Macworld without Steve

The tech news sites have been in an uproar the last few days about why Apple is dropping out of Macworld 2010 and more so why Jobs isn't giving this years keynote. Just a hint - Jobs not presenting has NOTHING to do with his health.

There are a lot of posts about why Apple isn't continuing at Macworld. This isn't one of those.

I'd like to talk about what will be discussed at Macworld this year.

First, I'm excited for Things 1.0. Things is a to-do list manager for the Mac and iPhone. Simply brilliant. Things will be released on Tuesday at Macworld.

Apple will have some announcements too. We know that Phil Schiller will be presenting so I'm expecting a technical keynote about Snow Leopard. We may also have some small product announcements including iMacs, Mac Minis, and Mac Pros. Based on rumors and intel's roadmap, I'd expect the Macs to be released the same day or shortly after Macworld. Snow Leopard will be later in the quarter with some sources pointing towards the end of the first quarter.

What I'd hoped to see at Macworld was an updated AppleTV but now that Schiller is presenting I think Apple is going to stick to their post Macworld game plan and have various mini announcements rather than two or three big shows each year. So I expect to see an updated AppleTV in the first half of 2009. I've got some pretty basic projections for 2009 but that is another post.

Handbrake 0.9.3

Handbrake is a utility for converting video formats (ie. DVD => iPod, AppleTV, Xbox 360, etc.). New in this version is the ability to convert files from basically any format to any other format. Old .avi files to AppleTV for instance. I was testing out some conversions of some Pixar Shorts I have in High Definition in a .mkv format and transcoding them to for use in iTunes for AppleTV and my iPhone. Long story short… the new encoding engine is amazing. Check out this comparison of Jack-Jack-Attack in DVD format and HD format. 

The quality of the new transcoded file is good but what really blows my mind is the HD version is the same size (100MB) as the old DVD rip I did a year or so ago. So I get higher quality video at a fraction of the size. Way to go Handbrake team. My 4GB iPhone and 2 year old love you.