Veerle's blog

Longhorn on a diet

There’s much going on in the computer industry these days, for example on Friday Microsoft said it would cut back one of the major features that would make Longhorn a revolution “WinFS”. WinFS promised to be a smart file storage system that would make searching a whole lot easier then when using separate search programs. Apple will have a similar feature called ”Spotlight” ready in Tiger in the first half of 2005. In the coming days we will also know if there will be cut-backs in “Avalon” Microsoft’s equivalent of Apple’s Quartz rendering engine. With all those axes they plan on getting it out the door in late 2006. In other words “Longhorn” sounds awfully like the good old Copland days. Copland was a much hyped Apple system that was never released.

Apple iPod from HP

HP has announced their iPod called ”Apple iPod from HP”.  To me this is one of the biggest milestones in Apple’s history. All new HP PC’s will have an iTunes icon on the desktop that will take users directly to the iTunes Music Store, this combined with the new Apple iPod from HP only tells us one thing:  Apple’s future looks quite nice. HP sells millions of PC’s each month and they will promote their iPod with a large advertising campaign and as a result will probably sell a buck load of iPods. The new HP commercial “You Let Musical Worlds Collide” is now available on their site

Presenting the all new iMac

Without a doubt the biggest buzz right now is the new iMac, with only two days left until Apple Expo starts in Paris speculation about this new device is still a hot topic on the net. One source claimed that he worked on the Charles de Gaulle airport and that he had to move large computer boxes. He claimed that those boxes contained the new iMac and took some pictures of it as you can see here. Philbott the topic starter has now confessed that it was a hoax. He said ”I hope I have kept a few (70,000+) people entertained for a couple of days! Can’t wait for Tuesday now… can you? PS. yes it was a LaCie 20” LCD in a PowerBook box.

When you think about it, it’s pretty hard to form an idea of how the new iMac will look. My guess is that Apple will drop the round factor and goes in the direction the G5 has set. Think Secret has some speculation about the specs on their website. Instead of talking it is much more fun to show a few of the ideas that I found on the net here.

One thing is sure, it will be Phill Shiller instead of Steve on stage in Paris because Steve is still recovering from his surgery for pancreatic cancer. He said he will be back in Cupertino in September but knowing Apple and its mystery factor I wouldn’t be at all surprised if Steve Jobs pops in from his sick bed using iSight. What I don’t know is if there will be a broadcast on the web of this keynote.