Well, that was fun. Steve Jobs' keynote, as expected, was very music centric, although he opened with a nod to the Mac's 20th birthday this year. He harked back to that ad, run during the 1984 SuperBowl, which announced the arrival of the first Mac, and screened a subtly remade version to wild acclaim in the hall.
But grabbing the headlines will be the new iPod minis, which are tiny wee things: half an inch thick, and around the same size as a business card. We were bathing in the glow of their bite-sized elegance, until we learned the UK pricing.
They'll cost $249 in the US, which works out at £138 at today's exchange rate. But when they eventually reach the UK - in April - they'll cost £199. Either Steve Jobs knows something we don't about where exchange rates are going, or Apple's having a laugh at our considerable expense. I'd bring some over for y'all, but they don't go on sale here until February.
In other news, there's a revamp of the iLife suite, including a good-looking music sequencer called GarageBand. You can mix 64 tracks of loops, software instruments, live audio and live guitar put through one of half a dozen software amplifiers.
Musician John Mayer was on stage earlier to put the package through its paces and made a very credible track although, quite clearly, having oodles of musical talent helps a great deal. Apple got the pricing right, too - the entire iLife package, including revamps of iTunes, iMovie, iDVD and iPhoto will cost $49, and come free with new Macs. It looks nice, although after previous dodgy experiences with iLife I'll reserve judgement until I've used a copy for a few weeks.
There's a new version of Final Cut Express 2, Microsoft's launching a new version of Office for Mac in the Spring, and the server room Macheads will have new XServe and XServe RAID storage systems to play with too.
