The Future of Apple Devices: A Preview of What's to Come

As we approach the release of new Apple devices, there is always excitement and anticipation among tech enthusiasts. This time around, we're going to dive into what we know so far about the upcoming iPad Air, Apple Watch Series 6, and a potential lower-end replacement for the Apple Watch Series 3.

The New iPad Air: A Design Revolution

One of the most significant changes coming to the new iPad Air is the lack of a traditional home button. Instead, users will be able to unlock their device by simply swiping up and holding their finger on the lock button. However, there's a catch – if you press too hard on the button, it'll lock instead of unlocking. This design change might take some getting used to, but Apple seems determined to find an elegant solution that doesn't require reaching up awkwardly to press on the side.

Apple has also confirmed that the new iPad Air will feature a 10.8-inch screen, which could result in thicker bezels compared to the 11-inch model. This design decision might be due to the fact that the device is smaller in terms of footprint, or it could simply be a choice made by Apple's design team.

The Apple Watch Series 6: A Familiar Design with Some Changes

When it comes to the Apple Watch Series 6, rumors suggest that the design won't be drastically different from the previous model. That being said, some fans are disappointed by this lack of innovation, particularly when compared to the iPhone 11 Pro and Pro Max, which boasted slightly thinner bezels.

However, there is one exciting possibility: a larger Apple Watch with a 48- or 50-millimeter display. While it's unclear whether this will actually happen, it would certainly be an interesting development for the brand.

Design Changes to Improve Battery Life

One of the most significant design changes coming to the Apple Watch Series 6 is the removal of Force Touch functionality from WatchOS 7. This means that hardware support for Force Touch will likely be eliminated, which could result in a thinner device or improved battery life.

Apple's motivation for this change is largely centered around improving the overall user experience and addressing issues with the Always-On Display. By removing Force Touch, Apple hopes to create more space for a bigger battery, which should ultimately benefit users who have experienced battery drain issues with previous models.

New Features and Software Enhancements

As expected, the Apple Watch Series 6 will feature some significant software enhancements, including support for Blood Oxygen Detection and sleep tracking. These features are designed to promote user health and wellness, which is a key aspect of the Apple brand.

WatchOS 7 will also introduce new capabilities aimed at improving overall user experience. While details are scarce, it's clear that Apple is committed to creating a seamless and intuitive experience for users.

A Lower-End Replacement for the Apple Watch Series 3

Finally, rumors suggest that Apple plans to launch a lower-end replacement for the Apple Watch Series 3. This device will allegedly have a similar design to the Series 4 and 5, but with some flagship features stripped away to make it more affordable. This move is expected to be a major success for Apple, particularly given the popularity of the Series 3 at reduced prices.

By offering a lower-end option, Apple can cater to users who want an Apple Watch without breaking the bank. It's likely that this device will outsell the Series 6, making it a savvy business move for the company.

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enwelcome to another episode of nine to five mac weekly where i think after today that uh apple leaker tier list um some things need to be moved around a bit i am your host miles somerville let's dive into the news and talk about the event that apple announced today apple just took some of us by surprise and announced a virtual event for next week september 15th and based on trusted sources it seems as though this is only going to be for announcing the ipad air 4 and apple watch series 6 not the iphone 12 models or the new silicon imac or macbook pro or airpod studio or any of that stuff simply just the apple watch series 6 and ipad air 4. tim cook himself said that the iphone would be arriving later than usual this year so this all kind of adds up but let's dive in and talk about everything we know or at least everything we think we know about this new ipad air 4 and apple watch series 6. the ipad air 4 is shaping up to be one of the best value tablets you can get your hands on firstly the design based on league documentation is going to be nearly identical to the 11 inch ipad pro minus the lidar scanner and the quad speaker setup we should still expect the same flat edge design as the ipad pro with the smart connectors on the back for use with perhaps a new keyboard or just to use the existing uh magic keyboard and apple pencil for the ipad pro we're also expecting to see touch id implemented in the power button instead of face id like on its bigger brother the ipad pro the display is rumored to come in at 10.8 inches which is slightly smaller than the 11 inch ipad pro and a commentary 905 mac pointed this out thinking that this is because the ipad air is going to have slightly thicker bezels than the 11 ipad pro and i think that makes perfect sense because if the ipad air is supposed to use the exact same accessories as the current 11 inch ipad pro aka the magic keyboard or smart folio cover then it essentially has to have the exact same dimensions as the current 11 inch ipad pro aka the same general footprint because if it's slightly smaller you know you're going to have some case hanging off your ipad and as the 11 inch iphone the cheaper alternative to the iphone 11 pro and pro max has slightly thicker bezels than its pro counterparts i think that's going to be the same case here with the ipad air in comparison to the ipad pro which i think for most people is going to be plenty fine i'm sure me using a tablet that's not going to be something i really care about especially given the decrease of bezels we're already getting this is already such a really important redesign for the ipad air other than the redesign one of the biggest changes we expect to see on this new ipad air 4 is the adoption of usbc also seen in this league manual and just based on the fact that it has the same ipad pro s design i can confidently say that we should expect usbc to be coming to the ipad air this year and once that happens we should look to the next models to adopt usb-c aka the traditional ipad and the ipad mini because usbc all the things and this is also very interesting exciting because with usbc and the ipad air 4 depending on how apple adopts it into this tablet assuming it's the same as the ipad pro as far as functionality we should be able to hook up the ipad air to let's say an lg ultra fine display and have like an actual desk setup running off of an ipad air which is pretty much going to be a first for the tablet we don't have any substantial pricing information just yet but the last generation ipad air was priced at 4.99 so even if it's just 50 or maybe even a hundred dollars more than that i'd say we're still looking at a pretty killer tablet for the money it's not going to have a high refresh rate display most likely like the ipad pro and that's probably the biggest downside when comparing the two in my opinion but i think if you just want a nice full screen tablet specifically an ipad with second generation apple pencil support then this is going to be pretty hard to beat i'm excited to test this out srb srb says the biggest feature is an increase of 0.2 inches i hope not we still hope for a better brighter display promotion etc well firstly it'd be an increase of 0.3 inches because the current generation ipad is a 10.5 inch display but yeah i hope the display in general is improved and not just you know getting uh the ipad pro bezel treatment uh it would be nice for this blade to get brighter i don't think promotion is in the cards because you know it's called promotion you figure they would save that for the ipad pro give you a reason to spend the extra money on that tablet instead of getting the air but i mean if they threw it on there i would definitely not complain our gomez photo says i love my 9.7 inch ipad pro it's been an amazing performer but if the ipad air came out with slimmer bezels and a usbc connection it would convince me to upgrade i understand why apple wants to keep lightning around but the less different types of cables i have to carry around with me the better yes i 100 agree and i think at least within the next two years the majority of apple's devices will all have usbc uh the iphone is still a bit of a question mark but me personally i could totally do without lightning usbc all the things aaron says new ipad air simply swipe up and hold your finger on the lock button to unlock but don't press it too hard because then it will lock i hope they don't use the touch id lock button or find an elegant solution i don't want to have to reach up awkwardly and press on the side whenever i unlock my screen dot dot dot yeah i kind of agree i don't really get why apple didn't just put face id on this new ipad air uh but i think apple should be able to find a nice way to implement touch id uh into the power button i hope so ipod craze says the leak screen is 10.8 inches so the bezels are going to be a bit thicker than on the 11 inch model i mean that could be the case and i could see them totally doing that where it's kind of the same thing where on the iphone 11 pro and 11 pro max those have slightly thinner bezels than on the iphone 11 just the same as the 10s and 10s max did and the 10r had those thicker bezels i could see that happening or maybe the ipad air just has a smaller footprint footprint and hence has a smaller display now moving on to the apple watch series 6. it doesn't look like this is going to be a substantial update by any means as far as the design it looks like it's going to be pretty similar if not identical to the series 5 which is a bummer i always like looking at new and shiny things but i don't think anyone really had any general complaints about the series 5's design outside of the people who never liked the apple watch design to begin with i always thought it'd be cool to see apple do a larger version of the apple watch like a 48 or 50 millimeter i think that'd be interesting to see but i wouldn't expect anything radical like that to happen this year now while the design for the series 6 may not be that different from the series 5 at least according to rumors we should probably expect a new color in material option last year apple introduced the titanium finish option for the series 5 and that was cool i guess so i think apple should definitely bring out something like that again this year especially if there's going to be essentially no visual difference between the series 5 and 6. the series 6 is also looking to strip away some features that you might have come to love in previous versions yep watch os 7 is looking to remove force touch from the apple watch as far as the software functionality aspect of it but this means that the hardware to support force touch is likely going to be removed from the apple watch series 6 meaning it could be thinner or you could improve the battery life on it because everyone who purchased series 5 or at least upgraded to a series 5 is aware of the battery loss that you're getting with that always on display so freeing up some space for a bigger battery in the series 6 might be the perfect fix that apple needs to solve that battery issue at least battery drop that they had with the series 5. as far as software there's of course going to be some new features with the series 6 because apple wants you to stay as healthy as possible so you can buy more products the biggest feature we're hearing rumors of is support for blood oxygen detection this feature is supposed to work similar to the heart rate detection feature where it notifies you if your blood oxygen levels are below the norm watchos 7 is also going to include sleep tracking features so we should expect to see that on the new apple watch as well with maybe some new features made specifically for the series 6. now that's pretty much all we know as far as the series 6 but it's been reported that apple's planning to launch a lower end replacement for the apple watch series 3. we don't know much about it but we're hearing that it's gonna have a similar design to the series four and five with some of the flagship features stripped away for a more affordable price uh i think this is a very smart move for apple as i know they probably sold a ton of those apple watch series three watches when they brought the price down to 199 and 229 uh yeah i think this should be an easy slam dunk for them uh and my bet is that this will probably outsell the series six that's pretty much gonna be it for this one i will say definitely keep it locked to nine to five mac.com as well as this youtube channel subscribe with that bell notification turned on because this month in october are going to be quite eventful thank you all for watching make sure to subscribe like i said and i'll talk to you in the next one youwelcome to another episode of nine to five mac weekly where i think after today that uh apple leaker tier list um some things need to be moved around a bit i am your host miles somerville let's dive into the news and talk about the event that apple announced today apple just took some of us by surprise and announced a virtual event for next week september 15th and based on trusted sources it seems as though this is only going to be for announcing the ipad air 4 and apple watch series 6 not the iphone 12 models or the new silicon imac or macbook pro or airpod studio or any of that stuff simply just the apple watch series 6 and ipad air 4. tim cook himself said that the iphone would be arriving later than usual this year so this all kind of adds up but let's dive in and talk about everything we know or at least everything we think we know about this new ipad air 4 and apple watch series 6. the ipad air 4 is shaping up to be one of the best value tablets you can get your hands on firstly the design based on league documentation is going to be nearly identical to the 11 inch ipad pro minus the lidar scanner and the quad speaker setup we should still expect the same flat edge design as the ipad pro with the smart connectors on the back for use with perhaps a new keyboard or just to use the existing uh magic keyboard and apple pencil for the ipad pro we're also expecting to see touch id implemented in the power button instead of face id like on its bigger brother the ipad pro the display is rumored to come in at 10.8 inches which is slightly smaller than the 11 inch ipad pro and a commentary 905 mac pointed this out thinking that this is because the ipad air is going to have slightly thicker bezels than the 11 ipad pro and i think that makes perfect sense because if the ipad air is supposed to use the exact same accessories as the current 11 inch ipad pro aka the magic keyboard or smart folio cover then it essentially has to have the exact same dimensions as the current 11 inch ipad pro aka the same general footprint because if it's slightly smaller you know you're going to have some case hanging off your ipad and as the 11 inch iphone the cheaper alternative to the iphone 11 pro and pro max has slightly thicker bezels than its pro counterparts i think that's going to be the same case here with the ipad air in comparison to the ipad pro which i think for most people is going to be plenty fine i'm sure me using a tablet that's not going to be something i really care about especially given the decrease of bezels we're already getting this is already such a really important redesign for the ipad air other than the redesign one of the biggest changes we expect to see on this new ipad air 4 is the adoption of usbc also seen in this league manual and just based on the fact that it has the same ipad pro s design i can confidently say that we should expect usbc to be coming to the ipad air this year and once that happens we should look to the next models to adopt usb-c aka the traditional ipad and the ipad mini because usbc all the things and this is also very interesting exciting because with usbc and the ipad air 4 depending on how apple adopts it into this tablet assuming it's the same as the ipad pro as far as functionality we should be able to hook up the ipad air to let's say an lg ultra fine display and have like an actual desk setup running off of an ipad air which is pretty much going to be a first for the tablet we don't have any substantial pricing information just yet but the last generation ipad air was priced at 4.99 so even if it's just 50 or maybe even a hundred dollars more than that i'd say we're still looking at a pretty killer tablet for the money it's not going to have a high refresh rate display most likely like the ipad pro and that's probably the biggest downside when comparing the two in my opinion but i think if you just want a nice full screen tablet specifically an ipad with second generation apple pencil support then this is going to be pretty hard to beat i'm excited to test this out srb srb says the biggest feature is an increase of 0.2 inches i hope not we still hope for a better brighter display promotion etc well firstly it'd be an increase of 0.3 inches because the current generation ipad is a 10.5 inch display but yeah i hope the display in general is improved and not just you know getting uh the ipad pro bezel treatment uh it would be nice for this blade to get brighter i don't think promotion is in the cards because you know it's called promotion you figure they would save that for the ipad pro give you a reason to spend the extra money on that tablet instead of getting the air but i mean if they threw it on there i would definitely not complain our gomez photo says i love my 9.7 inch ipad pro it's been an amazing performer but if the ipad air came out with slimmer bezels and a usbc connection it would convince me to upgrade i understand why apple wants to keep lightning around but the less different types of cables i have to carry around with me the better yes i 100 agree and i think at least within the next two years the majority of apple's devices will all have usbc uh the iphone is still a bit of a question mark but me personally i could totally do without lightning usbc all the things aaron says new ipad air simply swipe up and hold your finger on the lock button to unlock but don't press it too hard because then it will lock i hope they don't use the touch id lock button or find an elegant solution i don't want to have to reach up awkwardly and press on the side whenever i unlock my screen dot dot dot yeah i kind of agree i don't really get why apple didn't just put face id on this new ipad air uh but i think apple should be able to find a nice way to implement touch id uh into the power button i hope so ipod craze says the leak screen is 10.8 inches so the bezels are going to be a bit thicker than on the 11 inch model i mean that could be the case and i could see them totally doing that where it's kind of the same thing where on the iphone 11 pro and 11 pro max those have slightly thinner bezels than on the iphone 11 just the same as the 10s and 10s max did and the 10r had those thicker bezels i could see that happening or maybe the ipad air just has a smaller footprint footprint and hence has a smaller display now moving on to the apple watch series 6. it doesn't look like this is going to be a substantial update by any means as far as the design it looks like it's going to be pretty similar if not identical to the series 5 which is a bummer i always like looking at new and shiny things but i don't think anyone really had any general complaints about the series 5's design outside of the people who never liked the apple watch design to begin with i always thought it'd be cool to see apple do a larger version of the apple watch like a 48 or 50 millimeter i think that'd be interesting to see but i wouldn't expect anything radical like that to happen this year now while the design for the series 6 may not be that different from the series 5 at least according to rumors we should probably expect a new color in material option last year apple introduced the titanium finish option for the series 5 and that was cool i guess so i think apple should definitely bring out something like that again this year especially if there's going to be essentially no visual difference between the series 5 and 6. the series 6 is also looking to strip away some features that you might have come to love in previous versions yep watch os 7 is looking to remove force touch from the apple watch as far as the software functionality aspect of it but this means that the hardware to support force touch is likely going to be removed from the apple watch series 6 meaning it could be thinner or you could improve the battery life on it because everyone who purchased series 5 or at least upgraded to a series 5 is aware of the battery loss that you're getting with that always on display so freeing up some space for a bigger battery in the series 6 might be the perfect fix that apple needs to solve that battery issue at least battery drop that they had with the series 5. as far as software there's of course going to be some new features with the series 6 because apple wants you to stay as healthy as possible so you can buy more products the biggest feature we're hearing rumors of is support for blood oxygen detection this feature is supposed to work similar to the heart rate detection feature where it notifies you if your blood oxygen levels are below the norm watchos 7 is also going to include sleep tracking features so we should expect to see that on the new apple watch as well with maybe some new features made specifically for the series 6. now that's pretty much all we know as far as the series 6 but it's been reported that apple's planning to launch a lower end replacement for the apple watch series 3. we don't know much about it but we're hearing that it's gonna have a similar design to the series four and five with some of the flagship features stripped away for a more affordable price uh i think this is a very smart move for apple as i know they probably sold a ton of those apple watch series three watches when they brought the price down to 199 and 229 uh yeah i think this should be an easy slam dunk for them uh and my bet is that this will probably outsell the series six that's pretty much gonna be it for this one i will say definitely keep it locked to nine to five mac.com as well as this youtube channel subscribe with that bell notification turned on because this month in october are going to be quite eventful thank you all for watching make sure to subscribe like i said and i'll talk to you in the next one you\n"