It’s been a busy week for Apple fans. We knew Apple had a lot more to cover with this week’s announcement, and were rather certain that OS X Mavericks would be released sometime this week. There was the hint at WWDC of a new iWork and possibly iLife, but we wouldn’t have been way too surprised if the new versions hadn’t been announced. And yet they were, along with upgraded MacBook Pros — with the Mac Pro’s release date left as the final known Apple puzzle of the year.
Price was the theme this time, with Mavericks, iWork, and iLife all going free, the MacBook Pro and Retina Display MacBook Pro both had $200 shaved off their price, and the Mac Pro’s announced price of $2,999 is cheaper than you can build a similar PC right now. And yet, everyone’s not happy. OS X Mavericks is pretty great, but some of its includes apps such as iBooks weren’t quite as power user friendly as we would have hoped. That trend continued, with GarageBand X gaining nice new features but losing its pro tools, and Pages and Keynote looking sharper than before but losing AppleScript and most OpenType support, among other issues. The new Mac Pro would make anyone think Apple was more interested in pro users than ever, and yet their software choices make us question that pro users commitment.
All in all, I happen to like most of the new software, and am hopeful Apple will bring back some of the currently missing pro features. They’ve done that before with Final Cut Pro X, and they just might again. But what’s your thoughts on the new apps this week? Are you enjoying Mavericks and the new iWork, or sticking to your current apps for now? We’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments below.
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