
  - Breast Cancer
    - Tracking of post-treatment symptoms.
- Privacy
  - User control over data, and Apple will not see data.
- The goal of the ResearchKit is to make data collection more reliable and up-to-date.
- It will bring people into the process by providing feedback on their conditions.
- ReserchKit will be open source software, will be released in April. First five apps available today.

Mac

Best crop of Macs ever.
Mac growth outpacing industry sales.
Apple wanted to reinvent the notebook.

New MacBook

2 lbs., lightest ever
13.1mm thin, 24% thinner than MacBook Air
Full-sized keyboard
- New keyboard keyboard technology
- Butterfly mech. instead of scissor, with stainless steel dome switch.
- 4x more stable then scissor, 40% thinner, 17% larger keycap.
- More precise and accurate typing
- New backlight, LED for each key
Display, 12” w/ Retina display
- 2304x1440 resolution
- .88mm thin display
- New retina pixels, 30% less energy for same brightness
Force Touch trackpad, with Tapic Engine with better feel.
- Glass touch surface.
- Software adjustable feel.
- Pressure sensitive with Force Click, can auto-select what’s under the cursor.
- Pressing harder can and emphasize to gestures.
Unibody architecture of MacBook has components attached directly to body.
First fanless MacBook.
Logic board is 67% smaller than any logic board before
- Intel Core M, 5w power draw.
More batteries
- Asymmetric cells.
- Form-fitting batteries, contoured to fit inside unibody.
- 35% more battery by filling all the space
- All-day battery life, 9 hours on Wi-Fi.
802.11ac, BT 4.0 built-in
- Antenna is part of case.
Wireless is the future, Airplay, etc.
One port
- Covers charging, data, and expansion.
- USB-C, reversible connector is 1/3 the size of USB-A.
Silver, space grey, and gold colors.
Worlds most energy efficient notebook.
Base price: 8GB ram 256 SSD, $1299
Shipping April 10th.

Other Macs

Macbook Air, updated processor and flash memory.
13” MacBook Pro gets force touch trackpad, new processors, 2x faster flash, battery life extended one hour.

Apple Watch

Most advanced timepiece ever.
Timekeeping
- Accurate to 50 milliseconds of UTC.
- Many faces and configurations available.
  - Serious business oriented faces.
  - Fun faces, with animations.
- Faces are user-configurable.
- Swiping from bottom brings up Glances.
Communication
- Vibration alerts.
- Can receive calls on watch.
- Email reading and can reply.
- Side button to bring up contact list.
- Can talk to other Watches.
  - Send graphics drawn on Watch face.
  - Send taps.
  - Send heartbeat (this will be huge).
Health & Fitness
- Fitness tracking, steps, etc.
- Sitting too long warning.
- Interface is a three-ring interlocking graphic.
- Health reports are right on Watch.
  - Analysis and goals send to Watch.
- Workout app included.
  - Covers many different exercises and activites.
  - Provides metrics on workouts.
Test unit to Christy Turlington Burns
- Finished half-marathon with Watch.
- Christy will be blogging on Apple.com.
Built-in apps:
- ApplePay, photos, music, Siri, notifications, and social media.
- Any iPhone notification can go to Watch.
Watch apps & Usage
- Glances are for short interactions, a few seconds each.
- Start Siri using the crown, or voice control.
- Messaging can open app on iPhone or reply from Watch.
- Reminder to stand up and move.
- Apple Pay, double tap side button and use with scanner.
  - Much faster than getting iPhone out.
- Force press to customize Watch face.
- Instagram has Watch app(!).
- Phone calls directly on Watch.
- Watch uses WiFi at home, in addition to bluetooth, giving longer range.
- Passbook on Watch, along with QR barcode to scan at airport security.
- Demo of hotel door unlocking. Watch is door key.
- Quick reply buttons, dictation can send text or voice recording.
iPhone will be app browser and installer.
- Apple Watch app store in iOS 8.2—available today.
All-day battery life.
- 18 hrs battery life.
- Charging via magnetic charger which clips to back of Watch.

Apple Watch Models

Apple Watch Sport
- Silver or Space Gray colors.
- Aluminum body
  - Special alloy, custom for Apple.
  - 60% stronger than other alloys.
  - Raw, pure AL with Mg & Zn added.
  - Heat treatment & extrusion form the body.
  - Zirconia beads for satin finish
  - Anodized out layer for scratch resistance
- Prices start at:
  - $349 38mm
  - $399 42mm
- Bands
  - Rubber or leather.
Apple Watch
- Stainless steel body.
- Custom alloy, 80% harder than normal stainless.
- 38mm $549 to $1,049
Apple Watch Edition
- 18K gold, another custom alloy.
- Custom bands available only as part of Edition.
- Starting at $10,000.
- Select retail only, not in Apple Stores apparently.
Preorders begin April 10th
- Watch Sport and Watch will be in stores April 10th for touching.
- Available April 24th in white people countries. Brown people countries coming soon.