Everything from Apple’s ‘Time Flies’ event in c.5 minutes

Apple made nine key announcements during its Time Flies event September 15:

Apple Watch Series 6, Apple Watch SE, iPad 8^th Gen, iPad Air 4, Apple One subscription service, its new Fitness+ workout service, the A14 Bionic processor, work it is doing in digital health and promised to ship iOS updates.

Here’s the 5-minute top down guide to all the news, and links to more.

Apple Watch Series 6

Available in several new colors (now in blue, silver, space gray and gold aluminium and also in PRODUCT (RED)) and equipped with a much faster S6 chip (itself based on the A13 chip in iPhone 11), always on altimeter and Blood Oxygen sensor, Apple Watch Series 6 aims to build on the device’s reputation as a great solution to augment your health. It’s 20% faster and gives 18-hours battery life and is 2.5x brighter than before.

Highlights:

The blood oxygen sensor. Apple is now involved in studies with leading universities to identify how this information can help manage and control asthma, heart failure and – most of all – provide early warning of flu or COVID-19.

What you missed:

Apple underplayed the product’s inclusion of the U1 chip, as used in iPhone 11. Why? I think it’s building a platform here, but needs a little more time.

Price:

From $399, or from $499 with cellular. More info.

Apple Watch SE

A bigger Retina display, fall detection and an always-on altimeter make Apple Watch SE a beats the rest fitness tracker. The processor is last year’s S5, but performance is twice that of the still available (and cheaper) Series 3.

Highlights:

This is very much a health tracking device.

What you missed:

That lack of the heart rate sensors Apple has arguably built the digital health credentials of the AWatch family on.

Price:

From $279 or from $329 (cellular). More info.

iPad 8^th Gen

Boosted with the A12 Bionic chip with support for ML in the Neural Engine, a 10.2 inch Retina Display and all day battery life (and better cameras), this appears to be a big improvement on the seventh generation, which felt a little sluggish in contrast to its peers. Compatible with Apple Pencil (v1) and equipped with Touch ID, it’s really a step up for this model of tablet. More info.

Highlights:

Massive performance gains in contrast to previous model, it’s twice as fast as the best selling Windows laptop.

What you missed:

Apple really has souped up this model. The 7^th gen version carried an A10 chip, which first appeared in 2016.

Price:

From $329, or $459 cellular. More info.

The all new iPad Air

The definite star of the show, iPad Air was already a great device, but is now faster, with better battery life and more. You get a 10.9-inch Liquid Retina display, 12MP rear camera and a Touch ID sensor tucked inside the top button. You also get a 6-core A14 Bionic chip, which hasn’t even reached an iPhone (yet). It’s available in silver, space gray, rose gold, green, and sky blue and has a 12MP camera, USB-C and WiFi6.

Highlights:

The processor. It’s the most powerful yet in an iPad and it’s good to see the tech become more approachable.

What you missed:

It has a 7MP FaceTime camera. Does this mean the iPhone will get similar?

Price:

From $599 or $729 (Cellular). More info.

The Apple One subscription service

Boosted by an all new fitness service (below) Apple One lets you subscribe to and share multiple Apple services (Music, TV+, iCloud, Arcade and New+) for a slightly lower fee. The deals in one image:

Highlights:

Family plans. This makes the offer really rather good.

What you missed:

Premier is only available in Australia, Canada, the UK, and the U.S. And we don’t know if we like the fitness service yet. It is oddly not available in Ireland of NZ, even though Fitness+ is…

The all-new Fitness + service

“Apple Fitness+ intelligently incorporates metrics from Apple Watch for users to visualize right on their iPhone, iPad, or Apple TV, offering a first-of-its-kind personalized workout experience,” Apple states. This looks like a powerful service, including a variety of different types of exercise (Cycling, Treadmill, Rowing, HIIT, Strength, Yoga, Dance, Core, and Mindful Cooldown).

Highlights:

Family plans. Integration with the familiar Activity app. Happy smiley people on well shot videos.

What you missed:

I missed my standing target today because I wrote this. What did you miss? Fitness+ will be available in Australia, Canada, Ireland, New Zealand, the UK, and the US on launch.

Price:

Fitness+ will be available to Apple Watch customers as a subscription service before the end of 2020 for $9.99 per month or $79.99 per year. Everyone can try Fitness+ free for one month. More info.

The A14 Bionic processor

This is what Apple had to say:

“Apple’s most powerful chip ever made, the A14 Bionic.”

It tells us:

• A14 can handle 4K video editing
• It’s a 5nm process chip
• 8b transistors
• A new 6-core design,
• Delivers a 40 percent boost in CPU performance
• A new 4-core graphics architecture for a 30 percent improvement in graphics.
• A14 Bionic includes a new 16-core Neural Engine that is twice as fast, and capable of performing up to 11 trillion operations per second, taking machine learning apps to a whole new level.
• A14 Bionic also includes second-generation machine learning accelerators in the CPU for 10 times faster machine learning calculations.

“This combination of the new Neural Engine, CPU machine learning accelerators, and high-performance GPU enables powerful on-device experiences for image recognition, natural language learning, analyzing motion, and more.”

And it’s coming to an iPhone near you soon.

What you missed:

*And a Mac*

Want more? Here’s something on digital health.

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