Apple has just made official the date for their September event. As predicted, we’ll see an ‘executive presentation’ at 10am on September 10th in Cupertino.
This means Australian Apple enthusiasts should set their alarms for 3am AEST, September 11th in order to catch the event either streamed or live-blogged from your tech site of choice.
No official word yet from Apple on if they plan to stream the event, but if WWDC 2013 was anything to go by we’ll see it appear on AppleTV and Apple’s website just prior to the event.
What can we expect from Apple? Well, we should anticipate their main focus at this event to be on the introduction of new iPhones. This will definitely include the next iteration of the iPhone (unofficially known as the ‘5S’ for now) but we may also see a completely new lower-cost iPhone; currently known as the ‘iPhone 5C.’
What features will a new iPhone bring to the table? Well, recent rumours have suggested we’ll see a fingerprint sensor (courtesy of Apple’s acquisition of security company Authentec last year) embedded in some way, an improved camera with dual-LED flash and a possible ‘champagne’ (aka gold) colour option.
Rumours of the iPhone 5C have also pointed to a cheaper variant of the phone, with the new taller 16:9 screen, lighting connector & a polycarbonate body which will be available in a range of colours.
So if that’s coming up, what won’t we see change for the iPhone? Well, I wouldn’t expect to see a dramatically redesigned phone (for the 5S, anyway). I’m sure it will improve on the internals in many ways, but physically the design does not usually change on the ‘S’ upgrade cycle of the iPhone, so cases, docks & all manner of accessories made for the iPhone 5 should still be perfectly fine. In theory.
I also don’t think the iPads will be changed just yet either. John Gruber hinted at an October event for an iPad revamp earlier in August, and I’m inclined to believe it.
We should expect another showing of Apple’s updated iOS 7 at this event. In fact, I would also expect to hear about a concrete date for an iOS 7 Gold Master, as well as a slew of other dates for products previewed at WWDC, such as OS X Mavericks, iTunes Radio (which will be US-only for now) and even hopefully a formal release date for the revamped Mac Pro.
And of course, a launch date for the next iPhone.