With Apple Inc.’s September event on a fast approach, the rumor mill meter is hitting a white hot pitch right about now. Will there be an iPhone 5 to coincide with iOS 5? What about an iPad 3? Oh, and I hear the Magic Mouse is being discontinued, is that true?

We can’t answer any with certainty, but here’s what is being batted around:

Magic Mouse being discontinued? Nope. I found out from John Gruber’s link to a short forkbombr.net recap – which relayed Cult of Mac‘s Alex Heath eating claim chowder: Our source in Apple inventory has followed up with us, and it appears that Apple has instead discontinued the Magic Mouse’s old part number in favor for a new one. This move may indicate an update to the Magic Mouse, with the most logical prediction being better integration with advanced gestures in OS X Lion.

iPhone 5 – Every Apple watcher knows the product schedule Apple follows: Every year their entire line of products get a refresh: iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch, Macbook Air and all other Macs. iPad update in January, iPhone in July, iPods in September for Back-To-School… and so on.

This year was a tad different though – the iPhone 4S (the temporary name) did not debut in July as normal. It is generally agreed that the cause may have been the Tsunami in Japan and thus a shortage of parts. But it may also have to do with iOS5 and iCloud; some say that they were not fully ready by July, so September is the natural substitute.

I can safely say that yes, a new iPhone will make its debut in September/October. It’s best to hold off upgrading until then if you can. What I can’t be safe about is…

iPad 3 – Possible… anything’s possible when you want it bad enough! The rumor is this iPad will be for Pro users, with a close to Retina screen. This to me feels like a stretch though. Yes, 9to5 Mac released some photos of dock connecter part that differs from the iPad 1 and 2, but that doesn’t prove much. There are dozens of shots like this that have been floated around as proof before – iPod Nano case with camera hole anyone?

I would wait until September 15 before purchasing an iPad 2 – you never know what Apple has up it’s sleeve. I’m waiting – and I’ve waited a long time to get my iPad!

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David Pogue’s TED Talk in 2006 is a fascinating look back, only five years ago. Hearing the talk of Microsoft and Apple and the art of simplicity still rings true today, if not more so. While Apple continues to dominate the tablet market, what does Microsoft do? Slaps Windows on tablets with a touch shell. Over and over again, we see that the industry still doesn’t understand Apple’s mind and philosophy.

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iCloud in iTunes on iPhone

When Steve Jobs took the stage yesterday, he got a standing ovation – and it was well deserved on many levels. The Apple, Inc. crew revealed their road map to guiding us into the post PC era; with demoes of the new operating system Lion, iOS5, and iCloud.

Lion was already known to take on traits of the iPhone, iPodTouch and iPad iOS system. Gestures are deeply embedded, and as Jobs said, “scroll bars are not present.” Lion also has: auto-save, Time-Machine-like document histories, full screen documents and apps, Mission Control (a mix of Spaces, Expose and the deck), Resume (which is the Mac equivalent of iOS’ app freezing when switching between apps, allowing a state of resuming where you left off in the desktop app,) a new and improved Mail, resize windows from any edge, and AirDrop (allowing you to drag and drop files to others in your network, much like DropBox.)

iOS5 has 200 new features, including: a new notification system, an SMS app that works with other iOS device owners, the camera app has upgrades allowing photo editing right from the app, Twitter baked into the software, a Newsstand app (basically a store for magazines and newspapers,) mobile Safari upgrades and enhancements, a Reminders functionality, camera shortcut right on the lock screen, and of course…the long awaited sync over WiFi; which means, no more cords!

iCloud was also introduced, the reason for that huge data center Apple has been building. iCloud will store your library of music in the cloud, but you won’t have to upload it. Unlike Google and Amazon’s music lockers, iCloud will scan your music in iTunes and will use its own copies for your listening pleasure. How about the CD’s you ripped? That will also be scanned and it will be upgraded to a higher quality if needed. The cost is free up to a point, but in the end will be $24 a year.

iOS5 will be available this Fall, Lion ships in July.

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Ah, the moment we’ve all been waiting for! HBO has now released their app HBO-Go – free to all HBO subscribers! Watch all 1,400 HBO programs on your iPad, iPhone or iPod Touch.

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9to5 Mac published a proported Intel leak of the new Macbook Pros…or Macbooks? What do you think? I agree with a lot of commenters that this is a Photoshop job, but it is a real ad. Without seeing the keyboard it could be any laptop really – but it’s fun to wish isn’t it? Insanely thin…maybe?

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Apple has aired its first commercial touting the new iPhone 4 on Verizon, with a cameo of AT&T…and the world didn’t implode. Featuring two iPhones, side by side, doing mostly the same things while Johann Strauss’ “The Blue Danube Waltz” plays, it concludes that, “Two is better than One.” (By the way, this was filmed by a fan on TV, Apple has not posted it to their site yet)

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Verizon revealed its new iPhone 4 commercial this past week, and it’s brilliant. I can’t help but wonder if Apple and Verizon teamed up on this one. The look, feel and sound just has an Apple finesse about it. The shot that seemed to seal the deal that this was the case is the fish clock with the rolling eyes, very nice touch and stylish. Plus, they used the iPhone typeface for “It Begins” and “2.10.11″ – you also get a shot of a desk with Apple’s slim bluetooth keyboard and Magic Mouse. What do you think?

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So at long last the Verizon iPhone is a reality… if Tuesday pans out as all have been reporting. What’s intriguing though is the amount of noise I’m reading, “Finally I can give AT&T the finger and be free as a bird, with unlimited data, at my new home on Verizon! Eat that AT&T!” Even Robert Scoble has written a blog post to AT&T, a scathing Dear John letter.

(Full disclosure, I’ve been on Cingular/AT&T for 6+ years, third year with the iPhone; I’ve had no issues. After hearing all of the horror stories, I feel blessed to live in a city that has full coverage.)

I smell trouble though. I don’t think the new marriage with Verizon’s iPhone is going to be the easy-breezy love-fest everyone assume it’s going to be. What most of these folks maybe haven’t done is experience Verizon for who they really are. Or asked several friends or strangers what their Verizon experience has been. Techies maybe have done their surveys, but regular folks, not so much.

The facts? Cell phone companies will never change, they are looking out only for themselves, and though what they offer may look enticing, in the end, they are still the beast that they are. Until we have a consumer revolution, Verizon will be no better than AT&T, T-Mobile or Sprint. They’ll all ham-fist us into things we don’t like and charge us up the wazoo for every last itemized bullet list they can dream up.

That unlimited data plan Verizon’s to be offering? Don’t bet on it lasting long. Expecting to have the great iPhone experience you’ve had all this time, or have seen others have all this time? Not going to be the pristine Apple experience we’ve come to love, I can almost guarantee you that. Have you seen the VCast or other propitiatory apps they force upon customers? That’s not going to go away no matter what platform you’re on, Android or iPhone. Verizon already has changed its upgrade time from 12 months to 20. Think they’ll stop there? Don’t count on it.

I hope that all goes well with you guys who are jumping ship, or upgrading, I really do. I really hope your experience with Verizon’s iPhone is filled with double rainbows, butterflies and unicorns. I pray it’s the utopia you think it’s going to be. I hope it’s a match made in heaven and you both live happily ever after.

If it works out for you? Awesome! I’ll just continue being happy with my iPhone 4, 5, or 6 on AT&T. Who knows? Maybe those of us over at AT&T will benefit in some way from your new marriage. Either way, I’m looking forward to seeing what the future holds for you both. Maybe you’ll both prove me wrong…

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TiPB has reported that Digg founder Kevin Rose says he has it on good authority that February 1st will be the iPad 2′s introduction date. Claiming a close source said that dual cameras and a Retina display were in the cards…later detracting that statement on the Retina display, saying that it not be Retina ore say, but :higher dpi” – which is a higher probability.

I’ve never explained here why a Retina display for the iPad would be “impossible”, but TiPB does a great job in explaining the reasons it’s not likely to happen, in this 2nd gen anyway. It’s too costly for one, and two, there would be resolution issues with iPad apps…noy something Apple would want to toy with right now.

I do wonder though about the timing…if they unveil it on the 1st, one would hope they’d ship later. I certainly would not want to be the one holding an iPad 1 that I got for Christmas, 30+ days later saying, “WTF?!” Most likely what will happen is a much later ship date, in April.

Rose has not had the sharpest Apple leak record, so I’ll take this with some salt…

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