At Last! The iPhone Becomes Half-Decent & Macbook Air

Mr Jobs is part-way through his Macworld presentation and there does look to be some cool stuff coming out of Apple.

Not least the Time Capsule back up system for Macs. But also loads of gadgets for the iPhone and iPods!



For the iPod touch they're adding Mail, maps, stocks notes and weather - I may actually upgrade now!



They're also launching iTunes movie rentals with co-operation from Touchstone, MGM, Miramax, Lions Gate, Fox, WB, Walt Disney, Paramount, Universal and Sony.

It'll cost $2.99 to rent a library film and $3.99 for a new release.

Basically you have 24 hours to start to watch it and then you have 24 hours to finish it. To me this far beats Virgin Media as I think some of the films are over priced and a bit clunky.

The new version of iTunes launches today!



You can also download youtube videos from it (I was waiting for that) as well as HD 5.1" sound quality movies (but that's $1 more). You can also get tv shows for $1.99 an episode.

They're also relaunching Apple TV where you won't need a pc/mac to operate it!

There's also a fantastic hook-up with flickr so you can view your (and other's) photos on there. And all this is a free upgrade to the current ATV software.

And don't forget you can get the movies and tv shows on to your iPod and iPhone straight from iTunes.

But it works the other way too! Working with Fox they're creating DVDs that you can move a copy into iTunes. (er what - why can't you just download it? Oh the same reason why I still by CD's - I like having something physical - right!)

They're also launching MacBook Air - the world's thinest notebook (I'm glad I bought that domain at 7am this morning :-)

It's about 2cm thick and thats thinner than the Zony TZ!



It's got an 80gb hard drive and a backlit keyboard.

To save battery life you can watch movies wirelessly from Apple TV. You can also install software wirelessly - now this is freeking fantastic!

Stay tuned!

Sources:

Macworld / Engadget .