As I have updated on the
News Page of the site,
Apple held an event yesterday. All of the details can be found there, but I wanted to make a few comments about the event.
As discussed with Buddy Brannon and Justin Romack on our next Triple Click Home episode, Apple did some really brilliant marketing things. Making Mavericks available as well as the iLife and iWork packages, is certainly going to ruffle the feathers of their competition. To my knowledge, I don’t believe that Microsoft has ever offered a version of Windows for free (Windows 8.1 does not count because it is really a Service Pack to fix all of the issues in 8.0). This, to me, was an interesting change, and it seems that all future OS upgrades will be free. I will discuss Mavericks in a separate post to come over the next few days.
I am going to buy an iPad Air. I think these models are just fantastic. I am using an iPad 3rd generation, and I am looking forward to the faster processor and smaller size. I think the iPad Mini is also a great model as well, but as much as the Mini is a tempting choice, I still like my full-sized iPad.
As for the marketing positioning, again, Apple is spot on. Having the iPad Air starting at $499 and the iPad 2 still being available at $399 is only enhanced by the iPad Mini’s $399 starting price and the fact that the original iPad Mini will be $299. This is a great way to go into the holiday season.
Lastly, the Mac Book Pro improvements are truly impressive too. I’d love to get a new 13 inch model. Apple dropped the starting price for both the 13 and 15 inch models, and you sure get a lot of punch for the price. Before anyone points out that you can still purchase Windows laptops for less money, the only problem with that logic is that such computers still come with that cumbersome operating system/virus called Windows ….