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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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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Gizmodo purchased the iPhone prototype that someone “lost” and left behind in a bar. They did a pretty good job in looking it over, inspecting its guts and basically running through what they can with a fine-tooth comb. What are your thoughts on the design?

To me, it doesn’t look Apple-finished. It looks like a slab, rather than an elegant product tat Apple is known for. However, John Gruber has said that he checked his sources and has found that this is an actual iPhone prototype that Apple would like back because it was stolen. Why haven’t there been letters of cease-and-desist yet from Apple? That would be a dead-on sign that it is the next iPhone. Was it deliberately planted?

Remember the coffee date that Steve Jobs and Eric Schmidt? And Jobs stating, “They’re going to see it all eventually so who cares how they get it.” Hmmmm…call us crazy, but he could have been talking about the iPhone. Yet, then again, he could have been talking about porn on the iPad for all we know.

Look here to Gizmodo for all the details; including the new front-facing camera with flash (on both the front and back camera,) 960×460 display (they say they don’t know, but Gruber mentioned it a while ago, and they state you can’t see pixels on it – YUM!) and separate metal buttons for the volume, one for up and down.

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Tomorrow’s the big day, Apple unveils its iPhone 4.0 software. What will they wow us with? There’s plenty to go around in the rumor mill, but there are some thing we pretty much can count on.

John Gruber reported on Mac Break Weekly with Leo Laporte that multi-tasking will be announced. This has been the most requested missing link in the iPhone software. Me? rarely do I need it, but alas, I too admit it would be useful. Why has Apple locked that out? Actually, the iPhone does multi-task, it just doesn’t allow third party apps to do so. Andy Ihnatko wrote a great post about the misrepresentation that the media and tech elite (particularly the PC Microsoft crowd) continue to trumpet, “iPhone sucks, doesn’t have multi-tasking and therefore isn’t a real smartphone.” So, according to Gruber, that missing link will be finally recovered.

The next “most important” popular want is a unified In-Box. This one I agree with whole-heartedly. I have seven e-mail addresses (yes, 7!) and I’m sure some people have more. I have seven partially due to the fact that I publish a magazine and since it’s my baby, I have to respond to all e-mails that come in. The iPad’s e-mail is absolutely gorgeous and slick. The two pane landscape mode would be the sweetest gift Apple could give us, well second only to third party multi-tasking.

After those two, it all comes down to wishing, and you never know what will happen. I can foresee Apple porting quit a few things form the iPad. I’m consistently seeing updates of apps that are for both iPhone and iPad, all in one. I would think that Apple has learned a few things from their experience with the iPad, and it wouldn’t take a genius to think, “Hmm…could we put this on iPhone too?”

What will be really great is the next iPhone hardware. As Gruber said about the Wall Street Journal’s vaugue predictions, “Not the A4-family CPU system-on-a-chip. Not the 960 × 640 double-resolution display. Not the second front-facing camera. Not even the third-party multitasking in iPhone OS 4.” Yee-haw!

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If you have a iPhone 3G, then you know all too well that the power gets sucked up from the battery over a period of 8 hours. 3 or less if you have the 3G turned off. I haven’t done a scientific survey, so those numbers are just guesstimates.

I knew about this issue before I even got my 3G iPhone, so as I usually do, I started to research the options available for back-up battery options. I looked at many sites, and eventually picked FastMac’s iV battery pack. It has twice the full runtime of the iPhone’s existing power cell, a light on the side the camera is on, (but on the opposite edge) and it was unanimously the Editor’s choice for Best In Show at the 2008 MacWorld.

This was my first official online purchase on my iPhone, which made it that much more sweet. One problem though. I didn’t think about the fact that maybe the 3G wouldn’t fit in the pack. I thought, “Hmm. I’m sure it’ll work, why wouldn’t it?” This was after seeing that the iPod dock I had fit perfectly.

After a week of nothing other than an e-mail stating that now my iV battery pack would ship in “just 7 days!!” – I received a phone call from them to verify my address. I asked, “One question – will this work with the 3G phone?” The guy told me, “well, yes it will work, but if you’re willing to wait 4-8 weeks, we’ll send you the new 3G model at no additional charge.” SWEET!

Of course I went for it. I had already been without battery back-up for 14 or so days, 4-8 weeks will fly by. So, the reason for this post is: I highly recommend FastMac. They “Get It” when it comes to the Apple experience and especially the fan base. Those t-shirts are another testament to that – the one I like best is the black shirt with the official Apple, “Works with iPhone” label.

Now if I could just wrangle them into an affiliate program, I’d be set.

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I have been incredibly busy with my day job in the past 17 days, so please forgive as I catch up on my posting routine.

I was among a small few on July 11th, at my iPhone camp-out spot here in Portland, Oregon. Thankfully, I was 2nd in line at 2 am that. Friday morning.

When the door finally opened, I was met with a big crowd of AT&T staff. Patiently I waited as the stock guy to go retrieve my 16GB slab of fan-boi sweetness. Mind you, I’ve never owned an iPhone yet, so it was even that much sweeter. I waited painfully for a full year for this day.

Of course you know by now that the iTunes servers began to choke, and I was told to go home and sync it myself. No worries here- I FINALLY had my object of lust, desire, passion, and religious idol.
I went home, it repeatedly didn’t sync. I took a nap for an hour, and woke up to my partner beaming, saying, “Good news!! It went through!!” Giddy-Up! (as a colleague, Von Glitchka has coined the glee.)

The rest has been a love affair that

won’t ever wane. You see, I had planned this event like a set of parents who are expecting a new bundle of joy. My birthday was July 1st, I had the forethought to ask for (and received) iTunes gift cards as presents, all $75 worth. I spent most of it on games and productivity apps. the day before – so it was all ready to sync and load.

Now, I have had to put a barrier between me a the app and iTunes store, available to me in an instant. My new rule is to buy myself iTunes gift-cards twice a month. No in-store credit? I don’t get to buy. You have to. Otherwise, it could be like a bad crack habit -”I want more!!!” That my friends is a fine spot to be in – I could be one of the thousands of people, trying to hunt an iPhone down and be horribly iPhone-less right now.

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After I posted my prediction yesterday, I came across this on MacRumors

What’s strange is that nothing is being said by anyone about when this announcement is expected. This morning, every Apple blog was reporting that on AT&T there was evidence of a 2nd option available to choose a iPhone Black. What that means, is beyond anyone, one can only speculate.

The drums are beating people. Mark my words, it’s going to happen soon. I’m saying that and I don’t even have any spies or journalist insider tricks.

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It’s been known since Saturday, May 10th that the Apple online store has a sign on the iPhone, “Currently Unavailable.” Not just the US web site – Our friends in the UK can’t get one either when they want to pull it up.

My prediction: the 3G iphone is coming sooner than once thought, and that will be this week. More specifically, Tuesday May 13th. Yes, I am being bold, but there is no other explanation for the sporadic oddities snapping about. That is – if it isn’t announced on Monday the 12th.

Apple doesn’t miscalculate demand for the current iPhone. That’s ridiculous. Some say that Apple is being rarely polite and nice to the would-be purchasers of the 1st gen. iPhone. Don’t want people buying the phone now, when the new one is coming out in a day or two. Sure, that’d be a way to avoid major amounts of disappointed people, throngs of them showing up to return theirs for the new devise. Imagine the craziness if those people and the newbies swarmed in all at once. I don’t get that either – they’re going to sell the 1st generation iPhone anyway. They’d be crazy not to have it on hand for those that still want it as an option.

Tomorrow we’ll see though – Monday is gonna be fun.

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