Here is a quick rundown of the new announcements from Mac mini: At 6.5 inches wide and 2 inches tall, it’s the cheapest Mac ever. It comes without a monitor, keyboard, or mouse, so you can either plug it into your existing Mac hardware, or your PC gear. There are two configurations: A 1.25-GHz G4 with 512MB and a 40GB hard drive for $499, or a 1.42-GHz G4 with 512MB and an 80GB hard drive for $599.
iPod shuffle: This is a flash-based iPod that is designed to compete in the low-end MP3 market. To accomodate the smaller size, the device does not have a display, so you either have to listen to your playlist in order, or in shuffle play. Smaller than a pack of gum and lighter than four quarters, you can get a 512MB model that holds 120 songs for $99, or a 1GB model that holds 240 songs for $149. I predict that this one will sell like…well, like iPods.
iLife ’05: The new iLife suite comes with a new version of iPhoto that provides more functionality for editing your photos, new slideshows, and new photo books, including three new softcover versions; iMovie HD that lets you do HD editing within iMovie, and adds many new features; iDVD 5 with, again, many new features; GarageBand 2, which provides real-time music notation, vocal effects, and the ability to change keys on recorded tracks just as you would with loops; and the latest version of iTunes. iLife is $79, and will be available on Friday, January 20.
iWork: iWork is a productivity suite that contains two applications: Pages, an application that lets you compose professional-looking word-processing documents easily, including the ability to have themed documents; and the new version of Keynote, which adds new transitions, new themes, and other new features. iWork will sell for $99, and will ship on Saturday, January 21.
Final Cut Express HD: The new version of Final Cut Express provides HD editing, and includes the new version of the LiveType titling application.
Mac OS X Tiger: Many new features of Tiger were featured, including fast Spotlight searching across the entire computer; the ability to play slideshows of pictures from within Mail; smart folders in the Finder and Mail that automatically update to include new content; and Dashboard, which provides cool widgets to access information on the fly. Tiger will be available on the first half of 2005.
