Apple’s service status for .Mac was updated tonight to include details about MobileMe’s launch. The service, the replacement to .Mac, will offer most current features of .Mac as well as ‘push’ calendar, mail, and contacts support; Apple’s tag line for the product is “Exchange for the rest of us.” .Mac will be shut down at 6 pm pacific time on Wednesday, July 9th and all services (except for .Mac Mail, which will be available on any desktop client, iPhone or iPod touch) will be offline. The MobileMe service will “be available as soon as possible during this maintenance window” and they give 6 pm - 12 am pacific time as the launch timeframe. Current .Mac customers will be automatically upgraded during the MobileMe launch.

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Apple just updated their Retail site to show an 8 am launch time for iPhone 3G, coinciding with AT&T’s launch time. People have already started lining up for iPhone 3G at the New York cube store and it is expected others will line up early at other stores as well.

via MacRumors

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Toyota will redesign the Prius next year and along with the new design will be a new, even more eco-friendly feature: solar power. No, this doesn’t mean the entire car will be solar powered, but the air conditioning will be. When Toyota releasesed the Prius way back in 1997, it was the first gasoline-electric hybrid widely available. Then in 2003, they redesigned the Prius and gave it an improved hybrid system. Now, the Prius is one of the most popular vehicles on the road and is about to get another redesign. The new Prius will feature the same basic shape, but be longer, wider, and faster. The solar panels will add even more to the Prius’s environmentally friendly look.

Reuters via Gizmodo

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Apple chopped $500 off the price of the MacBook Air with SSD (solid-state drive). The price drop was not even mentioned on Apple’s home page. The $500 drop, bringing the better Air to a new $2,598, is due to a $100 decrease in the price of the 1.8Ghz Core 2 Duo chip and a $400 drop of the 64GB SSD. Considering the laptop now has a price tag below $3000, it won’t look as scary as it did before and should attract new users.

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Gizmodo posted a short video of the iPhone 2.0 firmware today, showing off some of the new features. Besides the short video, they gave some screenshots of iTunes 7.7 (the version required for iPhone 3G) which show MobileMe support and more evidence of iPhone and iPod touch remotes with an option to look for remotes.

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So, for all of you PC enthusiasts out there who wanted a drive that performs like the velociraptor, but has more space and is cheaper, you shall wait no more.  Although Western Digital announced this drive about a month ago, this drive was nowhere to be bought.  As soon as benchmarks are made, they will be posted.  This drive comes in 750gb ($200.00) and 1TB ($250.00) flavors.  This drive is 7200rpm, but it is the fastest 1TB 7200rpm drive……EVER!  Get it before it sells out, because it is only for sale here.

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With iPhone 3G launch date getting closer, AT&T decided to give us even more information to chew on. Not only have they given us the plan information (detailed after the break, but we now know that AT&T’s doors will swing open at 8:00 am on July 11th for iPhone 3G customers. Besides that nice tidbit of information, the plans shown below show a definite price hike up since iPhone original. Information to note: plans do NOT include SMS messages, so look at the SMS plans for pricing (they raised the price of the 1500 SMS messages a month plan by $5). Besides the full voice and data plans listed below, AT&T will offer a $30 data plan similar to the current $20 plan offered. SMS messages will not be included in that plan as well. Also, to access the full capability of Exchange service, users must have the Enterprise Data plan which is an extra $15 a month. Besides announcing the plans, AT&T gave details on upgrades, pricing, and related details. Those eligible for an upgrade pricing ($199 and $299) include: “new customers, current postpaid iPhone customers in good standing prior to July 11, and AT&T non-iPhone customers who are currently eligible for an upgrade discount.” Those ineligible for upgrade pricing will put up $399 and $499 for the 8GB and 16GB models, respectively. Activation fees for upgrades are $18, while activation fees for non-AT&T customers will be the normal $36. Lastly, those looking for a unlocked, no contract iPhone will pay $599 and $699. Apparently, that unlocked pricing is more expensive than just buying the phone with the cheapest service, paying the upgrade fee, and then canceling the service. Click the read more link to view the plan pricing.

Read more »

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After watching the iPhone 3G What’s New video, you can see AIM listed as an application available via the App Store. The app was demoed back in March at Apple’s iPhone SDK event and is now confirmed to be available for FREE in the App Store. The video gives a caption: “Some applications are not available in all areas.” This could mean that depending on the carrier or country, AIM won’t be available. At least users will finally have an official instant messaging application. The photo was taken at 7 minutes 43 seconds into the guided tour, so check it out for your self.

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Apple posted an iPhone 3G Guided Tour this morning, coinciding with AT&T’s iPhone plan announcements. The familiar face of Bob brings you the same type of Guided Tour as the ones before. Alongside the Guided Tour, they released a “What’s New” video showing off some of the new features in iPhone 2.0 and new hardware in iPhone 3G. Bob even demoes some iPhone 2.0 games and applications, in the What’s New video.

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iPhone 3G packaging will be considerably more green than the previous iPhone’s packaging due to the inclusion of a paper tray made out of potato or tapioca starch. The new tray produces a carbon footprint a tenth of the size of a plastic tray, like the one in the original iPhone’s box. Apple hired Dutch firm PaperFoam to make the tray and they ordered apparently “millions of PaperFoam packages,” according to PaperFoam CEO Hans Arentsen. The tray will be inside of a cardboard box that is iPhone 3G’s packaging. The cardboard box and the starch tray inside of it will be fully recyclable. Apple is following in the footsteps of Motorola, who also uses PaperFoam packages. Going Green is definitely one way Apple could be even more revolutionary, especially with Al Gore reppin’ the whole green movement on Apple’s Board of Directors. In May 2007, Steve Jobs published an open letter describing how they will move to be a greener Apple.

via The Register

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Just as suspected, Telsa Motors announced the new Model S with the help of California Governator Arnold Schwarzenegger this morning. The five passenger, completely-electric sports sedan will sell for $60,000 and get 225 miles on a full charge. The reason for the Governator’s involvement: Tesla will be manufacturing the car in Northern California due to new incentives offered by the state; New Mexico originally offered more incentives, but the Governator wouldn’t give up. The car is on track for a release date in 2010. To stir the pot even more, however, another Tesla big shot Elan Musk said that they will try to get cars down to $30,000 soon and said it would probably be in the next four years. One thing’s for sure, a $30,000 car would make more of an impact in the mainstream market than a $60,000 car would.

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GameStop and Amazon added Rock Band track Pack Vol 1 to their product lists recently, giving a release date of July 15. The disc contains 20 of the most “popular tracks in Rock Band history.” You would think that it just is extra tracks for the game, but the expanded information reads: “A fully functional game with all the great features of Rock Band, including Tour Mode, Quickplay, Tug of War, Score Dual, and song unlock progression.” It also reads: “Rock Band Track Pack Volume 1 is a standalone software product.” Amazon reads “A musical expansion to Rock Band…” The game/expansion pack will be available for PS2 and Wii for $29.99.

[Thanks for the tip again, Eric!]

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Harmonix announced today that Rock Band 2, the follow up to the original, will come in XBOX 360 and PS3 flavors later this year (with XBOX 360 coming in September). IGN went to chat with Lead Designer Dan Teasdale about the game. Some big things we took out of the interview:

• Downloadable tracks from Rock Band 1 will be playable on Rock Band 2 and Rock Band 2 downloadable tracks will be playable on Rock Band 1.
• Rock Band 2 will feature “quieter, more realistic, and more reliable instruments.”
• Teasdale couldn’t spill much about the game, but he did say the track list would “read like a who’s who list of rock music.”

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Apple released an update to Mac OS X Leopard today, bringing the version up to 10.5.4. For the details on the update, check out specs here. So open up Software Update on your Mac and hit the install button.

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Did you see WALL•E this weekend? Well if you did, you were partly seeing an Apple masterpiece. How is WALL•E, a Disney•Pixar production, related to Apple?

The first connection is Steve Jobs. Back in 1986, Jobs bought The Graphics Group from Lucasfilm. The Graphics Group later turned into Pixar, which was purchased by Disney in 2006. Jobs is now the largest single shareholder of Disney stock. Who knows, if Jobs didn’t buy Pixar, would WALL•E even exist?

The next connection would’ve never happened if it weren’t for good old Stevie J. EVE, WALL•E’s “love interest”, was designed by Jony Ive and his team. Jony Ive, Senior Vice-President of Industrial Design at a certain company headed by Steve Jobs, is known for his work in designing iPhone, iMac, and other prominent Apple products. The story is that one day back in 2005, Ive and his team headed over to Pixar and helped them create EVE’s look. The reason for Ive’s involvement: WALL•E’s director Andrew Stanton wanted a sleek, high-end design, so he called up a certain high-up at Pixar that just happened to be Apple’s CEO. Looking at the character now, you can definitely see how EVE could be one of Apple’s creation.

So there you have it, WALL•E is just the work of Apple in a disguise.

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