REVIEWS OF IPHONE 4

                                         

In one of the smaller announcements today, Apple announced that iOS 5 on the iPad 2 will support a feature called AirPlay mirroring. This feature is something that I’ve been telling people would eventually come to the iOS world and basically backdoor Apple into the console market.

If you aren’t familiar with HDMI mirroring on the iPad, it’s a feature that lets you plug in an cable into a special adapter on your iPad 2 and display your screen on an HDTV. This feature is great for use in classrooms and has even seen some play in games as well with Firemint using this feature to allow 1080p output on your TV from their Real Racing 2 HD via mirroring. But, you are tethered to the TV with a cable.

So, what’s AirPlay mirroring then, you ask? According to Apple, “AirPlay® Mirroring to wirelessly display everything you do on your iPad 2 right on your HDTV through Apple TV®.” To me, that means with an iPad 2, you’ll be able to do that mirroring without a cable. That means anything you see on your iPad 2, you will be able to see on an Apple TV. Let that sink in and then think using that feature for games.

This means that any game you play on your iPad 2, you’ll be able to play on your TV, wirelessly. Yes, wirelessly. You launch Angry Birds on your iPad 2 and the Angry Birds screen will show up on your TV. Boom, instant game console with $0.99 game downloads.

To control the game, you would use the iOS device as the controller. The Apple TV becomes the cheapest console out there at $99 with the largest game library at nearly 100,000 games. Your iPad 2 becomes your controller, albeit a very expensive one. We can assume that this feature will also be available in the next iPhone and iPod touch, once their processors and memory are upgraded and on parity with the iPad 2.

Let’s wrap that all up together, and it means that you can consider the Apple TV to be firmly in the game console market now. This is huge! I can’t stress enough how much of a game changer this is for the gaming world.

Sony, Nintendo, or Microsoft should be worried. They have all been rather slow to adopt downloadable games, now Apple has gone and made it easy and cheap. If Apple does to the console market what they have done to the mobile software market, they should be very worried. The Apple TV, which started out as Steve Jobs hobby, could turn out to be the most popular home game and entertainment console around.

Apple announced a ton of info today at the WWDC keynote. Like that there are now 200 million iOS devices out in the wild. And that there are 425,000 applications available for iOS. Oh yeah, and iOS 5, Lion, and iCloud are coming very soon.

Rather than just go down the feature list, we’re going to post some thoughts on the new features and point you to places you can see full details on the new stuff.

First, we just posted about what is one of the largest features mentioned, that got very little attention. Apple is now firmly in the game console business by allowing iOS 5 games to be displayed, wirelessly from your device to your TV via the Apple TV. It will be huge.

The biggest new features shown of iOS 5 all looked more than a little familiar. There were many features in the new Camera app that looked like they could have been borrowed from Camera+. There’s a new todo application called Reminders that could be any number of todo apps in the store. The updates to the Message app, now called iMessage, match the features of the Blackberry Messenger app (BBM), that we’re shocked. Even the method for pulling down the notifications list comes straight from Android.

Now to be fair, these other platforms have “borrowed” from iOS as well. So all’s fair I guess. And I’m still looking forward to the new features, they look fantastic. And will be nice to have some of the baked into the OS.


Some of the new features that stick out in my head most include photo editing features, Twitter integration (single sign on built into the OS), greatly improved notifications / widgets available anywhere, great new mail features, PC-free setup, and apparently 200 more.

For a full list of new features, check out the official list at Apple. It’s got a good roundup and includes a lot of screens and details not mentioned in the keynote.

iOS 5 should be available for all devices in beta, for developers today. It will ship to consumers in the fall.

Apple has posted a slickly produced video highlighting some of the new features of iOS 5. Or, you can watch the recorded version of the keynote right on the Apple site.

The app’s database also provides information on how other users have rated a place. Making use of the iPhone’s hardware, the app can find places based on your current location. The travel guides also stay up-to-date thanks to online synchronization with Smart Travelling’s online database. (Such updates come at no extra charge.) As another ease-of-use bonus, users can also download content for offline access.

So, Smart Travelling Guides provides a great resource of select restaurants, hotels, shops, and more for travelers looking to take advantage of sightseeing in a new city. Next time you’re in Istanbul or Venice, perhaps Smart Travelling Guides will be of use!

Smart Travelling Guides can be downloaded as a free app, with extra “guides” unlockable via in-app purchase.

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