Apple used their special event on Tuesday to unveil iPhone 6s and the new Apple TV, the latter of which offers lots of new features.
The new Apple TV
Apple CEO Tim Cook noted that innovation in the TV space hasn’t been moving. “Today, we are going to do something about that.”
Besides a redesigned interface, the biggest change to Apple TV is the addition of an App Store. Apps, Tim noted, have been the way people are watching content through their phones. Thanks to the Apple TV App Store, innovation can now begin on the television.
Apple TV is slightly taller than its predecessor and includes a new remote with a touch surface. The remote also includes a Siri button which lets you ask phrases like, “Show me funny TV shows”. Siri will also search across multiple apps so that you don’t have to go in and out of Netflix, Hulu, iTunes, etc to find the content you’re looking for. Here’s a look at the new interface:
Proving their interest in improving the TV experience, Apple demoed a new Apple TV feature which lets you ask Siri, “What did he/she say?” while watching a show or movie. Siri will automatically rewind the content 15 seconds and temporarily turn on closed captioning.
In another example, Apple asked Siri who was in the movie they were watching. The answers appeared at the bottom of the screen:
Hate how the dialogue and sound effects/music are imbalanced while watching movies at home? Apple TV offers a solution:
Sweet: New feature on Apple TV boosts speech and lowers music/sound effects, an annoying issue with movies at home pic.twitter.com/YgDKT5PYX6
— Andrew Sims (@sims) September 9, 2015
Unfortunately, it didn’t look like there was much Siri integration with third party apps on Apple TV. Yet.
The new Apple TV is priced at $149 for the 32 GB version and $199 for 64 GB. It’ll be available in “Late October”.
iPhone 6s
As they do every other year, Apple’s new iPhone is a mid-step between the iPhone 6 and 2016’s iPhone 7, but that hasn’t stopped them from offering some nice upgrades for iPhone 6s.
The new phones feature new technology called 3D Touch, which already exists on Apple Watch under the name Force Touch. 3D Touch, however, offers a series of new menus and glances throughout the operating system, making it seemingly easier than ever to get things done. Apple offered a slew of great examples which we really think will come in handy. Here are a couple of small examples:
The force of your touch will give you different ways to interact with the iPhone. Whereas we currently only have the tap, you will now be able to interact with two additional interactions: The soft and hard touch (Insert dirty joke here).
iPhone 6s takes better pictures now thanks to a 12 MP camera. Here’s a great example of the new iPhone’s handling of a couple lighting situations simultaneously:
Finally, iPhone 6s now shoots 4K video.
iPhone 6s will start at $199 and 6s Plus will start at $299 on a two year contract. Pre-ordering begins Saturday, September 12 for a September 25 release.
Meanwhile, iOS 9 will be released for everyone on September 16.
Apple today also announced a larger iPad called the iPad Pro with a 12.9-inch screen as well as a variety of new Apple Watch bands.