All posts from Gadget Lab

Interactive Map of Afghanistan for iPad. Image By/Used Courtesy Of Development Seed
GPS maps for smartphones generally require a fairly high-speed wireless internet connection, consume significant processor resources, and are optimized for driving. But what if your 3G connection is unreliable or unavailable, and you still need to get from point A to point B — perhaps on foot?
Last week, I spoke with Eric Gunderson and Ian Cairns at Development Seed, one of the companies developing tools to create custom maps that work in a wider variety of situations, like this one. It’s not that farfetched: In a natural disaster and in the developing world, mobile phones may be useful navigational aids, but only if they can work without a reliable data connection and are optimized for different kinds of transportation than just zooming down the highway to the nearest Starbucks.
Development Seed caught our attention with a post that Cairns wrote for PBS’s MediaShift Idea Lab on custom maps for cyclists and drunken, late-night pedestrians. For StumbleSafely, DC Bikes, and DC Nightvision, a typical street map was overlaid with crime data, bike lanes, bar and bike shop locations, and municipal infrastructure: “Not just buildings and roads, but even crosswalks, medians, and topography lines.” In short, all of the data that actually helps you get where you’re going when you’re not in a car.
These maps were built with TileMill, an open-source program the company created to help governments, NGOs, news organizations, and others easily create custom maps. The idea is to make map image tiles and Geographic Information System (GIS) data as easy to work with as RSS feeds or CSV databases are today.
“We want to put these tools in the hands of the subject-matter experts and see what they can do,” Gunderson told Wired.com. Development Seed won a Knight News Challenge award for the project.

Knight News Challenge: Tilemapping from Knight Foundation on Vimeo.
One of the most-needed and currently most-poorly-served markets for mapping and data visualization support is in international development. As Gadget Lab reported this week, mobile devices are thriving in Afghanistan and elsewhere in the developing world, but data bandwidth and easy-to-find electricity aren’t.
“You can’t get an application like Google Earth working in Afghanistan,” Gunderson said. Maps On A Stick offers full-fledged, data-and-image-rich maps on a USB drive for no-bandwidth or poor-bandwidth use. The company and clients have plenty of experience with those scenarios, mapping uncharted road data in Africa, or helping relief workers provide housing assistance after Hurricane Katrina.
I think about those disaster scenarios often, just as I think about the people I love walking home alone in the city late at night.
When Apple launched the iPhone, it made a big deal about how its software team had written its own Maps client, using Google’s data only for the backend. It had to work for the touch interface, but it also had to make sense for how people would be likely to use Maps on a mobile device.
Now that easy mobile maps have become a natural part of our smartphone-carrying, 3G-surfing lives, it may be time for us to broaden our assumptions about the kinds of maps we’ll need and the conditions we’ll have when we need them.
See Also:

Google Maps Finally Adds Bike Routes
Microsoft Adds OpenStreetMap Layer to Bing Maps
Help Us Review Google Maps for Bikes
Preparing for the Next Haiti, with Maps, Texts and Tweets
Google Maps Adds Bike Directions
Satellite Net Service Sued for Caps, Paltry Bandwidth
Using Google Earth and GPS to Track Afghanistan Cash

The official Twitter app for iPad is finally here, and star developer Loren Brichter has polished yet another gem.
Formerly called Tweetie, Brichter’s popular iPhone app impressed the big wigs at Twitter headquarters who ultimately hired the talented coder to produce native Twitter software in house. Twitter for iPad is his first brand new creation since the acquisition, and from the looks of this app, it was clearly a wise investment.
Twitter for iPad sports a really elegant interface that’s significantly faster and more intuitive than competing Twitter clients we’ve tested (such as Twitterific and Tweetdeck). Loading and sending tweets feels almost instant, and the overall design is very pleasant. When you’re creating a new tweet, for example, the app brings up a notepad-style compose window, which is plain cute.
It also introduces some functionality we haven’t seen before: tap on a tweet with a link, and the content loads in a browser pane (pictured above); pinch a person’s tweet to get more details on the author, and swipe down with two fingers to view the threaded conversation. The paned view of content was very cool and surprisingly fast with loading photos and web pages. However, the pinch and two-finger swipe functions are awfully gimmicky: simply tapping on a person’s tweet with a single finger shows profile details and threaded conversations as well, rendering the pinch and double-swipe redundant (screenshot below).

When composing a new tweet, there’s a location-pin button to share where you’re tweeting from, as well as a paperclip icon to attach a photo. The photo-sharing feature worked in a snap, but after multiple attempts I couldn’t seem to get the location feature to work properly. I’ve put in a query to Brichter about this issue, and I’ll post an update when I receive a response.
All in all, it’s a sweet update, and it’s free. Download the Twitter app in the iPad’s App Store.
See Also:

With Tweetie Acquisition, Twitter Locks On Mobile
Hands-On: Tweetie for Mac Shakes Up Twitterverse
Tweetie 2 for iPhone Flutters Into the App Store

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After weeks of leaked photos and videos, Samsung’s 7-inch tablet called the Galaxy Tab is finally here. Samsung has announced the launch of the tablet that could become the first major Android powered challenger to the Apple iPad.
The Galaxy Tab runs Android 2.2 Froyo operating system and has a 7-inch LCD display with a 1024 x 600 resolution. At 0.8 pounds, the device weighs just about half as much as the iPad.  It also supports Adobe’s Flash Player 10.1 so it can display web pages that run Flash–something the iPad can’t.
Samsung hasn’t announced a price yet for the Galaxy Tab.
Since Apple launched the iPad in April, almost every major consumer electronics maker has said it is working on a slate of its own.
Earlier this month, Dell launched the Streak, a device with a 5-inch display that has been billed as a tablet but is priced and acts like a phone. Dell plans to introduce more tablets. BlackBerry maker Research In Motion and HP are also reportedly developing tablets. Meanwhile, Apple has sold more than 3 million iPads.
The Galaxy Tab has a smooth, slab-like design that’s similar to the iPad. It packs in a powerful Cortex A8 1.0GHz processor and supports HD video. The device has a1.3 megapixel front-facing camera for video telephony over 3G and a 3 megapixel rear-facing camera to capture images and video. It will offer 16 GB or 32 GB internal storage and will have microSD expansion for up to 32 GB of additional storage.
The Galaxy Tab will support 3G, Wi-Fi and Bluetooth, along with push e-mail.
Android OS fills out a smart hardware package
Hold the Galaxy Tab and the first thing that strikes you is how compact the device is. The Galaxy Tab has a smaller screen than the iPad and that translates into a lighter device.
The tablet’s smaller size also makes it easier to hold it in just one hand as you would with an e-reader like the Kindle or the Nook. The 7-inch display means the device is small enough to slip into the pocket of a suit or a purse.
The Galaxy Tab runs Android, an operating system that so far has done best on smartphones.
But Samsung seems to have done a good job of making the Android OS work on the tablet form factor. Samsung has an attractive calendar app for the Galaxy Tab and the email app on the tablet is comparable to that on the iPad.
The Galaxy Tab also includes an e-reading application powered by Kobo–the e-reader sold at Borders. The tablet has a ‘Media Hub’ for video clips and movies, which Samsung hopes to offer as rentals or downloads that users can buy.
Almost all independent apps in the Android Market will work for the Galaxy Tab, says Samsung. So users can buy the tablet and immediately have apps they can download and play with. But we will have to test this to see if it will work for all apps in the Market.
Samsung plans to launch the device in Europe in mid September, and in the U.S. and Asia shortly thereafter.
See Also:

Samsung to Launch 7-inch Tablet in September
Video: Samsung Tablet Looks Like a Strong iPad Rival
Samsung Enters Tablet Race With the Galaxy Tape
First Look: ELocity’s Android Tablet Makes Great Media Player …
Attack of the Pads: Tablets Take On Apple

Photos: Samsung

Arc Touch Mouse Promotional Photo from Microsoft.com
Microsoft has made two new controllers — one for your computer, one for your XBox 360 — that can switch into different shapes depending on your needs or preferences. The well-leaked, much-anticipated Arc Touch Mouse is shipping now; the new wireless XBox Play and Charge kit will be out stateside in November.
Exactly a month ago, Microsoft Hardware teased their new mouse on Twitter with a partial image and a riddle/tagline: “Don’t be so touchy… flat is where it’s at.” Most people guessed it was a new mouse or trackpad, but as John Paczkowski noted, “the composite image also looks like the back of a smartphone or media player…or a remote control…or an electric razor…or a pancake griddle.” What was this new mystery device?
Well, it’s a highly mobile, lightweight, touch-sensitive mouse that arcs to fit in the palm of your hand while you’re using it and packs flat so you can stuff it in a pocket on the go. It’s targeted for laptop users who don’t like their always-flat trackpads.
In a press release titled “Think the Mouse is Dead?“, Microsoft Hardware’s Brett Ostrum wrote that even as trackpads and other input devices have evolved, the market for mice has only grown: “The reasons people need external mice will not change: comfort and precision.”
There are some nice concessions to the trackpad model here, though: the Arc Touch has a touch strip instead of a scroll wheel. Instead of a perfectly smooth drag, the strip vibrates to simulate to simulate a wheel’s click-click bumps. I hope you can toggle this feature on and off — I imagine some people enjoy, or at least have gotten accustomed to, the finger-on-glass feel of a trackpad or touchscreen.
(Here’s a promotional video of the Arc Touch in action. If only Microsoft could invent a Silverlight video that could flat-pack into HTML 5 for easy embedding!)

The XBox 360 has a new wireless controller, too, but its flat-packing profile tweak is more subtle. Its directional pad can pop up into a “plus” for raised directional controls, or snap flush into a “disc” for easy Street Fighter II-style thumb-drag joystick moves. (Sorry for the outdated game reference. I’m old.)

There are plenty of other nice things in this model, including wireless (of course) and a new silver-gray look. But I think the versatility of the d-pad is the real item of interest here. As we start using remotes for game consoles to do more and more things, whether as media players or web browsers, we’re going to want controllers that can morph to match.
See Also:

Hands On: Xbox Kinect Games Give You a Serious Workout
Why Xbox Might Be Microsoft's Future — and Computing's, Too …
Apple Redefines Remote Control — Now, It's Your Cellphone
Poof! After Wireless, the Computer Mouse Turns Invisible
Toe-Mouse for Foot-Controlled Computing
Wired 13.06: The Xbox Reloaded

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Over in Japan, the NES was called the Nintendo Famicom, or Family Computer. Like the SNES, or Super Famicom that followed it, the original Famicom -- launched in 1983 -- looked a lot different than the one that was sold in the rest of the world.

In this exclusive gallery, shot in exquisite detail by the folks at iFixit, we take a look inside the spiritual home of Mario, part of a series showing off iFixit's new set of console repair guides.

Originally, the Famicom was white. This aging specimen, picked up by iFixit boss Kyle Wiens, is a rather more dis-colored beige. The hideous burgundy details are pretty close to the original, though.


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Nintendo Family Computer (Famicom) Teardown [iFixit. Thanks, Kyle!]
Captions by Charlie Sorrel and Kyle Wiens

Just when you thought the only differences between the iPhone 4 and the iPod Touch were the size and the phone, a closer look reveals that the Touch actually has a different camera.
Apple’s specifications page for the Touch lists a resolution of 960-by-720 pixels for the rear camera, which is roughly one megapixel. That’s several steps below the 5-megapixel camera seen in the iPhone 4.
Then again, the iPod Touch is about half a millimeter thinner than the iPhone 4 (which is significant when it comes to pocketability). Anything bigger than a one-megapixel sensor probably would have been a squeeze, especially when you consider that the Touch includes a front-facing camera, too.
When Apple refreshed its iPod family last year, many expected the iPod Touch to gain a camera and were left disappointed when it didn’t. However, a teardown by iFixIt revealed that was just barely enough room for a camera. iFixIt CEO Kyle Wiens speculated that the feature was omitted due to engineering challenges.
Long story short, the iPod Touch’s camera probably isn’t great, but we’re glad it’s finally here.
See our earlier posts for more details on the new iPods announced today.
Via DaringFireball
See Also:

Live Blog: Apple’s iPod, Music Event
Sporty New iPods Tout Tiny Touchscreens, Retina Display

Photo: Jon Snyder/Wired.com

Promotional Image from Apple.com.
There’s a lot to say about the new Apple TV that Steve Jobs presented today. But I’m not going to talk about the tiny little box. I’m not going to talk about your TV either, much. Instead, I’m going to talk about that remote. Mostly, I’m going to talk more about the things that aren’t on it than the things that are.
The first iteration of Apple TV had the same little white infrared remote they used to ship with laptops. It was great for clicking through a slideshow presentation. It wasn’t very good to keep around your living room, unless you stuck it in a bowl with your keys. It wasn’t a real remote, and most people hated keeping track of another remote anyways, especially one that got lost at the drop of a hat.
The new remote shipping with the Apple TV isn’t a lot different from that old white remote. It’s a nicer device. Like everything else Apple makes now, it’s longer, and it’s aluminum. It’s still got just six buttons: up, down, right, left, play/pause, and menu.
But that minimalism seems almost smarter now. Apple now seems to be figuring out the exact number of hardware buttons it needs on each device. They took away too much on the iPod Shuffle, so now some are coming back. They wanted to get rid of the buttons on the Nano, so they switched it to touchscreen. For the Apple TV, they’re keeping the action on the screen, with the software interface. Make that easy to navigate, give people the exact options they need depending on context, and you don’t need dozens of buttons on the remote/media player/phone.
Maybe you don’t even need a remote.
Seriously — what are the chances of someone buying Apple TV who doesn’t have an iPod, iPad, or iPhone? The intersection of those two sets has got to be virtually empty.
The App Store’s offered Remote for iOS devices for a while now, but the new Apple TV might be the best device and use-case to show what an app-based touchscreen remote can do. Instead of digging through the couch for your DVD remote, you can pull out your phone from your pocket and press play. Instead of scrolling endlessly through a Netflix queue, you can search for a movie title using your iPad. Apple TV has Netflix search built-in, a big, keyboard-dependent upgrade for some of us who stream it through their game consoles. TiVo’s got a hardware QWERTY keyboard now; Apple’s right there with a software counterpart.
Then there’s AirPlay. This is the “ooh, aah” feature of the new Apple TV for folks who already love their multitouch iThings.
How it works:

Start watching a movie or TV show on your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch.
Tap the AirPlay icon and choose Apple TV.
Whatever you’re watching will instantly begin streaming to your widescreen TV.

So you can essentially perform all of the navigation on the touchscreen of your remote. You don’t even have to be in the same room as your television set: get the movie ready, walk up or down the stairs, then throw it on the screen of your choice. In theory, you could even carry the tiny Apple TV + HDMI + power cable around the house with you, too — not any worse (and maybe a little better) than carrying a laptop and plug.
Some of these mobile remote features may not be ready until iOS 4.2 ships in November. On their web site, Apple’s advertising the Remote app for iOS right now and AirPlay as “coming soon,” but Wired.com wasn’t able to use either in their hands-on.
And even these features only hint at what’s possible when your remote is essentially a portable touchscreen computer. What if you could shake your iPod to shuffle songs playing on your Apple TV? What if you could get a commentary track to play out of your iPhone’s speaker while the main soundtrack played through your TV’s sound system — like the director was sitting next to you on the couch? What if your iPad could take screenshots of a movie playing on your TV, which you could mark up and share with your friends on Twitter or Ping?
In his essay “Gin, Television, and Social Surplus” (which was originally titled “Looking for the Mouse”), the NYU professor and Here Comes Everybody/Cognitive Surplus author Clay Shirky tells an anecdote I really like. His friend’s four year-old daughter was watching a DVD when she hopped up and began poking around behind the screen. “I’m looking for the mouse,” she said. Shirky’s lesson: even four-year-olds know that a screen without a mouse — a screen that only displays content to you while you sit passively waiting for it — ships broken.
In 2008, that was profound. Now it almost seems silly. A TV screen, with a mouse? Attached with a cord? Your screen shouldn’t have a mouse. Your mouse — or remote — should have a screen. Four-year-olds were so dumb back then.
See Also:

Live Blog: Apple’s iPod, Music Event
Apple Takes Aim at Cable With Tiny New Apple TV
Hands-On With New $100 Apple TV
Hands-On With New Apple iPods
Why iOS Could Make Apple TV Succeed
Logitech Google TV Box Embarrasses Apple TV
Boxee Beta, Now On Apple TV

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Apple on Wednesday refreshed its family of iPod products. The iPod Nano, iPod Touch and iPod Shuffle all received some compelling makeovers that should help Apple stay in the lead in the portable media player market.
The iPod Nano was the most interesting upgrade. It does away with the click wheel seen in previous model and is now more like a belt buckle with a multi touchscreen displaying four mini icons on the main screen — basically, a quarter of the size of an iPhone or iPod Touch.
The Nano is now 1.6 inches wide, 1.4 inches tall and just 0.3 inches thick including the belt clip.
One screen on the Nano shows ‘Artists’, ‘Playlists’, ‘Genius Mixes’ and ‘Now playing.’ Swipe your finger and you get a few more apps: radio, photo, podcasts and settings. There’s no home button, so you have to hold your finger down on the screen to exit an app, which is simple enough. You can also rearrange the icons by holding your finger on an app until it jiggles, then move it to wherever you’d like–just like on the iPhone.
The question remains as to whether or not the iPod Nano is running iOS and if we’ll be able to jailbreak it to run different apps. Apple hasn’t disclosed whether the operating system was iOS but it sure looks like it.
Also noteworthy is that the Nano does not include a camera, even though last year’s model just introduced one. I guess nobody cared about snapping photos with the tiny device, which isn’t surprising.
What’s nifty on the Nano is the small integrated clip to snap the device on to your pocket or belt buckle. The entire body including the clip is made of aluminum so it feels nice and sturdy.
Moving on to the iPod Touch, this was a predictable but monster update. It’s about a millimeter thinner than the iPhone 4, even though it’s got most of the same guts. There are the front and rear cameras–the rear for shooting high-definition videos and photos, the front for ‘FaceTime’ video conferencing.
The Nano now has an Apple A4 processor and the high-resolution “retina display.” Grip it in your hand and it feels really smooth and light.
I had a chance to test FaceTime and it felt even faster than FaceTime on the iPhone 4, though this time around Apple might have just had a better Wi-Fi connection.
Overall, the new iPod Touch is the same as the iPhone 4 but now we can’t really say “It’s an iPhone without a phone,” because the Touch includes a videoconferencing webphone! That’s a major difference and should have an impact on videoconferencing in general.
Last, and least important, was an upgrade for the iPod Shuffle. To put it simply, it’s another belt-clip iPod similar to the Nano, only with the traditional click wheel. On the top is an integrated button for ‘VoiceOver,’ which enables you to dictate the playlist or artist you want to listen to. Example, if you say “Play songs by The Shins,” the Shuffle will obey your commands.
The Shuffle is puny– 1.2 inches wide, 1.1 inches tall and 0.3 inches thick. And it is so lightweight I could barely even feel it in my pocket, which should be ideal for athletes.
Photos: Jon Snyder/Wired.com
See Also:

Hands-on With the New $100 Apple TV
Apple Takes Aim at Cable With Tiny New Apple TV
Live Blog: Apple’s iPod, Music Event
Apple to Live Stream Press Conference — to Apple Customers Only

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SAN FRANCISCO — When Steve Jobs was preparing to introduce the Apple TV, he called it “one more hobby,” and based on our first impressions, that’s a safe choice of words.
The new Apple TV is a major hardware revamp — one quarter the size of its predecessor. It’s a small black box with curved edges, somewhat resembling a hockey puck. The highlights: It costs $100, and it integrates nearly instant TV and movie rentals, along with Netflix streaming.
The major limitation: For TV rentals, only two studios are on board to stream shows through the Apple TV –ABC and Fox. This isn’t an adequate replacement yet for cable subscriptions.
So calling it “hobby” was right — Apple’s starting out small, and maybe it’ll roll into something bigger if more studios warm up to the idea.
I got some hands-on time with the new Apple TV and it is a promising start.
TV and movie rentals are really snappy and fast. After choosing to rent a movie or show, the Apple TV takes a few seconds to prepare a buffer and begins streaming right away.
Also particularly cool was internet integration. I enjoyed searching through Flickr streams. Select a photo and hit the Play button and it immediately plays a slideshow with music and fancy transitions. I’m too lazy to check my friends’ Flickr streams the normal way on Flickr.com, aren’t you? Plus, the photos look great on a big screen through the Apple TV’s HDMI connection.
The Apple TV’s remote is familiar: It’s got the same aluminum and black design as the current MacBook Pros. It’s also very similar to the current Apple remote that controls Macs–only it’s a little longer and the buttons have small bumps for subtle tactile feedback. It feels great in the hand and navigating through the Apple TV menu was really smooth.
As good as the idea sounds, you won’t be able to use your iPhone or iPad a remote for the Apple TV (not yet, at least). Instead, there’s a feature called ‘AirPlay’, so if you’re using your iPad or iPhone to listen to music, look at photos or watch a video, you can tap an AirPlay button, select your Apple TV and boom — your content is streaming onto your Apple TV. We weren’t able to test that since this feature won’t be available until iOS 4.2 ships in November, but we’ll keep you posted.
You can also stream media from your Mac’s iTunes library by choosing the ‘Computer’ option and selecting a movie or playlist. I tested that out too, and it worked fine, but do note that iTunes only supports a few formats for video (.H264, for instance). So if you prefer getting media through some alternative non-iTunes-compatible, means you’re still going to be doing a lot of file conversion before you can watch your videos on the Apple TV.
All in all, it’s a cool device, and for $100 it’s going to pose a serious threat to the Roku Netflix player. But as a TV replacement, it’s still not there yet. Maybe later.
See Also:

Apple Takes Aim at Cable With Tiny New Apple TV
Live Blog: Apple’s iPod, Music Event
Apple to Live Stream Press Conference — to Apple Customers Only

Photos: Jon Snyder/Wired.com

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SAN FRANCISCO — In a sign that its television “hobby” has turned into serious business, Apple announced an aggressively-priced new set-top box that takes aim at the heart of the cable TV and DVD rental industries.
The new Apple TV, which will go on sale at the end of September for $100, is a puny box just 1/4 the size of the previous model. It has an HDMI port, a power supply built in it, an optical audio port, an Ethernet jack, and built-in Wi-Fi.
“It’s silent, cool and tiny,” said Apple CEO Steve Jobs, showing off the dimunitive metallic box.
Despite rumors, the product was not rebranded as “iTV.” Jobs did not state whether it was running a version of iOS, although the Apple TV’s new interface includes some very iOS-like touches, such as icons that jiggle when you are rearranging them on the home screen.
Apple joins an increasingly crowded and risky scrum of companies trying to reinvent television for the internet age. Netflix and Hulu both have been offering streaming video playback of movies and TV shows, with some success, for over a year. Google is working on a set top box that would blur the line between TV and internet fare, YouTube is said to be planning mainstream film rentals and Amazon is rumored to be planning its own Netflix-like video streaming service. But the real threat are the cable companies and TV networks, which have a lock on the shows that people want to watch — and so far, there’s been little incentive for them to open up their tightly-controlled ecosystems to internet upstarts.
Apple’s play is for convenience, but it’s not the cross-platform strategy needed for dominance, writes Andrew Eisner, a director at online electronics retailer Retrevo.com.
“A TV OS vacuum exists at the moment and unfortunately for consumers, TV manufacturers appear to be filling it with their own proprietary offerings,” Eisner wrote recently. “Apple needs to gain control of the third screen or TV screen, after smartphone screens and computer screens, and the TV industry needs to move away from closed environments and let their connected TVs work with all the apps and streaming content that consumers are finding so appealing.”
In an implicit acknowledgement of Apple TV’s poor sales to date, Jobs again referred to the product as the company’s “hobby.” He showed the new Apple TV at a press conference here on Wednesday.
But Jobs was careful to cast the company’s previous product as a learning experience, and indicated his intention of throwing more of the company’s weight behind the upgraded Apple TV.
Apple TV customers will be able to rent first-run HD movies for $5, at the same time as they’re released on DVD. That’s a substantial improvement from the past, when there were significant time lags before movies were available through iTunes.
Customers will also be able to rent HD TV shows from ABC and Fox for $1, a discount from the previous price of $3. The shows will run without commercial interruption.
Netflix customers will also be able to stream video from Netflix via Apple TV, and can also use the device to browse and view YouTube videos and content uploaded to Apple’s MobileMe service.
Customers can also stream content from ther computers, including photos, videos and music, with no syncing required.
The company will also be providing an iPad app that customers can use to control what appears on the screen via Apple TV, essentially turning the tablet into an oversized remote control.
Apple is already accepting preorders for the new Apple TV on its site.
For full coverage of Apple’s press conference, see Wired.com’s live blog of the event.

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Apple Wednesday showed off a sporty new model in its popular line of tiny MP3 players, the iPod Nano, a “retina display”-enhanced version of its iPod Touch, and a new version of its iPod Shuffle.
The new iPod Touch is basically the same as the iPhone 4 but thinner, and without the phone: it gains the latter’s high-resolution display, front- and back-facing cameras for videoconferencing, A4 chip, three-axis gyroscope, and iOS 4.1 with Game Center.
The display, which Apple calls a retina display, is the same 326 ppi, 24-bit color LED screen found in the iPhone 4.
The new Nano, which is a small square apparently about 1.5 inches on a side, does away with the click wheel on previous models, replacing it with a tiny, square touchscreen that nearly covers the face of the device.
The Nano has hardware buttons for controlling the volume. It will support the voiceover feature that first appeared in the iPod Shuffle, and will also have an FM radio and support for the popular Nike+ pedometer/fitness add-on. Apple claims its battery will last for 24 hours of audio playback.
The iPod Nano will come in two versions: one with 8GB of storage for $150 and one with 6GB for $180.
Apple also announced a small, square, screenless version of the iPod Shuffle. It’s actually larger than the previous model Shuffle, but CEO Steve Jobs said that customers missed the control buttons, so the clickwheel interface returns to the larger Shuffle with this model.
The iPod Shuffle will have 2GB of storage and will cost $50.
For full coverage of Apple’s press conference, see Wired.com’s live blog of the event.

Apple Wednesday announced the next two versions of iOS, its operating system for iPhone, iPod Touch, and the iPad, adding support for multiplayer gaming, HDR photography, and wireless printing.
The first revision to the operating system, iOS 4.1, will be available next week as a free download for the iPhone and iPod Touch, but not the iPad. IOS 4.1 includes bug fixes, support for making high dynamic resolution (HDR) photos, TV show rentals, and an entertainment feature for multiplayer gaming called Game Center.
Jobs says that the bug fixes are focused on the issues most frequently raised by customer support calls.
“We think we’ve nailed a lot of them and we think you’re going to be pretty happy with them,” Apple CEO Steve Jobs said.
The next version, iOS 4.2, will available in November for iPhone, iPod Touch, and iPad users. Its feature enhancements will be focused on iPad users, with a focus on wireless printing from the iPad. It will also include features already available to iOS 4 users on the other two platforms, but which have not yet been made available to the iPad: multitasking, multi-threaded e-mail and folders.
HDR photograph on iOS 4.1 will combine multiple photos into a single high-dynamic-range image. Photo by Jon Snyder/Wired.com
HDR photography refers to a technique used by photographers in which multiple shots at different exposure levels are combined in order to create a single image with a higher level of detail, from extremely light areas to extremely dark areas, than is ordinarily possible with a single shot.
On iOS 4.1, the feature will let customers take three shots in quick succession, then combine them for a single HDR photo on the device.
Apple CEO Steve Jobs shows off Game Center, a feature of iOS 4.1. Photo: Jon Snyder/Wired.com
Game Center provides support for multiplayer games, and will let you challenge friends to competition in supported games. If you don’t have any friends it will auto match you with people online who have the appropriate skill level.
Two developers from Epic Games joined Jobs on stage to provide a demo of an impressive-looking multiplayer 3-D medieval combat game.
For full coverage of Apple’s press conference, see Wired.com’s live blog of the event.