Windows 8 Hands On

I have finally succeeded in installing Windows 8 on my MacBook, via VirtualBox. All it took was most of the day, and multiple installs, but what the hey, its done now! I have to admit, its a little sluggish, but as I said Im running it on VirtualBox, on top of Mac OS X Lion, on just an ickle White MacBook 6.2 with just 2GB of RAM, so I could only allocate 1GB to it anyway. I might actually create a Bootcamp partition and whip it on there. I will of course have to find an OS X disc to install outdated Windows drivers, but its all fun! :)

So what do I think of it? Well its OK. When you close down Metro, and hit the actual Desktop, it basically is Windows 7, but with a HORRIBLE task bar. It looks shite. Really hope thats just a rush job to get it out for the preview. 

Metro is OK. But mouse/touchpad use doesn't feel right. Really feels like it needs a touchscreen. But its not all bad. Looks nice, clean, and actually kinda stylish. 

I have only tried one Metro App so far, and that was Tweet@rama. Again, looks great, and seemed to work fine. Horrible lag, but thats again due to the lack of RAM most likely, not the actual app. 

So things are looking good for it in all honestly! :) But can't help feeling it could have just been a Metro patch for Windows 7. Hopefully either MS will add more to the actual OS, or at least discount it heavily on release. Mac OS X Lion was only £20, and what I have seen so far, I would say that Windows 8 is also only worth £20.

Why Windows 8 will fail

Saw this picture on Gizmodo.com, and had to laugh! Sadly it is actually true! Windows 95 was  a major jump from 3.1, but had a lot of faults, and really wasn't ready for release. Windows ME was just bollocks, plain and simple, and everyone knows about Vista! Hopefully MS will be able to break the chain, but its not looking good.

More iPhone 5 rumours

OK, so above is a picture of the Apple prototype N94 (on the left) which is supposed to be the iPhone 4S, and on the right is an artists impression of what the new iPhone 5 will look like, based on the new pictures that have come in of the new cases coming in from China.

I have to admit, Im loving the idea of the iPhone five. Sexy teardrop shape, ally back sans iPhone 2g, and a larger screen making the bezel smaller. Not sure about the long home button tho...I think I prefer the round one. There are rumours that the home button is going to have gestures and the like, but I have to ask myself why you would want them, especially when you have that lovely big screen in which to use gestures.

Sadly its not all good news, and their are reports that their the iPhone 5 will be late to be released, possibly not until early 2012 due to processing and manufacturing problems. which means the iPhone 4S will be the only new iPhone this year. But like I say, tis all rumours! 

Windows 8

So Microsoft's Windows 8 developer conference is now over and the world has seen alittle more of the OS that is suppose to be bringing Mobile, Tablet and Desktop computers together. Their vision is that have the phone in your pocket, the slate in your hand and the laptop in your bag all running the same software, able to run the same programs, so no matter what device you have to hand, you can do what you want. Well strictly that's not true, as the phone will be running the mouthful which is Microsoft Windows Phone Seven. But Windows 8 borrows heavily from this, so I'm classing it as the same thing, anyone that says otherwise, I don't care.
At the ipad's release alot of people complained about it running iOS instead of Mac OS X, and that it was basically an oversized iPod Touch. In away it is, but mostly it's not, but that's not the point. Microsoft are almost doing the reverse. Porting their mobile OS to the desktop market. Will it work? Not sure. Mobile devices have an update cycle of around 6 months. Bringing new features to old devices. Much like multi-tasking was updated for the iPad with iOS 4, and how my old HTC Desire went from having 800x600 video capture to having 720p recording with Android Froyo. But can you see Microsoft doing such for the home computer? Honestly I can't. Meaning that lovely new slate you brought will get left behind Android and iOS.
Also how can you have apps that work across the board flawlessly, when you have atleast two different input types? For example Angry Birds on a touch phone or tablet works great, but download it from the Mac App Store and use a track pad, and it's not quite so fluid, and just doesnt feel as good. The reverse for office software. Using spreadsheets is easy with a keyboard and mouse, but stabbing at the screen doesn't work for me I'm afraid with iCal. It's a very careful balance which if done incorrectly is going to ruin the user experience and maybe even go so far as to lose Microsoft some if it's customer base.
Also Microsoft is opening up the Metro UI, (the cool looking touch part which is basically Windows Phone 7/XBox interface,) to third parties, allowing them to customise it. Which is a little scary. For one, I don't want to have my Windows Box boot and be covered in stupid Dell or HP stickers all over the interface. And secondly, if developers can do it, it will only be a matter of time before hackers can, and then you will see stupid virus's coming along, changing your wallpaper for nude pictures, or adverts for penis enlargement. Not the kind thing you want to see when the vicar comes round for tea, and you decide to show him your holiday snaps on your shiny new tablet.
To be honest I can see the pro's, but I think their are many more cons then pro's. Who knows, maybe Microsoft will prove me wrong, and it will be great and everyone will love it, and no one will ever install Linux on a Dell again. Or maybe not....

iOS 5 Gold Master

OK, so news has leaked out this afternoon that iOS Goldmaster will be shipped to Apple's assembling partners within the time frame of 23rd of September to the 30th of September. Taking account the need of time to actually install the software on already made devices, this would put the release date around mid October. So hopefully, in around 4 weeks time. Good news indeed!

Also the same leak suggests that there will be no "iPhone 5", but just an "iPhone 4S" which would mean that there would be no updates in the looks department, just in the hardware itself, making a 4S just a faster 4. I.E it would use the A5 chip like the iPad, maybe have a larger camera, etc, etc. Not so good news. But it also suggests that the iPhone 4, AND the iPhone 3GS would be continued to be made and sold. Pricing would probably be something like £520 for the 4S, £420 for the 4, and at a guess, sending the 3GS back down to £350. Thats not too bad, but I still think that a 3GS at £200 would blow the rubbish Android phones out of the water, and making the 4 priced at £350 would be better, as the tech in it is now a year old. Perhaps Apple will surprise everyone at drop the prices dramatically, you never know, but then thats hardly likely from a company who's entry level laptop comes in at £850 and entry level desktop comes in at  £530, (thats the mini, not the iMac.) But I suppose we can always dream....... 

iPhone 5...Or iPhone 4S, take your pick.

So any day now, Apple is likely to announce their either iPhone or iPod event. More then likely it will be combination of both and I would like to think not only will they reveal the new iPhone, or iPhones, but also update their iPod range.
There are a million rumours floating around the interweb at the moment about what the next iPhone will be like. Below are a few things I would like to see in it;

A larger screen - It would look so good to have an edge to edge screen, plus the current iPhone has a ratio more like 4:3 then 16:9. Retina screens look amazing, making them larger would make so much more sense!

Thinner and with a form factor more like the iPad 2 - I like the look of the iPhone 4, the glass back is great. But with the problems with the antenna they had at launch, basing the design on the beautiful iPad 2 would make sense.

Mini USB Port - The EU are making it mandatory to have a mini USB charging port on all phones, could this be the iPhone to have one? Imagine the hacks that could be had if they ditch the 30 pin connector!

Cheap IPhone - Or iPhone nano if you will! Be it a cheap iPhone 4 (or iPhone 4S as it maybe) weighing in at around £200 contract free would be an amazing way to try at catch up Android in a user base kinda way. Let's face it, most Android phones are cheap and nasty. Having a lower tier iPhone would be a big draw for most people.

Well that's just some of the things that will happen, but my track record is poor. I would imagine the cheap iPhone will just turn out to be a 3G iPod Touch. Not really sold on that. But am looking forward to iOS 5, as long as the jailbreak is unteathered! Dam you 06.15 baseband!!!!!!!!! Hopefully we will find out in a few weeks!

Full OS X and Facetime on 1st Gen iPad

OK, well, not quite! It is technically my iPad running Splashtop Remote and basically mirroring my MacBook Display. But it does give me full control from my iPad, and is quite handy. Means I can watch .avi files on my ipad without messing around in iTunes, and also means full flash is supported, and also Facebook chat, straight in the web browser. Not sure you would find Facetime handy, as you have to use the MacBook cam, so if your close enough to use the cam, surely its easier to use the MacBook...that aside, its actually a useful program, and you guys should really use it. Works in Windows too, not sure about Linux.

Apple OS X 10.7 Lion Developers Preview

While installing OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard on my latest Hackintosh, I got bored. So I decided to download the Developers preview of Lion. I won't beat about the bush. Getting the dam thing to install on my late 2009 White MacBook was a pain in the ass. It would almost install, then decide it couldn't be bothered, and quit. I managed to solve this by booting back into Snow Leopard, running the install disc, telling it to install on the correct partition, and letting it run. I still got errors, but instead of just quitting, it let me "Try Again", and finally, after about 30 minutes, it was ready for its first boot.

After the normal OS X first boot video, and the registration details, I finally got presented with the desktop. So what has changed? Well not a lot visually. Aqua has finally disappeared, but that is really it. If you have Snow Leopard and Lion side by side, they look almost exactly the same. Of course on the dock you get a icon for both App Store and FaceTime straight away, but more importantly, you get a Launchpad icon where the Dashboard icon is normally on a fresh install.

Clicking on Launchpad brings up a screen very similar too the iPad/iPhone home screen. All you applications are there, and you can even drag one on top of the other to make a folder a'la iOS. If, like me, this is your first port of call, you also find something else inspired by iOS. Two finger scrolling is now in reverse. So scroll down on the trackpad, and the screen scrolls up. Scroll left, and the screen scrolls right and so on and so on. At first its a little hard to get used to, but if you have an iOS device, then soon it becomes second nature. 

Another thing Apple made a big fuss about was full screen apps. When I was watching the "Back to the Mac" media event, I didn't really think much of it. After all, you can normally expand a window to fill a screen, and thought that was basically it. On launching Safari in the top right corner of the window is a small icon, similar to Microsoft Windows resize icon. Click on this and the browser goes full screen, much like hitting F11 in IE. Three finger scroll then the browser, or app, is thrown to the side and you are returned to the desktop. (Keep scrolling to get to Dashboard). It is actually a really nice touch, and I think it works better then Exposé. Taking the mouse to the top of the screen brings down the desktop bar, and to the far right is the icon to come out of full screen.

There are a few UI tweaks. Status bars look neater, no scroll bar buttons, with scroll bars only appearing when you are actually scrolling. That could be a nightmare if you don't have a trackpad. But thats about it really. After all this isn't an update like Windows 3.11 to Windows 95. I like the OS X interface, and tweaking it seems right, a complete overhaul isn't needed right now. Maybe for OS XI. 

For a Developers preview, its snappy. Its actually faster then my Snow Leopard install. Although that is now 2 years old, and Im not good at house keeping, so its bound to be faster. Safari seems faster too to render the pages and switch tabs etc. 

Overall Im loving Lion at the moment. People on the web bashing it because it hasn't changed much, or it isn't Linux/Unix/Windows 7, don't listen to them. Everybody likes different things. If you like Snow Leopard, or even Leopard, then you will love Lion. HOPEFULLY Apple will keep it a low price upgrade. I think £20 like Snow Leopard is wishful thinking, but I think £50 is fair. Like I said, this isn't a major overhaul like the jump from Tiger to Leopard. But only time will tell on that front. And hopefully Apple will include over new features too in the official Beta.

XBMC Apple TV 2 madness

Well I gave up. Apple didn't announce apps for the Apple TV, so I jailbroke mine. I have to be honest, Im so glad i did! I love my Apple TV but having to recode all my video's in order to watch them was stupid. And so is having to have another device on to stream from. So I installed XBMC, and now I can watch all my .avi and .mkv files direct from my NAS. I can even watch BBC iPlayer, and live TV via TVCatchUp. Come on Apple sort it out! Why couldnt I do these out of the box. If a group of hackers with limited resourses can get the best out of this box, including 1080p, think what you guys could do with all that money. Also stop giving the Americans everything. Us Brits dont even have TV Show rentals. Stick Sky Player on there!

iPhone 5

Apparently, according to MacRumors, this could well be the next iPhone. Gone are the days of flat glass and aerial's that don't work when held in an incorrect position. Back to square one with a nice aluminium back, like the first iPhone.
I think it looks good, although will need a small black patch of plastic some where to let the radio waves in, like the iPod touch or the black band on the bottom of the first iPhone.
Only time will tell if this is correct, expect the new iPhone to be releases June/July.

Cheap iPhone! ATLAST!

Remember all those iPhone Mini rumors that were later assumed to actually be about a cheaper iPhone? Apple’s COO Tim Cook has thrown some more fuel on the fire after a meeting with a research analyst about iPhone market share, as reported by Forbes. The most notable comment attributed to Apple’s COO is this:

Cook “appeared to reaffirm the notion that Apple is likely to develop lower priced offerings” to expand the market for the iPhone. Cook said the company is planning “clever things” to address the prepaid market, and that Apple did not want its products to be “just for the rich,” and that the company is “not ceding any market.”

A ‘lower priced offering’ would be in line with past reports by the Wall Street Journal and New York Times that have mentioned a cheaper iPhone/iPhone Mini.

Many possibilities and questions remain, including whether or not a low cost iPhone offering will be announced alongside an all new iPhone 5, or if a cheaper model is going to just be the current iPhone 4 sold at reduced prices, which some rumors seem to suggest.

The comment about the prepaid market is also interesting. Currently, the iPhone 3G and iPhone 3GS can be converted into a prepaid phone rather easily just by inserting an AT&T pay-as-you-go sim card to make phone calls, and enabling data is just slightly more difficult. Offering an iPhone that is specifically intended for the pay-go market would be a bold move away from their current contract offerings. The iPhone 5 is expected to be released at WWDC 2011.

Apple TV 2

It's my birthday on Tuesday, yay me, and my wife game me £100 to spend to get my birthday present. Now £100 isn't a lot of money really for someone as obsessed with gadgets as myself. So I narrowed it down to 3 choices. Nintendo DSi, Kinect for the Xbox 360 or Apple TV. If you read the post title I would imagine you guessed that I brought the Apple TV.
I have been impressed with it since Steve Jobs announced it last year so I decided that would be the correct purchase for me. Now I'm at a cross roads tho. Do I, or don't I jailbreak it.
Without jailbreaking it, it is basically a box I can rent iTunes movies on. But I have a sneaky idea that Apple will announce an app store for it soon, maybe even on Wednesday. What makes me think this? For a start ATV has 8GB of storage, yet doesn't store anything. Yes it needs a little space for iOS and for buffering the stream you are watching or listening too, but not 8GB. Also apps have started for it already. Jailbreak it and you can install weather widgets, xbmc, and plex. I can't see Apple sitting by the side while they could be making money from selling apps for the device.
Therefore I think I will wait till Wednesday and see what happens, then maybe jailbreak it on the Thursday....

New MacBook Pro's

Well, just to spoil my predictions for next weeks media event, or to celebrate Steve Job's birthday, (Happy Birthday Steve if you are reading this), Apple went ahead and announced the new MacBook Pro today.

Long over due, some say, Apple's flagship laptops are now looking decidedly tasty;

(15 - 17 Inch Versions)

2.0gHz - 2.2gHz Quad i7 Core Intel Sandy Bridge Processors

4GB RAM (Expandable upto 8GB)

500GB - 750GB Hard Drive

AMD 6490M Graphics with 256MB Video RAM or AMD 6750M Graphics with 1GB Video RAM

Prices coming in at, you might want to sit down if your not already, $1799 - $2499. Not cheap for a laptop, or a desktop for that matter. Of course you could have the 13 inch version, with runs on dual i5 chips, and has Intel HD graphics processors. But they still come in at $1199 - $1499 depending on spec.

All of the above come with the normal input ports, such as USB, SD Card slot etc, but Apple has also introduced a hybrid Thunderbolt/mini Display port on the new MacBook Pros. This represents Intel's Light Peak technology which is said to offer high speed connections and is expected to replace the need for USB 3.0. Also they have included a HD iSight camera for all your Facetime needs, (plus I just had to fork out 59p for the official 1.0 version of Facetime, but these come with it free.)

Shame my current MacBook is only a year old, or I might have to rob a bank and get one of these beauties! Sadly I feel my wife might kick my ass if I got one....

Apple release iPad2 2nd of March??

Its official! The 2nd of March is going to be the unveiling of the new iPad. Apple have announced that on their media event will be in San Francisco, with the tag line, "Come see what 2011 will be the year of".
This of course means they are more then likely going to release details of products other then the iPad. At best guess I think they will be the following;

- iPad 2 (Of course, their is a dam picture of it in the press release...)
- iOS 4.3 to be released on the same day, hopefully, maybe even a preview of iOS 5 probably for release in June when the iPhone 5 is due to be announced.
- New service! Its rumoured that Apple are creating positions in their bricks and mortar stores for business support. Its likely to be Apple Genius's that answer support calls from businesses signed upto the scheme, as well as visit sites for installs and repairs. Current Apple Genius's can't answer phone support or support off site.
- More of OS X Lion. It wont be the release, as Apple have already said that it wont be released until the summer, and the beta isn't even out yet.
- MacBook Pro refresh. Lighter, more powerful, Sandy Bridge chipset, Intel Graphics, and Light Peak ports, apparently renamed "Thunderbolt".
- White iPhone 4. Come on Apple, its about time!!
- Something to do with MobileMe. Either new services, and or making it free.

Those are my guesses. Would love to see something about the mini iPhone, but that is more then likely going to be announced when the iPhone 5 is announced, it just makes sense. I would imagine the media event will be streamed live over the internet, as long as you have a mac or iOS device. Sadly I am working late that day, therefore I wont be able to watch as my workplace is dell only God dam it!!!

Death of the Tablet computer?

After predicting the rise of the Slates this year, I fear the revolution could be over before it has begun. Let's get one thing straight. Tablets/Slate computers fit in between smart phones and your general laptop. They are for things like surfing the internet when you can't be bothered to boot your main PC and when your phone screen is too small for what your upto, and of course for playing Angry Birds.
They have no optical drive, and tend to have limited storage, at best around 64GB. They, at the moment, can not replace the Dell machine on your desk or lap. 
And yet the price of them is insane. The new Xoom is a good example. $600 on a 2 year contract, or a stupid price of $800 without said contract. For that price you could buy a fairly decent 17 inch laptop, 4GB of RAM, atleast 500GB hard drive and an optical drive that will let you rip and burn all the music and movies you feel like.
Apple have had amazing success with the iPad, £429, which is still alot, but when you consider a entry level Apple laptop is £879 its all relative. For half the price of the laptop you get a device which can do half the things. Can't rip music, can't watch DVD's, and can't import your camera pictures out of the box.
Now take HP's new WebOS tablet. Rumoured to be priced around the £500 mark, their entry level laptop, £350. It just doesn't make sence and it gets worse. 
Samsung Tab £429, Samsung laptop £300. And the tab is only 7 inches! Dell Streak, (marketed as a tablet) £429 without contract and only 5 inches, Dell 15 inch laptop £300.
Prices like this only attract geeks like me. They are no good for the average person on the street at sometimes double the price of the netbooks they are supposed to be replacing.
Of course you could buy a Chinese ePad for around £140, but for the love of God, don't. For these to actually take off, companies like Samsung and HP need to go back to their laptop price structures, half the price of Apple for similar specs and half the looks...

My top five tech tips for this year

Here are my personal top five tech tips of this year. The five fields I can see really coming into their own, and changing everything...again...

Internet Streaming;

This year I can see this completely going to the next level. Last year we saw things like BBC iPlayer take off completely, coming to multiable devices, such as Blu-Ray players, PS3 and BT Vision. Sky Player too has come on leaps and bounds, no longer restricted to stuffy old Beige Windows Boxes, and hitting things like Xbox 360. 

This year I expect more. More OnDemand. More of what I want, when I want it, and Im not talking about stupid YouTube! Sky is again leading the way, (with an idea pinched from BT Vision) in updating its Anytime to Anytime+. More programs available, and all downloaded through your broadband. The killer part of this being its free also.

Im going to stick my neck out as well, and say this year I expect Netflix to actually come to the UK. LoveFilm has started streaming movies, but they are mostly shite. Time for it to be done properly.

3D TV;

Last year saw 3D TV take off big time…Im not really sure why, but it did. I mean, who actually wants to sit in front of the TV wearing stupid glasses, and my god, the cost! But I expect this year to be all about glasses free 3D TV. The tech is already out there. Next week the Nintendo 3DS comes out. LG and Samsung have HUGE 3D TV's coming out which are glasses free, so I can see this taking off. Shame no one can be bothered to invent something that makes normal HDTV's 3D though, kinda a cheap option, but it would help get 3D TV into main stream houses, instead of the rich…or plain stupid…

Cloud Computing;

Its coming! In many ways its already here.What with MobileMe, DropBox, and all the cloud goodness Google provide, its hear to stay, and it can only get better! Admittedly upload speeds need to get better, and they are starting too. But with the amount of information that we currently carry around with us, on phones, laptops, office PC, home PC, etc, we do need somewhere to store everything we need, on everything we use! 

Rumour has it that MobileMe is about to become free, which if that is true, will be HUGE news. Automatically sync'ing contacts, photo's, videos. calendars etc, all in the background. Yes I know Google already do this, and yes it is free, but have always found MobileMe a better experience. Also the next version of OS X, (Lion) is supposed to have some kind of cloud based Storage Safe for important docs. I can really see cloud computing coming of age this year.

Smart Phones;

Ever since the launch of the Apple iPhone, smart phones have become big business. Nearly everyone I know has one now, and they are getting better and better each time a new one is released. The new Galaxy S 2 from samsung looks amazing, as does the Motorola Atrix 4G, which when put into a dock actually becomes a laptop!! I think that this year is probably the 'Dumb' phones last.

Tablet Computing;

Last year we saw the best, (iPad), and the worse, (Im looking at you stupid ePad of a billion models) but this year the rest of the big boys hit the market. HP with a webOS tablet, which looks divine, Blackberry with its Playbook, LG with a 3D Android offering, and no doubt a million cheap chinese pads, running Windows 7 Starter that just doesn't work with a touch screen.

The days of a Beige box in the corner of the room are truly gone. From now on I see laptops, and slates, with gamers turning to consoles to get their kicks.

Some of the Slates I have seen really look like they can take on the iPad, but, Apple are about to announce the new one, so this year has to be the year of the Slate.

Does everyone hate Apple?

Nearly everytime I open up my web browser my first three stops are gizmodo.com,engaged.com and macrumors.com. Basically I am just being a geek, and like to keep upto date with what's going on in the world of 'Gadg'.
For a while now I have been amazed by some of the comments on these sites, as most of them tend to be about hating Apple and cursing Steve Jobs. For the life of me I can't understand why people hate Apple. Unlike sure. I unlike mushrooms, but just don't order them on my pizza, not spit out bile about them in a fruit and beg forum. Hate is a strong word. Hate would be preferring to have your nuts cut off instead of buying an iMac.
All any website has to do is print something to do with Apple and suddenly it is set upon by the Apple lynch mob. 'I hate Apple', 'MacBooks are over expensive tosh' and '256mb and no flash player? The iPad is shite' are common comments. Sure you are well within your rights to not buy that new Mac Mini, but no need to slag an entire company off just because it doesn't play your favorite game.
I am not a fanboy. But I do like Apple gear. Looks great and is so simple to use! I know I can buy a similar spec machine for half the price, could even install OSX and make a hackintosh. But I prefer to spend my money at Apple. For example my five year old MacBook can out run my Quad Core Windows box still. And I'm sure if I had brought a similar laptop instead, it would be dead and buried by now.
Apple don't do themselves any favors, like locking down the iPhone and iPad so they can only install App Store apps, but by doing so it means they can control the quality of content, and almost eliminate the risk of viruses and malware.
Apple isn't a cult. It's just people deciding they don't want a dell, or run Windows, and can't be bothered with messing around with Linux. If someone asks me to recommend a computer I don't automatically say Apple. I'll ask what they are going to use it for, and how much they are willing to spend.
I know Apple are doing well right now and I think that's the main problem. Human nature tends to dislike anyone succeeding, we would all much prefer to see people fail. Of course there is always the jealousy option. Some people can't afford it, so they knock it instead. But I think the more likely reason is that they haven't grown up yet, and have never been told 'if you have nothing good to say...shut the fuck up'. Just my two cents...

What I want to see in the iPad2

May, 2010. I had actually saved up enough money to buy, lets face it, the worlds first slate computer you could actually use. The Apple iPad. Many people said that I was a fool. That it was just an over priced, over sized iPod Touch. But I didn't care. It is a beautiful piece of design, and in my opinion possibly the most important piece for tech to come out since the desktop PC. Yes it only runs iOS, not OS X, but is that a bad thing? A lot of people have asked me, "What is an iPad?" well, it is basically anything you want it to be. If I want to listen to my favourite radio stations, I fire up TuneIn. If I want to write a letter, I open up Pages. And if I want to lose an entire day of life I play Angry Birds.

Now the technological world is awaiting news about the iPad2. Apple tend to have refreshes of their products every 12 months or so, so its almost a given that in the next couple of weeks they will announce the new version, no doubt with a whole array of new features. This leaves me with a decision, do I upgrade my favourite piece of computing kit, or do I hold out, maybe even look at the new Android slates, or heaven forbid, Windows 7 slates.

I feel that Apple did leave out some things from the first, that would have made the iPad unbeatable, even by the new slates that were announced this month. First of all, a front facing camera. The iPad was announced in all its splendour in March. Then in June, Apple announced the new iPhone 4 with facetime. Why Mr Jobs did you not put a front facing camera in the iPad?? What I have seen of Facetime on both the iPhone/4G iPod Touch and the Mac, I have been very impressed. Yes I know, you need a wifi network to use it instead of using 3G, but the quality of the app is outstanding, and it has finally brought about the era of video calling. My old Nokia 6680 from 2005 had video calls, so it has taken over 6 years for it to actually catch on. I really am not fussed about having a rear camera. The iPad to too large to use as a camera/camcorder. But I think a front facing camera is a must for the second generation.

People have said that it is likely to have the Retina display, but I doubt that. It would increase cost too much. One thing the iPad has over Android slates at the moment is the price, and I doubt Apple will change this until the Retina display can be made cheaper.

I would love to see the second iPad be alittle lighter. When in its case, it tends to make your wrist ache after a lot of use, so shaving off a few ounce's couldn't hurt.

Battery life is excellent, I don't think Apple need to change that at all. But maybe a dual processor, and more RAM, (256MB does seem alittle small even though you don't notice) would be great, but would probably effect battery life, so maybe the battery would need to change after all.

I have seen a lot of moans online about iOS. But I actually like it. If I want OS X or Windows then I boot up my MacBook. I would love to see a Slate only version of iOS. Like Android have done with Honeycomb. There seems to be a lot of screen space wasted with the current iOS. Its fine with an iPhone or iPod, but with the iPad it just seems wasted. Would be great to have widgets etc on your homescreen.

So, to recap;

1) Front Facing Camera, cant believe it was missed the first time!!!

2) Lighter.

3) Dual Processor, More RAM.

4) A slate only version of iOS.

If Apple tick 3 of those boxes, I think I will upgrading my current version. If not, I just hope they bring out a portable iSight cam for the first generation.......