Jobs Debuts New Apple Browser, PowerBooks At MacWorld

Apple CEO Steve Jobs debuted a slew of new products to the Mac faithful during his MacWorld keynote Tuesday, including a new Web browser for the Mac, the first commercial browser product since the Netscape-Microsoft browser wars five years ago.

Jobs, speaking at the Moscone Center here to the usual enthusiastic reception, also debuted new software for building professional presentations on Apple computers. In addition, Jobs unveiled new PowerBook computers--one with a 17-inch screen, the other with a 12-inch screen--to kick off what he called "the year of the notebook" for Apple.

The new Apple browser, called Safari, is available for free download and runs on Mac OS 10.2, the Jaguar version of OS X, Jobs said.

Jobs said that Apple based Safari on an open-source HTML rendering engine called KHTML and has donated all of the updates it made in building Safari to the open-source community by posting it to the Web today.

"Some people have a problem with open-source," Jobs said, in a subtle jab at Microsoft. "We think it's great."

Jobs said that in benchmark tests, Safari ran three times as fast as Microsoft Internet Explorer on Apple machines. Speed, he said, was Apple's primary goal in creating a browser for Macs.

Safari also has the Google search engine built in and enables users to go back to the start of Google no matter how far they have gone into a search with a "Snap Back" button on the toolbar. Users also can implement this function with any page because it shows up on the URL bar as soon as a new page is opened.

Keynote, the new presentation software, gives users of programs such as Microsoft PowerPoint the ability to build presentations with professional-grade graphics, Jobs said.

Jobs called Keynote a product "built for me," saying it came from his own need for an application to build presentations for his keynote addresses. In fact, he said he has been building presentations on a "beta" of the product for two years.

"Our goal was to let you create presentations that look like you have an entire graphics department working for you," Jobs said.

Demonstrating the new product, which was handed out free to all keynote attendees, Jobs showed how users can drag and drop in their own photos to use in slides, as well as put any number of effects on photos, slides, charts, etc.

Built on an XML-based file format, Keynote imports and exports PowerPoint presentations, and also exports PDF and QuickTime formats. This positions the product well for the future of Web services, Jobs said, suggesting that third parties can build applications that let Keynote automatically build presentations by culling information from databases.

Keynote is available immediately for $99 and runs on OS X Jaguar.

On the hardware front, Jobs demonstrated two new PowerBooks, the first with the largest screen Apple has ever produced, at 17 inches. It was inspired by the current screen found on new Apple iMacs, which were introduced last year at the same show, Jobs said.

The new computers are part of Apple's strategy to increase its shipment of notebooks over desktop computers, he added.

This year Jobs expects 35 percent of Apple computer shipments to be notebooks. Eventually, notebooks will comprise more than 50 percent of shipments, he said.

In 2001, 35 percent of Apple computer shipments were notebooks, but that number slipped to 32 percent in 2002, according to Jobs.

The new 17-inch PowerBook runs a G4 processor, is 1-inch-thick when closed and weighs 6.8 pounds. It has a battery life of 4.5 hours. The model also includes 64 Mbytes of graphics memory, 1 Mbyte of Level 3 cache and supports Firewire 800 as well as Firewire 400.

The 17-inch notebook also is "the most wireless-equipped" of any current notebook, Jobs said. The 17-inch PowerBook contains support for Bluetooth and for Airport Extreme, new technology from Apple that supports the draft-standard of 802.11g, which offers network speeds of up to 54 Mbps.

The product has an SRP of $3,299 and will be available next month, Jobs said.

The other new PowerBook is Apple's smallest to date, Jobs said. Running a G4 processor, it features a 12-inch screen, is 1.2 inches thick, weighs 4.6 pounds and has a battery life of 5 hours. It has 32 Mbytes of graphics memory and is Bluetooth-enabled and Airport Extreme-ready, though software must be bought to enable the wireless connectivity.

The 12-inch PowerBook has an SRP of $1,799 and will be available in two weeks, Jobs said.

In addition, Apple introduced updates to its line of what Jobs has dubbed "digital lifestyle" products, namely iPhoto, iMovie, iTunes and iDVD. Apple also is bundling the four together into one product called iLife, which retails for $49 and will be available Jan. 25.

New versions of iPhoto, iMovie and iTunes can be downloaded for free. Apple's iDVD, however, is too large a download and must be purchased separately, Jobs said.