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Hi Apple, I’m Back…

Posted on by Jerad Hill

So here I am back on Apple after going back and forth for over a year now. Over the last year and a half I have been battling with trying to find the perfect Windows computer that would give me the experience I am used to having with Apple products. I am not necessarily talking about the aesthetics alone, as there are some pretty decent Windows computers out there these days. What I am talking mostly about here is the ecosystem that Apple has built around their products. I spoke about this in an Apple vs Windows video I published on YouTube a month or so ago. Since posting that video, I have dove even deeper back into Apple.

Since posting that video on YouTube, many have called me out as an Apple Fanboy knocking on Windows. That is far from the truth as many of you who read this blog know how hard I have tried to get away from Apple. As I will explain below, I just can’t, and it has nothing to do with anything other than the Apple ecosystem. Believe me when I say that I wish there was another way. I want nothing more to be on Windows and Android, it’s definitely the cool thing right now to switch from Apple to a PC. I will do my best to explain why that just can’t be for now.

New MacBook Pro 2016 in the bag
That new MacBook Pro swagger!

I started off this year now even owning an Apple product as part of any of my personal devices. We have an Apple TV at home, but only because we own over 200 movies and around 100 TV shows we have purchased on the platform. We are kind of locked in as far as the Apple TV goes. Other than that, my wife has an iPhone, and my kids play on an iPod Touch, but personally, I used no Apple products. I had a Windows laptop, and my phone and tablet were Android.

The discontent I was feeling mostly came from the broken connectivity between my devices. In 2017, I expect all of my devices to talk to each other and I should be able to use one device to connect to the other devices. You can accomplish this as a Windows and Android user, it’s just kind of broken.

Even when I was using a Mac laptop and an Android phone the process was kind of broken. I used Pushbullet so I could respond to text messages using my computer in a similar way you can use iMessage to reply to text messages on your Mac that came in through your iPhone. Pushbullet is pretty fantastic, but it doesn’t always work perfect. It’s not as clean of an interface to use as iMessage is on the Mac. I would have to really pay attention to assure I was responding to the right person. It runs as a Chrome browser extension and I would have to want for the text message to completely send before clicking away from that window or I might lose the message. There were also situations where the message would hang and never send. I would sit there for 30 seconds or more waiting for it to send only to have it fail. This most likely is not a Pushbullet issue, but it was still annoying.

I could also use Pushbullet to send photos between my laptop and my phone. This worked the same on a Mac as it did on a Windows PC using Pushbullet. I did miss how easy it was to use Airdrop between a Mac and an iPhone. So simple. I have owned a lot of Android phones and when I try to make them my main phone, I always use Pushbullet because there just isn’t anything else that makes it that easy to send and receive your text messages from your laptop or desktop computer. 

The closest I got to finding true love on Windows is with the Razer Blade laptop. It kind of looks like an Apple laptop with that premium aluminum build quality. It even came in black, which is a color I had wished for from Apple for years. The problem with the Razer Blade had nothing to do with the laptop itself, it had to do with not being able to find as good of a user experience when doing the work that I do.

There is a lot of software these days that is the exact same experience whether you are on a Mac or a PC. Take Adobe Photoshop and just about any Adobe applications for example. Besides Windows utilizing the “control” key on the keyboard where Apple has the “command” key, the software experience was the same. I saw drastic differences in performance in tasks such as rendering out video in Adobe Premiere Pro. The Razer Blade I own has very similar specs to the MacBook Pro I just purchased last month with the touch bar. Side note: I absolutely hate the touch bar and the fact that the only way I can differentiate my MacBook Pro from any other is to mention it is the one with the touch bar. I’m sorry, but a touch bar just sounds inappropriate… I digress.

MacBook Pro 2016 vs Razer Blade with Razer Core Video Rendering Battle
Video Rendering Battle between the MacBook Pro 2016 and the Razer Blade with Razer Core & GTX 1080 GPU

When it came to performance, there was not much of a difference between the Mac and the PC I currently used. Sure the Razer Blade would slaughter the MacBook Pro when it came to rendering out video, but other than that, there was no real difference. Both laptops have similar processors and both have 16 GB of RAM. Unfortunately you simply cannot get more than 16GB of RAM right now in most slimstyle laptops. Here are a few areas in which each laptop was in fact better than the other.

Razer Blade Windows Laptop

  • Huge advantage for video editing, specifically rendering out video. I have not seen any performance difference during the actual editing process. Performance boosts were in rendering and in playback, but only when playing back 4K video.
  • 4K display is kind of cool for viewing larger media such as zooming in on high resolution photos I took.
  • I will mention that this laptop is a clear winner if you are into gaming. I am not, which is why this is not a factor for me.
  • Ability to connect an external GPU was fantastic. Using the Razer Core and a GTX 1080 GPU, I was able to get blazing fast performance when rendering video projects. I have some videos showcasing the difference on the State of Tech YouTube channel.

MacBook Pro Late 2016 with Touch Bar

  • Native resolution is better for productivity. I had a hard time on the Razer finding a resolution that allowed me to easily multitask and have a couple of applications in view at a time.
  • Battery life is a clear winner on the MacBook Pro. Even when rendering video, though the Mac is slower, at least the Mac would have enough battery left to do more work after rendering a video project.
  • The Apple ecosystem is far superior to what Windows can offer, even if you are using a Windows phone. Windows 10 is leaps and bounds better than Windows has ever been before, but it still tries to be too many things to too many people, which ends up limiting it’s usefulness for people who want their laptop, phone, and tablet to be able to work well together.
  • Average software user experience: The majority of software developed for Mac OS has user experience in mind. There are a lot of good applications for Windows, but many of them have poor user experience. Most specifically, I use Coda from Panic, Inc. daily. When I switched to PC, it was hard to find software that was 1/2 as good as Coda is. One of the main reasons I came back to Apple was because of Coda from Panic, Inc.
  • AirDrop: I do a lot with photography and social media. It is so much easier to transfer images from an iPhone to a Mac than it is on other platforms using AirDrop. I have tried dozens of applications for Android on both Mac and PC. Nothing performs as well and is as simple to use as AirDrop.

If I wanted to go into extreme detail, I could mention a few other pros and cons about each platform, but I think most of you see where I am going with this.

Now I know that there is no such thing as true multitasking. We like to think that we are multitasking but in reality we as simply task switching. I am a professional at task switching and have been for many years. I juggle a lot of plates and I want to be able to get between tasks quickly. Mac OS and the iPhone simply allow that to happen better than I have experienced on Windows and Android. Up until late last year, no Android phone has been able to hang with the frequency in which I task switch between apps. The Google Pixel XL is the first phone that did not start to lag after I swapped between a couple of tasks. The only thing that Android has going for it over the iPhone is the ability to share items. On Android, you can share just about anything between any app. You are more limited here on iOS. It’s not a deal breaker for me though. Some would also argue that Android is better at multitasking, and in some ways it has been. However, with Android 8.0 coming out, it looks like the Android operating system is not going to let apps just do as they wish in the background anymore. This is likely to help Android phones have longer battery life. I can easily get two days of battery life out of my iPhone 7 Plus, but can only get through about 24 hours with my Google Pixel XL. The majority of Android phones I have had over the years would not even last me until dinner time on a single charge. This is due to how much I use my phone throughout the day of course. Your mileage may vary from mine.

IPhone 7 Plus Product RED Edition
Sorry, but there just are not many (if any) Android phones that look better than this iPhone 7 Plus Product RED in a Black Leather iPhone Case.

Build quality is another issue that Apple just rarely has a problem with. Each product developed by Apple is beautiful. The design does not change much from year to year, but the build quality is second to none. Samsung’s flagship Galaxy line has a similar cost and the build quality just isn’t there. Sure they build in interesting features that some may consider gimmicks, but if you look at the build quality of their devices, it does not match the attention to detail that Apple has with their iPhone. Look at the average PC laptop, which is not built very well. There are some PC laptops that stand out and look fantastic, such as the Dell XPS and Razer Blade laptops. PC manufactures are learning slowly, but they can’t seem to get away from building budget products which requires them to cut corners.

Consistency is king!

At this chapter in my life, I just need things to work. Apple products just work, and without much customization. I love customizing my tech, but when it comes to what I need to get work done, I just want it to work and to stay out of my way. Mac OS and iOS does that in a way Windows simply does not. I can easily live on Android, but there are a few conveniences that make using an iPhone and a Mac together better than a Mac and an Android phone.

I am not a fan of how slowly Apple has been rolling out quality updates to their products. I still throw up in my mouth a bit when I realize how much money I spent on my laptop with older internals and a touch bar. I wanted Windows to be my new home, and in some ways, it could have been. If I was primarily editing photos and video in Adobe software, I would had stayed on Windows. The performance increases alone would make it worth it. I have even contemplated building another Windows PC for my office so I could use it for heavy lifting and then use my MacBook Pro for less process intensive work as I am using it for now.

My plan is to try and wait until later this year before making any other decisions. If Apple updates their Mac Pro, I may look at purchasing one of those, but only if they put a serious graphics card in it. I don’t want to be forced into using Final Cut Pro X by Apple. I prefer Adobe products, and Adobe software renders much better on Windows PCs that can take advantage of GPUs that are more powerful. I am also considering building a Hackintosh, which is essentially a PC that you install the Mac OS on. The list of available hardware that you can get to work with Mac OS is much bigger these days than it used to be. A Hackintosh could be the answer to my need for more horsepower when editing video.

There is no perfect computer or platform

Mac OS and Windows has to be a lot of things. It can’t just be a platform for developers and it can’t be the perfect platform for video editors. People do many things on these platforms and because of that, they can’t be all things. Phones can’t be perfect either. They can get close, but they can’t be perfect. The iPhone has many shortcomings as does many Android phones. What it really comes down to is choosing a platform that works best for you most of the time. What platform is going to help you get done what you spend most of your time doing? Since switching back to Apple, I have been less stressed because everything just works. It might not work as fast as some other available laptops and phones, but it makes up for it in consistency. The Apple ecosystem is not as much of a battle as attempting to make multiple platforms talk to each other. It is better than it ever has been, but not as simplified as Apple has made it for their own products. For a moment, Samsung attempted to build their own ecosystem, but they experienced a ton of pushback early on. Apple has just always been this way, and it’s why they can get away with it.

Call me an Apple Fanboy if it will make you feel better, but I’m able to be more productive on my MacBook Pro and an iPhone. That’s just the way it is. It’s less to worry about and less problematic. That is what I need in my life right now.

What’s your perfect setup?

What works, or has worked for you when it comes to keeping your technology connected? Share it with me in the comments below, or connect with me on Facebook or Twitter.

And I’m Back on iPhone

Posted on by Jerad Hill

To anyone who has received a blue chat bubble from me in the last 24 hours, I am back on iPhone. Last Summer, I wrote a post about how I won’t be buying the iPhone 6S or the iPhone 6S Plus. I went into detail about how Apple doesn’t innovate much anymore, blah blah blah. I was pretty adamant about my decision and did not see myself wavering. However, after some frustration I will elude to below, I decided it was time to go back to iOS for the time being.

When I sold my iPhone 6 Plus, I was using a Nexus 6 and was quite happy with it. My iPhone 6 Plus had become something I would leave behind for the Nexus. A few months later, I purchased the LG G4. The camera was nice on the G4 and the phone worked well. However, after a while, the phone became a bit slow and would lag on me. The camera would fail to open and I would have to restart the phone to get it working again. I purchased a Samsung Galaxy S6 and was plagued by the horrible battery life. I went for the Samsung Galaxy S6 Active which had a slightly larger battery but had lag issues as well. I moved on to the Samsung Galaxy Note 5, which was a great phone but had a lot of features I didn’t need that seemed to bog the phone down a bit. That led me to the Samsung Galaxy S6 Edge+, which was a beast of a phone, but I couldn’t justify having spent that much money on a Samsung phone. I also spent a few weeks with a Moto X Pure, but it would lag on me as well.

As of yesterday evening, I was using a Nexus 6P and had been since its release date last fall. I like the phone, but it has some minor lag issues that keep me from using certain features of the phone. I also notice that when I am using Android phones, I take fewer photos. I am not sure why as most Android flavors provide a more useful camera experience than the iPhone does. I guess the iPhone camera is just more accessible and there are less features in the way of using it as a camera.

My Nexus 6P was having major lag issues and I needed to make a change. I obviously had been through a lot of Android phones in the last year. Going through Android phones is a problem I have. I have lost count, but since Android launched in late 2008, I have owned over 60 Android phones. It’s pretty ridiculous. I should have kept a log.

I have found that Android is not a very consistent experience for me unless the device has 4 GB of RAM memory. There are very few Android phones that have this amount of memory. Most phones that do, lack something else. The only two phones that are a solid flagship phone that have 4 GB of RAM are Samsung devices. I don’t have anything against Samsung phones, I just don’t like all of the preinstalled software and lack of battery longevity.

The latest Nexus devices come with Android 6.0 installed. This is the latest version of Android which has some cool features. The problem I have with the latest versions of Android is that all of the other phones out there are still on a version of Android 5.0. Many App Developers have not even updated their apps to work on Android 6.0. It actually took my bank four months to support it. I use Sony Cameras and it took them six months to support Android 6.0. This simply doesn’t happen on Apple’s iOS platform. Even NFC does not work with my Sony cameras on Android 6.0 which defeats the purpose and was one of the reasons I complained about the iPhone last summer.

I also enjoy using a Smartwatch. I have had the Apple Watch in the past. I have also had a variety of Android Wear Smartwatches. I even spent a few weeks with the Samsung Gear S2 which is on Samsung’s own Tizen platform. Each watch lacked something. The only consistent Android Wear Smartwatch out there is the Sony Smartwatch 3 however, it lacks many features I have come to rely upon in a Smartwatch.

Last night, I put away my Nexus 6P and moved over to an iPhone 6S Plus. I know, the very 6S Plus I said I would not take part in. Having spent so much time this last year chasing an Android Smartphone that would not give me any problems, I decided it was time to throw in the towel and come walking back into the familiar arms of Tim Cook.

I also realize what I have done over the past year. I have not only wasted a lot of time on phones, I have wasted money as well. I just want current technology that works. Though the iPhone 6S and 6S Plus do not contain much over their previous versions, they work and they work well. The phone is fast and it does not lag. iOS has better memory management because it doesn’t allow apps to run when they are not doing anything. Android has become better at memory management over the years but it still takes twice as much memory for Android to provide an equal experience. The manufacturers producing Android phones are not putting enough memory in their phones to make for a seamless experience. There is enough memory for a basic experience but if you install a lot of apps and plan to use them, you will eventually run into issues.

I am not back on the Apple bandwagon and I don’t think I really ever was completely. Since Android came out, I have deeply desired for an Android experience that was as seamless as Apple’s iOS. Android 5.0 came very close to that as Android phones started coming packed with decent cameras around that time. One could even argue that Android cameras trump the iPhone’s camera in certain aspects of performance. For me, what it comes down to, is performance. I run two businesses, have three kids ages five and under. I don’t have time for a phone that has to be finagled into working. I am tired of having to delete apps from my phone that are known to use up more memory so that the rest of my phone operates better. All these years later, I still find myself sacrificing in one way or another to be on Android, and that simply shouldn’t be the case.

Sure the current iPhone is pretty basic, but it works. The Apple Watch is kind of ugly, but it works well and iOS developers support it. I am ready to start ignoring some of the Android phones that come out and just exist on iOS. I’m not ditching Android. That will never happen. I just won’t be on such a search for the perfect Android phone, which will result in less worry about whether or not my phone is going to work when I need it to.

Who knows how the next month or two will go. My iPhone could start to give me issues as well, but for now, I am back on iPhone and plan to stay there for a while. For now, it’s about saving time and probably some money. Though the iPhone is almost mid cycle before the iPhone 7 will become available, I will save hours of time and even some money by not fretting over the perfect Android experience. Only time will tell if I will end up eating my words again. All I am trying to do is share my experience with others and try to relate on some level.

What do you think about the current state of Smartphones?

And They Said We Can’t Innovate

Posted on by Jerad Hill

This week Apple is holding it’s yearly developers conference in San Francisco. Each year thousands of people attend and even more watch online to see what Apple has been working on for the last year. Because Apple has been riding the momentum they had created over the years, people felt that Apple had started to slip. New tech comes out so fast and companies like Samsung have been training us to believe that new tech should come every couple of months. At Apple’s keynote presentation yesterday it was apparent that Apple is smarter than most think they are. I watched the keynote from my iPhone as I waited in the airport to catch my flight to the Search Marketing Expo in Seattle. Since several people ask me what I think about Apple’s newest announcements, I thought I would write about it.

New Services

Apple continues to add value to their platform by adding new services like iTunes Radio, AirDrop for iPhone and iWork for iCloud.

itunes radioiTunes Radio: Many have said that an unlimited listening platform would hurt music sales in iTunes but I think it will work to their advantage. These days, when people listen to music and hear something new that they like, they go and download it. I have been an Rdio user for a few years now and when I really like a song, I often download it. Those who like to own their music and be able to access it anywhere will buy songs. iTunes Radio will work as a radio. It does not look like you will be able to listen to entire albums. From what I can tell, iTunes Radio is like Pandora but integrated into the music app. You will have to listen to ads but if you are an iTunes Match subscriber, you will have ad free listening.

iTunes Radio is very similar to Google Play Radio which was released at Google I/O just last month. Both services have curated music variety channels they produce. You can create your own channels based on a specific genre of music, artist or song. It’s pretty cool. Being that I have been using Rdio for so long, I tend to listen to an album or create my own playlists of music I know already. I am looking forward to moving back to a radio style listening experience.

AirDrop for iPhone: AirDrop for iPhone will be fantastic. I have been very tired of emailing myself photos or using a third party app that usually crashes or wrecks my photo library. The ability to share files with someone near you through AirDrop will make sending photos to my wife much easier. When I take a photo of our boys she always wants me to send it to her and this is usually a pain. With AirDrop enabled on your iPhone or iPad, you can send files to others who have AirDrop enabled and are near you. I will learn more about this feature once I get back to my office. Here in the conference center in Seattle I am pretty sure nobody else has iOS 7.

iWork for iCloud: I have not spent much time looking at iWork for iCloud but it will be nice to be able to edit docs online with out having to open them up in an app. Being that my workflow is entirely Mac and so is my office, we don’t really need to worry about collaborating with those who use other platforms such as Windows. What I am hoping for is an easy way to collaborate with documents that are saved in iCloud. Google has done well with this. Being able to share a document with others and work on it together is a neat feature. For Apple, I think that taking iWork to the cloud will make it easier for those unfamiliar with iWork to experience it. It will also make it easy to edit documents should you find yourself on a computer that does not have iWork installed on it. For people like me who have their MacBook Pro with them at all times, it will not matter as much. Apple even said that the native iWork apps will provide a better experience than the iCloud version. I am sure that there will be many more features added in the future as this is just the beginning of cloud document management for Apple.

OSX Mavericks

It’s not as catchy of a name but it’s the new OS coming for Mac and it looks fantastic. Apple has added many features that users such as myself have wanted. I am very excited about the features that will make it easier for multiple displays to be used with out effecting your single display use. Using a second display with my MacBook Pro has been a pain because when I disconnect that screen, all of my windows get reorganized. I like things to be where I left them and it looks like Apple has made it easier to use a second monitor.

There are a few hacks that I have used for years now that are being introduced into OSX Mavericks such as tabs in finder. I always hated having multiple finder windows open. Using tabs has made it easier to manage and get around different folders. I use TotalFinder which makes it easy to do this and easy to hide your finder window and bring it back when you need it. We will see if tabs in finder will be enough to get me to remove TotalFinder altogether.

I am super excited for Tagging. I always try to create a file structure that will help me remember where I saved files. I always end up with a couple of copies of files because I forget that I had already downloaded something and saved it. Tagging will make it easier for me to view items that may be in different folders but are part of the same project.

Battery life is going to be drastically improved in the new version. I have often struggled with the desire to have a long lasting battery and a powerful laptop. My MacBook Pro is maxed out with the most powerful processor and memory on the market because I need it to work quickly so I can get on to the next task. Longer battery life with out having to buy a new laptop sounds great to me.

Safari is looking great. Since Google announced the decommissioning of Reader, I have been trying to decide what I will use to read websites using RSS. I may end up using Safari for this. I currently use Google Chrome because I like having access to bookmarks, tabs, browsing history and pretty much everything else across all of my devices but now Safari will have this functionality as well. Though Google Chrome is pretty robust and works well, I may switch back to Safari for a while to see how it performs. As I write this, I am using Google Chrome but I will be giving Safari a try once OSX Mavericks is released.

iCloud Keychain is going to be a game changer. Password management in Google Chrome and most other browsers has been hit and miss. I have tried managing passwords using Chrome and the passwords are often not found when I try to access the same site on other devices. The only thing that is going to be a downfall of iCloud Keychain over Google Chrome Sync is the fact that iCloud Keychain will only be for iOS and Mac devices where as Google Chrome Sync works across all devices with Chrome installed which includes Android.

I have often avoided Calendar in OSX because it is a pain to use. I use Fantastical because it is much easier to use and manage calendar events. With the added features and Maps integration into Calendar, I think it will be much easier to manage events and tasks in Calendar than it was before.

iBooks coming to the Mac will actually make it useful to me. I purchase most of my books through Kindle because it works on all devices. iBooks is adding some really nice note taking features which will make it easy to read and take notes. For the classroom, this will be epic. I am pretty excited to see where this goes and how my kids will use it to learn in the coming years.

Mac Pro

I could not be more excited about the announcement of the soon to come Mac Pro. Most of the time I do not need that kind of power but when it comes to doing video, I need it. Allowing my iMac to render video during the day brings it to a crawl and I can’t accomplish much else while it is doing it. The Mac Pro usually can handle those tasks quickly and still have extra power to work on extra tasks. I am sure the price points will be similar but I am eagerly awaiting more info on this product.

iOS 7 and the No New iPhone

I installed the new iOS 7 yesterday and I have a love/hate relationship with it so far. I like many of the new features added, which I will explain below, but the design is going to take a lot of time to get used to.

The new flat design is not appealing to me. The shapes and designs look more like a mock up than they do actual user interface elements. This is not the first time I have disagreed with Apple’s design of things but I am pretty sure they know what they are doing. Being that about 2 months ago I switched to Android as my primary phone, I will have to spend more time with iOS 7 to see if it will make me want to switch back to iPhone as my primary device.

Apple did not announce a new iPhone, and I think that is smart. There is a small amount of people out there that would switch phones for slightly better performance in low light. This was the main reason I switched to the HTC One as my primary phone. I usually have my iPhone on me as well or with in reach, but the HTC One has been my phone since it came out a little over a month ago.

There are many new features in iOS 7 that will make it easier to use and more efficient. Many of the new bells and whistles in iOS 7 are just upgrades to already existing features. Here are a couple of my favorites.

  • Control Center – Now we have an easy way to do things like switch off Wifi, turn on the flashlight and adjust screen brightness.
  • Multitasking – More apps will have access to multitasking and apps will be updated with the new content when you launch them instead of launching them and then waiting for new content.
  • Notification Center – Now you can view notifications in the lock screen. The new notification center is much more robust and easy to manage.
  • AirDrop – Now you can share files with other people from iOS device to iOS device using AirDrop. Much easier to get photos and other stuff to your friends.
  • Photo App – Photos are managed much better. Instead of a huge list of images, everything is categorized and grouped, sometimes automatically for you.
  • Siri Updates – Siri is much more useful and smarter now. For me, I will use Siri to see tweets, read iMessages and turn on/off features of the phone.
  • Near Me Apps – You can see apps that are popular near you which is cool because you can see which games or social apps are popular in your area which makes using them more fun.

ios7photos ios7photos2

What is iOS 7 Missing?

In my opinion, Sharing is still broken in iOS. By broken, I mean that it never existed. In Android, I can take a photo in Snapseed, edit it and share it right to Instagram with in seconds. It is a nice workflow for making sure my images look good on their way to Instagram. When I come across an article that I want to share, I can share it to any of my social apps easily with a few taps. You can accomplish these things in iOS but you have to save your images then open them with the other app or copy an article link and paste it into the app you want to share with. It’s a process I try to avoid. I do not understand why iOS does not want to make it easy to share content to any app. I understand that they have Twitter and Facebook integrated into iOS but that is not good enough in a world where we are posting to multiple social networks and profiles. I don’t understand why any community manager or online social person would want to use anything else other than Android right now.

Typing should be on it’s way out. It is so much more efficient to Swype your words. Google has integrated this type of data entry into it’s core keyboard and many other keyboard apps on Android support different variations of Swype. Swype allows you to create words by dragging your finder over the letters as you spell out the word. To spell the word “phone” you would tap down on the letter p and drag your finger across the keyboard as you made your way over h, o, n and e. Once you get the hang of it you can knock out entire sentences very fast. I am so used to it that when I have to type normally on a smart phone it’s annoying. Apple should allow developers to create keyboard replacement apps like Android has allowed.

Innovation also seems to be missing from iOS 7. Though Apple has innovated some neat new products this year they failed to do much other than add some new flavor on top of features already had in previous versions of iOS. Being that they completely redesigned the look and feel of the iPhone operating system, I feel that was a cloak that covered up the fact that they should have developed some truly new features we didn’t know existed.

Apple Knows Best

I know that Apple has not just been sitting on their hands over the last couple of years. They have tons of amazing talent that I am sure is developing amazing technology that they are not ready to put out yet. I know that a huge part of it comes down to how much life they have left in other products. They didn’t release a new iPhone yet because they don’t have to. People are still buying the iPhone 5 and I bet sales will jump now that people know there is no iPhone 6 coming in the near future. Besides a better camera, I don’t need anything else out of my iPhone 5 as far as the device itself goes. Time will tell whether or not iOS 7 will be enough to keep my interest. Google didn’t announce a new version of Android at Google I/O this year so you can bet Android is just going to get better this year. I sure hope that Apple has a few bells and whistles left to add to iOS 7 before it’s final release.

It is evident in their new Mac Pro that Apple can innovate. That device is beautiful and will be a powerful trophy that will live on the desktop because it’s so nice to look at. The desktop computer no longer lives on the floor, I think that is what Apple aimed to do with the new Mac Pro.

The Macbook Air is also a revolutionary product. You can see that every pc manufacture has been trying to copy it as more and more laptops start to look like Macbook Airs and Macbook Pros. The fact that your laptop can last all day on a single charge is amazing. At these conferences that I attend we are all often sharing wall outlets to keep our laptops charged. Apple has definitely built technology that you can not afford to live with out.

What do you think?

How did you feel about the keynote? Do you think that Apple innovated this year?

Just How Big is iOS? – Infographic

Posted on by Jerad Hill

Apple’s iOS operating system found on it’s iPhone, iPad and iPod touch devices currently has been one of Apple’s hugest success innovations. iOS and Android are the leading mobile operating systems out there. So just how big is iOS? Tap Magazine created this nice infographic to help clue us in.

Just how big is IOS