AS IT happened: Apple launch

WHILE you were sleeping Apple CEO Tim Cook took to the stage in the US to shake up the tech industry once again. Here's how it all went down.

The MacBook Air starts at just $999.

What we know so far:

- New iPad Mini: Same specs as iPad Air. Prices start at A$479.

- New iPad Air: Prices start at A$598.

- Apple iWork : Available free with the purchase of iOS or MacBook / Mac Pro. Available for purchase today.

- New iPhoto, iMovie and GarageBand: Come free with any new purchase of Mac computers. Available today.

- New MacPro: Prices start at US$2999. It is available in 6, 8 or 12 core, dual work station graphics and 60GB of memory.

- MacBook Pro: Prices start at US $1299 for 13 inch display, dual core, is5 and 128G of storage running new Mavericks OSX. Ships today.

- MacBook Air: Pricesstart at US $999. Wonder what the mark-up will look like for Australians? Stay tuned.

- OSX Mavericks: Launches today, absolutely free.

Apple's iPad event in a nutshell: Everything you need to know

5.25am: And that's all folks. Stay tuned for a summary of everything you need to know.

5.23am: Cook is back on stage.

"These products are amazing examples of the type of innovation that only Apple can deliver," he says. "Other companies would be incredibly proud to just have one of these products but we couldn't be more pleased to present all of them to you in time for the holidays. I'd like to thank all of the people that worked so hard who brought these products to life. Thank you for joining us".

5:21am: We're getting an iPad Mini and prices start at just $479! It contains the same resolution and features as the iPad Air, impressive.

Apple's taking it to its competitors in a big bad way.

Prices:

iPad Mini

Available: 1st November

Wi-fi only: $479 for 16GB, $598 for 32GB, $699 for 64GB and $799 for 128GB model.

Wi-fi + 3G/4G: $629 for 16GB, $479 for 32GB, $849 for 64GB, $949 for 128GB.

Apple will continue to sell the original iPad Mini for $349 for the 16GB wi-fi model and $499 for the 16GB wi-fi + 3G / 4G model.

5:14am: Apple will also continue to sell the iPad 2 for A$449 for the 16GB wi-fi model and A$598 for the 16GB Wi-Fi + 3G model.

5.09am: The iPad weighs just 0.45kg. It's the lightest full sized tablet in the world, Schiller says. Twice as fast rendering. MIMO technology will provide faster wi-fi. UP to 300MpbsPBS, it has expanded LTE support, including Australia. Yay!

5.07am: iPad is getting a new name, it's called the iPad Air. It is 43 per cent thinner than the previous version. It sports a 1080HD camera, a new facetime HD camera with larger pixels. It provides 10 hours of battery life and comes in silver and white and space grey and black.

Prices (Australian):

iPad Air with wi-fi: $598 for 16GB, $699 for 32GB, $799 for 64GB and $899 for 128GB model. It starts shipping on November 1.

iPad Air with wi-fi + 3G/ 4G: $749 for 16GB, $849 for 32GB, 949 for 64GB and $1,049 for 128GB.

5:02am: Phil Schiller comes back on stage to talk iPad. "The iPad is thinner, lighter, more powerful than every before." 7.5mm thin, it's 20 per cent thinner than previous device.

5.01am: Cook teases Windows Enthusiast Paul Thurrott who said of the iPad "anyone who thinks the iPad is a game changer is a tool". Contrary to Thurrot, Cook says Apple has sold 170 million iPads so far. Ouch.

"iPad has rated #1 in customer satisfaction and has done since its inception. Because it combines incredible experience of hardware and amazing software and intuitive services into an experience no one else can match."

5.00am: Tom Cook is back. Finally on to the iPad! Bring it!

The iPad Air starts at just $499.

4.55am: iWork is free with the purchase of any iOS or computer. They're also available to purchase today.

4.53am: Roger Rosner takes the stage to talk Pages. Starts creating magazine covers of himself.

Sharing menu allows you to share via iCloud. You can email a link to the document within Pages. The recipient will open in iWork iCloud beta, can open it up on any computer (regardless of whether it's a Mac) even if it's not running the software.

Apple is adding a collaboration feature to iWork with iCloud, even if one of the collaborators is using a PC.

4.50am: iWork has full file compatibility, no more converting documents across operating systems (like if you emailed yourself a file from your Microsoft work computer which you want to read at home on your Mac). Apple's getting practical. Way to create goodwill.

4.49am: Phil Schiller is back on stage. iPhoto, iMovie and Garage Band come free with any new purchase of Mac Products.

The MacBook Air starts at just $999.

4.46am: Xander Soren takes the stage to demo Garage Band. It's iCloud compatible. New "Drummer: feature will let you play along with songs but takes your direction.

Create a new track, click the new Drummer Track Feature, hit space bar to have the drummer "Kyle" to play along until you tell him what to do next. You can change the drum he plays on, the intensity and way that he plays for an excellent rock and roll finish. If Kyle isn't your thing, you can choose from a bunch of different drummers.

4.45am: Garage Band now features the ability to contains 32 tracks at any one time. It contains a new sound library.

4.44am: iMovie lets you edit on iPhone and iPad as well as MacBook Pro or desktop. You can speed up or slow down video. It now contains a one tap sharing feature.

iMovie Theatre is a new feature "which is like a private screening room right in iMovie."

It now takes all your trailers and other videos from around iTunes and other Apple products within iMovie. It's also available via Apple TV. Handy and logical.

Picture: Apple

4.42am: Eddy Cue takes the stage to talk apps. All apps are 64-bit and integrated with iCloud.

iPhoto has a brand new look. Apple is launching a photo book printing service which allows you to create albums which you can send to the company to print. It will then mail it out to you.

4 :39am: Another video. "At Apple manufacturing and design are inexplicably link. We had to pioneer entirely new processes. It's a computer unlike anything we've ever built."

4.32am: Onwards to Apple's bizarre new desktop computer, the Mac Pro. It's price starts at $2999 and will be available by the end of the year, Schiller says.

"It's the fastest processor we've ever put in the Mac," Schiller says. It features Intel zeon, comes in 6, 8 or 12 core. It boasts the fastest ECC memory 1866 DDRECC memory. Four-channel controller. Up to 60GB memory. Dual work station graphics, 4096 processors, 384 bit memory buses. It contains 12GB of GDDRS VRAM and 7 teraflops of computer power, along with 528GB total bandwidth.

It contains a motion controller and an the IO illimunates so you can see what you're doing. Ethernet, HTMI, Thunderbolt port, Bluetooth 4.0.

4.30am: Wow, Apple's new MacBook Pro starts shipping today! It's thinner, gets 9 hours of battery life. Also getting a new Haswell chip. It comes with the new operating syste, OSX Mavericks preinstalled.

The 13 inch MacBook Pro starts at US $1299 for 13 inch display, dual core, i5 and 128G of storage.

The 15 inch startsw at $1999. 2Ghz quad core, i7, 8Gs of memory and a quarter terabyte of flash storage. Also ships out today.

Picture: Apple

4.25am: MacBook Pro Retina is just 0.71 inches thin and it's getting a new Intel Haswell Chip. Integrated graphics, 90 per cent faster than previous generation. It also will be getting better bayyery life, up to 9 hours of iTunes movie playback.

"If you're a Batman fan, like me. You can watch the entire trilogy on one charge," Schiller says.

4.24: Apple's new desktop operatings ystem Mavericks is free. That's right folks. FREE!

"The days spending hundreds of dollars getting the most out of your computer are gone. Today we announce a new era for Mac. Today we are launching OSX Mavericks for free," Federighi says.

"The best part, it's available today. Go out and get it."

The crowd applauds.

Phil Schiller takes the stage to talk Macbooks.

4.21am: Federighi's friend "Nina" messages him. The data detectors feature allows him to view the time and appointment, it extracts the location from calendar, a map and weather of the area. It also knows where his previous appointment is and how long it will take him to get from the one appointment to the next.

"I can ask to be alerted on my phone and computer when I need to leave," he said.

The MacPro

4.20am: iCloud Keychain feature shows that your passwords can be synched across all devices

4.19am: Federighi is providing a demo of Mavericks for the crowd. "I can respond to my wife - 'Phil is my fashion guru', he types, joking with the crowd. His wife's tag is "hair force one". Hair hair hair.

4.13am: You get up to an hour longer web browsing on a single charge and an hour-and-a-half longer watching iTunes video, Federighi says.

"You'll also get better memory".

Mavericks contains new feature which compresses memory to make space for new allocations.

Graphics system has been upgraded too, focusing on integrated graphics.

4:11am: Onto the MacBook Pro. "We love building computers people love to use," Cook says.

"Macs work seamlessly with all of your iOS devices with iCloud. And all of this comes together with this delightful experience that our users just love".

"Our competition is different. They're confused. They're trying to make PCs into tablets and tablets into PCs. Who knows what they'll do next. What I can tell you is we have a very clear direction and very ambitious goal. We believe deeply in this category and we're not slowing down on innovation. We've been working hard on Mac and have exciting products this morning".

Craig Federighi takes the stage to talk about OS10 - Apple's new operating system OSX Mavericks.

"This one is a doozy," Federighi says.

4.10am: 20 million users listened to over a billion songs on iTunes Radio just in the US in the last month, Cook says. Developers who created apps for the App Store have earned more than $13 million.

4.08am: Lots of back patting about the good reviews the iPhone 5S and 5C received from places like Wired or The New York Times. Unsurprisingly no mention about the problems with iOS 7.

64% of iPhone users are running Apple's new operating system, Cook says.

The MacBook Pro starts at $1299.

4.03am: Tim Cook has just taken the stage to talk about Apple's values.

"You're going to see some products this morning...we're really excited to show them with you but first we have a few updates about the iPhone," he said.

"By the end of the launch weekend (last month) we had sold 9 million iPhones making it the biggest iPhone launch ever," he said. "Excitement was palpable."

He played a video for the crowd showing off the excitement around launch day called "Life in Colour". If you're an Apple user, user you can follow the lifestream of the event via Safari. We'll get you the video as soon as we're allowed.

3.57am: Just got the 'switch off your phone' warning, let's lock and load. (Or unlock and unload...as the case may be). The action is just minutes away.

3.44am: Morning folks, it's C-Port here up bright and early to bring you all the latest from Apple's final launch for 2013.

What can we expect from this launch? We haven't seen as many leaks as you might expect leading up to the event but we're pretty confident we'll be getting a new iPad or two, a new Apple operating system, OSX Mavericks, perhaps an upgraded MacBook Pro and if we're lucky we'll finally get a look see at Apple's new bizarre desktop computer, the Mac Pro.

Read our full rundown of what to expect here.

In the mean time, strap yourselves in, it's going to be a wild ride.

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