Among the latest IOS 4.1 we have the aforementioned Game Center, iTunes Ping, the ability to upload HD videos to YouTube and MobileMe (using the Wi-Fi) and the HDR photos. Also corrected the problems in the proximity sensor, Bluetooth and bugs related to the iPhone 3G.

It is possible to upgrade the IOS through iTunes and remember always make a backup of your data before installing the operating system.

Apple on Wednesday unveiled a new iPod Touch that allows you to have phone conversations on video, and significantly lowered the price of its boxes Apple TV, for transferring content from one computer to an HDTV screen.

What’s new in the Apple iPod lineup:-

The new version of the iPod has cameras to have video conversations with users having an iPhone or iPod Touch, and using Wi-Fi and an Apple program called “FaceTime. It is part of “the new range of iPod strongest we have ever had”welcomed the Apple boss Steve Jobs. “This is the biggest change ever seen in the iPod lineup”. The new iPod Touch will cost $ 229 for the eight-gigabyte model, $ 299 for the 32GB model and $ 399 for the 64GB.

The Apple boss has also introduced a new iPod Shuffle that will sell $ 49, and a touch screen version of theiPod Nano sold from $ 149. The new models will be available next week.

The new iPod touch has a rear and front camera and a retina display. The retina display makes everything look unbelievable. Retina display has 960 x 640 pixels. The users can use FaceTime and enjoy video chat with iPhone or iPod touch users. HD video recording in 720p and a 3 axis gyro.is also incorporated in the new device. Users can easily capture HD video wherever they are and share it via email, MobileMe and YouTube.

Up to 40 hours of music playback and seven hours of video playback on a single battery charge is featured in this new iPod touch.

The new iPod touch comes in 8GB, 32GB and 64GB models and can be pre-ordered today from Apple.com and will be available from next week.

Apple’s CEO, Steve Jobs stated, We’ve put our most advanced technology inside the new iPod touch. Whether you’re listening to music, playing games, making FaceTime video calls, browsing the web, capturing HD video or watching TV shows and movies, the new iPod touch with its Retina display, A4 chip and 3-axis gyro is more fun than ever.”

Philip Schiller, vice president of Apple Worldwide Product Marketing said, “We were pleasantly surprised by the decision taken by the leadership of Autodesk, and are confident that the return of AutoCAD on Mac-Systems will be happy to millions of professional designers and engineers.”

The company started work on a Mac-version of the product about 18 months ago. In the beta test, AutoCAD for Mac OS X was attended by over 5000 users. The new product fully holds the functionality of Windows-based version, as well as to evaluate the numerous advantages of the operating system Mac OS X, such as 3D graphical interface and Cover Flow support technology «multitouch».

In the New York Times, Amar Hanspal, vice president and publisher, responsible solutions, said it was no longer possible to ignore the resurgence of the Mac. According to Gartner, 10% of computers sold during the first quarter of 2010 were Macs.

Mac-version of AutoCAD will be available in the U.S. and Europe this fall, and AutoCAD WS will soon appear in the online store iTunes App Store.

iTV launch is further supported by the news that Apple have entered “advanced talks” with News Corp over the possibility of offering their network TV shows as rental downloads.

Around this time of the year, Apple has hosted an event for years since the line commenced in 2007, with the Cupertino electronics firm apparently working on one with a 5MP camera, video calling abilities and an A4 chip.

Apple has for years hosted an event around this time to launch its new iPods, so this should come as no surprise, but since Apple hasn’t announced the date itself yet, you can take it as first confirmation of when we’ll see a new iPod touch: two separate sources are cited.

For more details watch the video on Engadget site.

The pictures show that over the display media player the ipod touch image has a hole indicating front camera. That can be used to communicate via video, as is already happening with the iPhone 4.

Apparently, the new version of the iPod touch will support functions FaceTime, as well as the latest generation of Apple device. For FaceTime need to connect to a wireless network Wi-Fi, such as a media player available. Supposedly, the new iPod touch, and other iPod, will be presented at a special event in September. The company Apple has not reported anything regarding this .

Source: MacRumors

A Federal Appeals court in San Francisco upheld a 2008 decision of a lower court and ruled in the favour of Apple – the maker of the iPod digital music player, alleging that iPod and it ear buds could cause hearing problems. The lawsuit, filed by an iPod customer in Louisiana and another customer in California way back in 2006, was shown the door because it failed to show that the devices weren’t fit to be sold for the ordinary use of listening to music, the appeals court adjudged. In their initial plea, the plaintiff argued that iPod sound levels can reach 115 decibels, enough to cause permanent hearing loss to someone who listens at full volume for a short time.

The interesting thing to note is – Joseph Birdsong and Bruce Waggoner, the complainant in this case, never actually themselves suffered any hearing problem; they just said that someone potentially could. And because of the risk, Apple should provide better headphones, better disclosures, and not to forget, monetary damages. The plaintiffs said the manufacturer’s warning, which cautions consumers about permanent hearing loss at “high volume,” is inadequate.

The plaintiffs’ claims “suggest only that users have the option of using an iPod in a risky manner, not that the product lacks any minimum level of quality,” said Judge David Thompson in the 3-0 ruling.

Jeff Friedman, lawyer for the plaintiffs, said the court failed to address what he described as the main problem with the iPod: that neither the device nor the written warning informs customers about safe volume levels. Friedman cites regulations in the European Union, which has decibel restrictions in place for music players for several years now. “Hopefully someone in government in the United States will follow suit,” Friedman concluded.

So, at least for now, when it comes to iPods and hearing, the onus is off of Apple’s shoulders. But there is more to Apple than just hearing problems. The ongoing patent tussle between Apple and Nokia, in which Nokia recently moved to US ITC accusing Apple of violating its patents with its products, is far from over.

Nokia has fired the latest salvo in the ongoing patent infringement tussle by filing a complaint with US International Trade Commission accusing Apple the California-based maker of popular computers and music players of violating multiple Nokia patents with its products. The imported electronic devices named in the complaint include the iPhone, iPhone 3G, iPhone 3G mobile phones, iPod Nano, iPod Touch, iPod Classic portable music players, iMac, Mac Mini, Mac Pro, MacBook MacBook Pro, and MacBook Air computers.

Nokia alleges that “Apple infringes Nokia patents in virtually all of its mobile phones, portable music players and computers.”

Paul Melin , in charge of patent licensing at Nokia said “While our litigation in Delaware is about Apple’s attempt to free-ride on the back of Nokia investment in wireless standards, the ITC case filed today is about Apple’s practice of building its business on Nokia’s proprietary innovation,”.

Both Nokia and Apple have engaged in verbal duet for the better part of the year. It began with Nokia demanding in May and then again in September that Apple pays a royalty to license its patents. The squabble reached court rooms when Nokia first sued Apple for patent infringement in October this year claiming infringement of 10 patents and seeking back royalties on the 33.7 million iPhones sold since the device’s introduction in 2007. Apple countersued in December, claiming Nokia infringed 13 of its patents

In the smart phone category, Apple has given the Finnish cell phone maker – Nokia a run for its money. Nokia- the world’s biggest cell phone maker and still the leader in smart phone with roughly 35 per cent market share, has struggled to keep pace in the fast-growing smart phone market since launch of the Apple’s iPhone. As of November, Nokia’s smart phone market share as determined by AdMob’s metrics had gone down from a high of 62 per cent in September 2008 to a mere 18 per cent. Apple’s worldwide share is now 54 per cent, crossing the 50 per cent threshold for the first time. Tied to the Symbian OS, Nokia’s share is slipping sharply and will probably lose to the newly launched Google’s Android by the time holiday season ends.  AdMob’s metrics, to be clear, don’t say what fraction of people own what. Rather, they measure the number of AdMob ads requested by different models of phone through AdMob clients.

Lets see who will reach the finish line first.

Brisk sales of Apple iPhone this holiday season prompted analysts to upgrade Apple’s share target price. Apple iPod touch 8 GB along with the Kindle Wireless Reading Device and Garmin nuvi 260W 4.3-inch GPS were the best selling electronics devices, according to Amazon during the holiday rush from November 15 to December 16.

Doug Reid of Thomas Weisel raised his estimates for the quarter and lifted his price target on Apple from $245 to $250. Shares of Apple rose 1.2 per cent to close at $211.61 on Monday. “ Reid wrote in a report that “Checks suggest December quarter sales of iPhones are tracking ahead of their prior estimates, driven by increased market penetration in the United States, additional carrier agreements in multiple countries, and first-time launches in Korea and China,”.

Brian Marshall, an analyst of Broadpoint AmTech also raised his price target on Apple’s stock to $260, which is approximately 11% higher than previous target, based on high sales estimates for the company’s iPhone in the December quarter. He said that “Despite the enormous success of the iPhone since inception in July ‘07, he strongly believe the device is still in its infancy with respect to penetrating the global post-paid subscriber market,”.

With every passing day, Apple’s iPhone sales, App store downloads and footfalls on Apple store are on a rise and so is the stock price. One such report by Flurry pointed out that Christmas Day downloads for the 3GS shot up 900 per cent when compared to an average of the three previous Fridays. The report also points out that Software downloads for Apple’s devices grew 51 per cent in December from the previous month. Analyst Brian Marshall puts a figure of 11.3 million units sold for the three-month period ending December way ahead of analyst expectations.

Speculation is rife that Apple could release an oversized iPod Touch as a tablet computer or the tablet may take the form of a scaled-down notebook computer, though there was no official word on that.

Apple shares hit an all-time high on December 24, as they rose to $209.35 up 3.5 per cent. Most of the increase way due to rumors that the company will finally launch its tablet PC at a product and software developer show late next month. But that not it, the latest in the ‘rumor offing’ is the news that Slate Computing, owner of the “iSlate” trademark may be a shell company set up by Apple to quietly obtain US trademark protection for the name.

According to TechCrunch, Slate Computing had also filed trademark for the term in the European Union through the same law firm that Apple has worked with in the past to trademark other product names such as the iPhone. Apple used a corporation based in Trinidad &Tobago, where Apple has registered European Union trademarks in the past, to register for the trademark.

So what kind of device it could be. There are two schools of thought on this: either the Apple tablet, or whatever it is called, will be a 10-or-so-inch tablet PC with a full Mac OS X operating system; or it will merely be a larger-screen version of the current iPod Touch, which has a closed, limited phone-like OS.

Initially, at least, the scant evidence hinted at the Apple tablet being akin to a touch-screen, keyboard-less version of the company’s current laptops. After all, convertible tablet laptops are, if not common, than at least easy to find. While mostly intended for medical, education, or other specialized markets, there are a handful of consumer-oriented ones, such as HP’s TouchSmart series.

The last several rounds of Apple tablet rumors, however, point more decisively towards an iPhone or iPod Touch style device. The Financial Times reports that Apple is planning a press event on January 26 in San Francisco, while the Silicon Alley Insider claims several app developers have been asked to prepare large-screen versions of their current iPhone apps.

There is a chance that the existence of a tablet PC is no more than a rumor. So, buy the rumor, sell the news. Apple’s share could be hit in the first quarter of 2010.