A Few Thoughts on Today’s Spring Loaded Apple Event

Today was Apple’s Spring Loaded event and it certainly was loaded with a new Mac, iPads Pro, AirTags, AppleTV, and a bit more. I have a few initial thoughts:

The 24″ iMac

  • Hooray for color back on the Mac. It’s been way too long. I particularly like that Apple went with bold colors on these new iMacs. As a good friend texted me, “They had me at Purple.”

  • Colored keyboards, mice, and trackpads also make me happy.

  • This really feels like the ‘Computer as Appliance’ version of the iMac.

  • I never thought I’d need a Magnetic power connector for an iMac. I’d be afraid I may yank the power while shifting the thing.

  • Just four ports. No SD card. No USB A. This is probably an M1 limitation but I’m not aware of any other iMac ever shipping with just four ports.

  • And the Ethernet is on the power brick. Weird. The reason I suspect is that the actual computer isn’t deep enough to plug in Ethernet (or USB A).

  • Overall, I really like the redesign. I am a bit sad the chin stayed and I’m still curious for the rest of the story with the bigger iMac.

  • When we saw the rumors of a flat slab iMac, I wondered if they’d be able to make the audio any good. I’m glad they addressed this in the product rollout, but I’m also looking forward to reading reviews on this point.

  • I think this will be the last implementation of the M1 chip. I suspect the next big Mac announcement will feature Macs with something faster that the pundits collectively call M1X. Probably more performance and graphics cores. If I was a betting man, I’d say that will show up in the 14″ and 16″ MacBooks Pro, a space grey Mac mini, and (hopefully) a big iMac, and (perhaps?) the rumored Mac Pro Cube.

The New iPad Pro

  • I didn’t expect them to put the M1 in the iPad. I expected something very M1-like, but with an A at the front. In hindsight, however, it makes sense. When you are making your own silicon, you’ll want to keep things as easy as possible.

  • The new screen technology on the 12.9″ iPad Pro is impressive.

  • I’d really like to hear about people using a 2TB iPad.

  • The 5G was expected, but I’m pleased to see it happen.

  • You can get it in any color you like so long as it is space gray or silver. I hope this isn’t a sign of things to come for the bigger iMacs. Why does Apple think pro devices can not have fun colors?

  • We heard a lot of rumors about a new Apple Pencil, but that didn’t happen.

  • I feel like every time Apple brings out a new iPad, it goes out its way to show how useful the iPad is, but then they don’t really deliver the goods with so many issues in the operating system. I wish the software team would reflect the marketing team’s enthusiasm.

AppleTV 4K

  • All they really had to say was, “We fixed the crappy remote.”

AirTags

  • Finally! We’ve been hearing about these in rumor-land for years.

  • I expect these will be a big hit and they seem priced about right at $99 for a four-pack.

  • I’ve always wondered how Apple would address the “creepy problem” when they announced AirTags. What if creepy people hide AirTags on other people so they can surreptitiously track them? Apple explained, “AirTags are for things, not people.” I’m curious to see how that gets implemented. (I’m also thinking about attaching one to my dog. What about dogs, Tim?)