Apple receives pre- orders for IPads
www.WirelessFederation.com/news: Pre orders for the iPad have started pouring in and Apple has started accepting the orders. IPad is a new touch-screen gadget for reading books, watching video and surfing the Web.
IPads with Wi-Fi wireless connections have been priced at $499 and up and it will go on sale on April 3. Order can also be placed online and people can get it on April 3 where Saturday delivery is available.
IPad can be reserved online too and shoppers can pay for it and pick it up at a local Apple store. According to Apple, versions of the iPad with cellular data connections and Wi-Fi will go on sale at the end of April.
Orders for the latest version of its iPhone, the 3GS have also been taken by Apple and it will be released in June and it is expected that many consumers lined up overnight anyhow to be among the first buyers.
Sony developing handsets to compete with Apple
www.WirelessFederation.com/news: A new lineup of handheld products is being developed by Sony Corp to compete with Apple’s iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad. The products are scheduled to launch this year. The range of products includes a smart phone capable of downloading and playing PlayStation games.
Sony and Sony Ericsson are working together to develop these handsets. Apple has a wide range of products that connect to its iTunes media platform and Sony’s product aims at having a dig at them. The portable-gaming market which is dominated by Sony has now being invaded by Apple. The nascent e-reader market where one million units have already being sold by Sony is expected to be disrupted by iPad tablet.
Project to develop a portable device is also underway to compete against multifunction products such as Apple’s coming iPad tablet. The product is designed in a way that blurs distinctions among a netbook, an e-reader and a PlayStation Portable, or PSP.
Sony’s online media platform will work with both the new smart phone and the multifunction device. The media platform is due to launch later this month in the U.S. as the company’s answer to Apple’s iTunes.
Apple IPad to hit the stores in April
www.WirelessFederation.com/news: The technology oriented people waiting anxiously for the much anticipated Apple iPad to adore their gadgets collection will have to wait a little more as the launch of the device has been delayed and will now hit the stores on April 3.
Earlier, Apple scheduled the launch of the device worldwide by end March. No reasons have been cited by the company behind the delay. According to analysts, Apple might have to delay or limit the size of the launch because of an unspecified production problem but denied any affect of the delay on the sales of the iPad during Apple’s fiscal third quarter, which ends in June.
Depending on the data storage capacity, the range of the first iPad will vary between $499, $599 or $699 and will be connected to Wi-Fi networks only. The cost of those versions which can also be connected to 3G cellular networks will range between $629, $729 or $829.
Orders can be placed by the US customers from March 12 and all models will be available in Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Spain, Switzerland and the U.K. by late April.
12 new applications will be included in the iPad, especially designed for the touch-screen device. According to Apple, it will also run “almost all” of the more than 140,000 apps already available for the iPhone and iPod Touch and users will be able to access the applications they bought for those devices through the iPad.
Apple holds annual meeting with shareholders
www.WirelessFederation.com/news: The annual face-to-face meeting with shareholders will be held by Apple Inc Chief Executive Steve Jobs with no shortage of questions for a company famously stingy with information.
Despite a strong December-quarter earnings report and massive hype around the iPad tablet, Apple’s shares have been treading water around the $200 mark since last October.
Analyst all over the world feel that the investors may be looking for a fresh catalyst to send shares that have already more than doubled from a year ago, even higher, as market capitalization of the company has approached $200 billion in recent weeks.
According to Pacific Crest Securities analyst Andy Hargreaves, Apple is a big company now and there are questions about the limits to growth in any market, and once the $200 billion number is hit, which they’re close to, people have questions.
Apple removing risque iPhone & iPad apps
www.WirelessFederation.com/news: Risqu© iPhone and iPod Touch applications will be removed by Apple from its online App Store, including some which had previously been approved for sale. The deletion of applications featuring bikini models is the result of the new policy towards adult-themed contents.
Apple has already begun notifying application developers earlier this week that apps with “overtly sexual content” were being removed. According to Apple, it will remove all the applications with inappropriate material besides requesting the developer to make any necessary changes in order to be distributed by Apple.
App Store offering more than 140,000 programs will be an important part of the marketing of the iPad, which Apple intends to promote as a device for families and schools.
Apple increases iPhone’s 3G app download limit
www.WirelessFederation.com/news: The size of the iPhone downloaded over 3G has been boosted by Apple from 10 MB to 20 MB. Earlier, users downloading an app larger than 10 MB had to switch to a WiFi connection.
The reason behind the limit was to preserve the bandwidth. It has been speculated that Apple has made the change in anticipation of the iPad, which is set to debut in late March.
The typical iPhone apps populating Apple’s App Store will not be as large as iPad application downloads. iPad apps will have to support higher-resolutions graphics due to its 9.7-inch screen, especially for games. It appears iPhone users will be able to enjoy downloading larger apps while on the go using 3G.
Apple iPad’s more like a magazine
www.WirelessFederation.com/news: Hailed as a step-change in the app economy, Apple’s iPad is attracting the glances for more than one exclusive and prominent feature. Its big screen and sleek body gives it a look of a magazine.
According to McCaffrey, product director at 2ergo, one of the industry’s leading mobile app developers, the iPad will be about sitting in front of the TV whilst watching TV, browsing a magazine.
2ergo is working on firm iPad app projects for four clients but there don’t seem to be significant technical upgrades from the iPhone version. In the iPad, all the existing iPhone apps will work. It’s going to be even more of an opportunity for newspapers and magazines to monetize their content from a subscription point of view.
Vodafone UK to offer Apple iPad to its customers
www.WirelessFederation.com/news: Although very few people are inclined to possess the latest Apple iPad, the device has a new taker in the form of Vodafone which has expressed interest in being able to offer the new Apple Tablet to its customers.
Vodafone interest in having the device is hailed as great news since they are the network provider who could provide the best 3G network service in the UK. The operator has been very successful with Apple’s iPhone and sold 100,000 units in the first week of launch this January and it also reported that their number of iPhone subscribers is continuously growing as subscribers from other lines are switching to their network.
The Apple iPad is expected to hit store shelves sometime this coming April just in time for the Apple iPhone 4G.
Intel’s mobile push threatened by iPad
www.WirelessFederation.com/news: Among the entire hullabaloo during the launch of Apple’s iPad, the most important fact which did not come to the fore was the new tablet computer will be powered by an in-house chip called the A4.
Though the chip will not be marketed by Apple publicly, it is highlighted that the rival chip designs may eventually win out over Intel’s designs in the emergent hot category of mobile devices like smartphones and tablets. It is also said to give the iPad a long battery life and is considered comparable to rival processors in both speed and performance.
According to Intel, the first smartphones using its chips go on sale by 2010′s second half, as it tries to stake out a corner in the wireless market and replicate what it did for the formerly red-hot netbook category it now almost completely dominates.
iPad hailed as a “real start” of a tablet computer market
www.WirelessFederation.com/news: Though not the first media tablet, Apple’s iPad has surely redefined the tablet computer market which is expected to grow more than tenfold to reach about 57 million devices sold annually by 2015.
According to a research company, a tablet might not replace a laptop, netbook or mobile phone, but will remain an additional premium or luxury product for wealthy industrialized markets for at least several years. It has also been predicted that the tablet computer makers will ship four million units this year.
Apple is expected to be a “fairly sizable player” in a tablet arena with traditional computer makers such as Lenovo and Hewlett-Packard as well as small firms such as Notion Ink.
When Apple chief executive Steve Jobs unveiled the iPad on January 27, he hailed it as a revolutionary device.
