THE iPAD PRO IS IN THE FRAME FOR A NEW 3D-SENSING CAMERA
With the SE2 penciled in for a first-quarter launch, it’s unclear whether Apple will reveal the device at a press event or simply announce it through a press release instead. However, an event could theoretically give Apple a good stage for pre-announcing two other products not expected to arrive until the second quarter: the new iPad Pro, with its time-of-flight camera system, and the scissor-mechanism MacBooks. Those, too, have been detailed in a report by Ming-Chi Kuo .
The new iPad Pro, presumably to come in the same 11-inch and 12.9-inch screen sizes as the current models, will feature a rear-facing 3D Time of Flight camera. The technology in this camera system will enable it to measure how long it takes for a laser or LED to reflect off a room’s objects, thereby allowing the camera to create an accurate 3D map of the space it captures. Kuo had previously predicted that rear cameras of this type would make it into some 2020 iPhones, too.
In both the iPad and iPhones, the camera setup will improve the quality of both the photos and AR applications possible with the devices. MacBooks lined up for release in the same quarter will also get a meaningful improvement, in the form of a new scissor mechanism intended to replace the oft-controversial butterfly mechanism used for the keyboards of recent Macs. Hence, the new keyboards should be more durable, as well as less vulnerable to failure from heat and small particles.
APPLE’S AR EFFORTS EXTEND TO A NEW HEADSET
“It’s clear to see why the current optimism surrounding Apple could continue for quite a while yet.”
Over the years, various firms have experimented with technologically sophisticated eyewear, with rather mixed results. Many years ago, Google revealed the Google Glass, a set of “smart glasses” instead to show smartphone-like information on its lenses, with voice commands used for interacting with the device. However, it wasn’t the most refined piece of kit in terms of appearance, leaving wearers looking rather akin to RoboCop, which made it best-suited to enterprise purposes.
It’s a similar story with Microsoft’s mixed reality headset HoloLens, although this particular product has been marketed more specifically to enterprise users in any case. At the other end of the scale, we’ve also been the Snap Spectacles, which allow users to record video for posting on the social media portal Snapchat. Traditionally, it’s been tricky for tech firms to produce eyewear that looks truly stylish while potentially rivaling the smartphone in functionality. Could Apple break that curse?
Rumors of a forthcoming augmented reality (AR) headset from Apple suggest that it could. In October, Kuo claimed that the product is scheduled for launch in the year’s second quarter – but crucially, will be promoted as an iPhone accessory rather than a replacement for the smartphone. This is because the headwear will largely serve as an external display for the iPhone, which will do the heavy lifting of computing and networking for the wirelesslyconnected eyewear.
It’s unclear whether the headset will, as Bloomberg reported back in 2017, run its own operating system. Then, the news site claimed that the device will use a custom OS, based on iOS and known as “rOS”, shorthand for “reality operating system”. Either way, it looks like, as the same site explained in late October, the headwear will synchronize with the connected iPhone to show details like emails, texts, maps and games across the user’s field of vision.
In the article by Bloomberg’s Apple reporter Mark Gurman, himself a reliable source of news about future Apple products, the Cupertino firm is said to have thought about giving the headwear its own App Store. This is just one sign that the company has high expectations for the new device, as it is also “hiring experts in graphics and games development to establish the glasses as the leader in a new product category and, if all goes perfectly, an eventual successor to the iPhone.”
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