Engadget Podcast 150 - 06.12.2009

It's the big one-five-zero, people, and you know what that means: absolutely nothing. We've got news to talk about, after all -- we'll leave the extensive accolades and embarrassing praise for the history books. If you hadn't guessed, this week's show is a bit heavy on the Apple sauce, so the squeamish should turn away before it's too late. Those inclined, however, to dive into MacBook SKUs and wax philosophical about the iPhone as a platform will likely get their money's worth. It'll be fun, we promise.

Hosts: Joshua Topolsky, Nilay Patel, Paul Miller
Producer: Trent Wolbe
Song: Fat Boys - Stick 'Em

00:01:20 - Archos rolls out Archos 10s, Archos 13 laptops, Classmate-based student PC
00:02:40 - Phil Schiller keynote live from WWDC 2009
00:05:06 - Apple's 8GB iPhone 3G falls to $99 on contract
00:05:20 - Apple shows iPhone OS 3.0 at WWDC, hits devices June 17th
00:05:30 - Find My iPhone is live, totally found our iPhone
00:06:00 - iPhone 3G S processor specs: 600MHz CPU, 256MB of RAM
00:22:40 - iPhone 3G S announced: $199 16GB, $299 32GB, June 19th
00:42:40 - Apple's new MacBook family: non-removable batteries, lower prices
00:50:00 - Apple's new MacBook Pro family unboxing and hands-on!
01:01:47 - Apple shipping Snow Leopard in September, $29 upgrade
01:06:38 - Jon Rubinstein takes over as Palm CEO
01:08:32 - Roger McNamee says Pre launch was a "dream come true," hints that all Palm devices will have physical keyboards
01:16:22 - Palm Pre goes on sale nationwide, line forms on the right

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Twitter: @joshuatopolsky @futurepaul @reckless @engadget

[iLoveApple @ Jun 12th 2009 2:09PM]

Oh my Allah! Look at all that Apple stuffs! WTFBBQ!111!

[Dan McQuade @ Jun 12th 2009 2:09PM]

Joshua Topolsky, you bastard

[Laura June @ Jun 12th 2009 2:10PM]

Whoever wrote this up is a genius.

[Patriks7 @ Jun 12th 2009 2:17PM]

Wait, you won't even mention any of the new Apple stuff?!



[/sarcasm ofc :p]

[Patriks7 @ Jun 12th 2009 2:17PM]

Oh, and before I forget, the RED WINGS ARE GONNA WIIIIN!

[Najakwa @ Jun 12th 2009 2:25PM]

"Like the Stealers in '75
I only like the Broncos when they come alive
I liked the Redskins in '83
There when the Dolphins are playin' well yeah
Well they're the team for me.

'Cause I'm Fairweather Johnson"

[clos1084 @ Jun 12th 2009 2:24PM]

Josh... wheres the enthusiasm?

[Joshua Topolsky @ Jun 12th 2009 4:30PM]

I will admit -- I do sound tired! I was!

[Why should I have all the fun? @ Jun 12th 2009 2:57PM]

Thank goodness WWDC was this week to distract engadget from the Palm Pre. Nothing like Apple news to refocus their attention.

... oh wait, they're STILL talking about the Pre.

[Doug @ Jun 12th 2009 3:42PM]

Apple stuff, for more than an hour out of a 76 minute podcast? Seriously?

[Nilay Patel @ Jun 12th 2009 4:25PM]

We get it. You don't like Apple. But -- that was the biggest news of the week, like it or not. We barely talked about Apple last week, you know.

[Patriks7 @ Jun 12th 2009 5:29PM]

"We barely talked about Apple last week, you know."
Because you really need to talk about Apple every week?

[Nilay Patel @ Jun 13th 2009 2:15PM]

Last week's podcast was two hours long and Apple only came up at the end when we made some offhand WWDC predictions. Many weeks we don't talk about Apple at all.

I'm pretty sure you knew that's what I meant, right?

[Doug @ Jun 13th 2009 4:38PM]

My problem is the overemphasis of Apple. I don't hate Apple; I own several Apple products. But the way that most Engadget folks get into a tizzy everytime Apple does anything is wearing a little thin.

WWDC was announcements of updates to existing products. Coverage of the event should reflect that... that they are updates, not new products. Meanwhile, an new product was released in the same time period (the Palm Pre), but coverage of that was minimal in comparison to coverage of Apple's announcements.

You can easily sum up the Apple announcements in a few paragraphs. Not so with announcements of new products. Since we don't know anything about them, more discussion ought to be devoted to them.

Which do you think should be covered more, something that is brand new and unfamiliar? Or relatively minor updates to products we already are familiar with. That's my point.

[Nilay Patel @ Jun 14th 2009 9:21PM]

If you're seriously suggesting that our Pre coverage has been "minimal" there's honestly not a lot left we can do for you.

[Doug @ Jun 14th 2009 11:32PM]

Pre coverage in the podcast was certainly minimal *relative* to the coverage of Apple's annoucements.

[Zune Claus @ Jun 12th 2009 4:38PM]

Hopefully they don't mention jimmy fallon. @_@

[arsix @ Jun 12th 2009 5:21PM]

i thought that was gonna be the first subject! LOL

[JG @ Jun 12th 2009 4:45PM]

These Engadget podcasts are getting harder and harder to listen to. Too must joking around and giggling. I'd perfer a more professional/serious talk with out all the silly joking side comments and conversations about...nothing.

Both GDGT.com and Autoblog run disciplined podcasts; can you try too, Josh?

[Zune Claus @ Jun 12th 2009 5:11PM]

Especially the "The listeners are in the future!" crap. Seriously its old.

[arsix @ Jun 12th 2009 5:24PM]

yeah josh can u sound boring for once, im dieing for a monotone podcast!

c mon, if you like other podcasts then listen to those, no1 forces u here.

[arsix @ Jun 12th 2009 5:20PM]

good, entertaining and funny.


makes commuting on Fridays a little bit better.

You guys should coach the guys that talk on the podcasts of Engadget HD, i was trying to listen to them last night while in the gym, they all sound like they are in different channels.

[Matt @ Jun 12th 2009 7:29PM]

I guess you can't please everybody but I love these podcasts.

And I laugh at the "listeners in the future" joke every time so keep em coming.

[Purnell @ Jun 12th 2009 7:34PM]

Fat Boys = Win

Apple should either kill the plastic MacBook or make it cheaper, $699 or $799 range.

Miller gets fatigue from using a physical keyboard?

No mention of the Thursday/Friday Podcast Paradox = Win

They are right about the Palm mindshare thing, but the Pre is still a huge unknown outside of the geek community. My mom knew when the iPhone was coming out. Palm needs better non-tech-blog media relations. The national media sold a lot of iPhones for Apple.

[sam @ Jun 12th 2009 7:39PM]

Joshua you got to let Paul know and you too, to accept a call on Palm Pre you just have to open slider and it answers the call. No need to keep dialer app open.

[Laiquelleion @ Jun 12th 2009 10:51PM]

Living in Sweden I keep getting surpriced at how people in the USA retell how often they experience dropped calls.How bad can your networks truly be ? If this is how it is where the market decides coverage then im glad that my government forces carriers to build across the entire country.

[zeeke @ Jun 13th 2009 4:22AM]

yeah I know, last time a call "dropped" was probably some years ago when someones pre-paid cash card ran out of money :)

[erik @ Jun 12th 2009 11:10PM]

Great podcast. I have always been wondering if the 9400m was enough to replace discrete graphics for a photoshop-illustrator machine.

[Devron @ Jun 13th 2009 12:09AM]

First off, "Stick Em" to lead the podcast was incredible. RIP to my main man Darren Robinson.

Paul put into works *perfectly* what I'm experiencing right now. I was an iPhone launch customer and now a launch Pre customer. I think if Palm can chip away at some of these concerns (stability, memory management, etc.) I won't bring the box back to Sprint. But it's difficult to predict whether Palm will put that small staff towards working on the next version of the device to make it out for CES or working on WebOS. (Hopefully the former.) I can't live for even 1 year with these types of problems. But when I go back to the very linear iPhone experience without the keyboard, I long for it again.

Please keep us aware in subsequent weeks of what you're considering. Great show.

[caley.brock @ Jun 13th 2009 2:52PM]

For me, the only con about these podcasts are the fact that when I download them with my iPod Touch, it is in video format with pictures of each subject... However, to listen to the podcast i have to keep my screen on and i can't listen to the podcast in the background.

Please make an itunes version that is mp3!!!!!

[Garst @ Jun 15th 2009 5:15AM]

Is it really that hard to copy the rss feed of the MP3 format and copy it into iTunes?

[UberAdept @ Jun 15th 2009 6:52AM]

If you download the audi podcast using itunes, not your ipod/phone, then it is just audio. All you need then do is use cable to sync. The OTA download is video? I have not checked if there is an audio only option for OTA in itunes.

[Garst @ Jun 15th 2009 3:47AM]

What was the deal with putting that song on the podcast? Even at only sound level 30 on the Zune software, that music shook the entire house! Even when the song played again at the end and the sound was turned down to 11, it still effectively shook my room. I'm glad I wasn't listening to the podcast on my Zune, which I usually keep at 7, because that would have blown out my ear drums. Normally, the volume level for the music is fine on the software or player, but this last one was a very poor choice. :-(

[Garst @ Jun 15th 2009 5:11AM]

On another note though, I know what the iPhone 3G[S] stands for. It's the iPhone 3 [for] gullible saps. Why else would Apple release a new phone that's barely upgrade from the last with features that should have been in the phone from day one? Because Apple has such high regard for its customers? I think not. Come on people! Apple is milking you through your stupidity!