Analysts have begun their traditional pre-release Apple hardware predictions for the next generation of iPhone. It may have started a little later this year, but that only makes it all the more interesting, as we eagerly await Apple’s first iPhone refresh that will take substantially more than a year to arrive.

If Deutsche Bank analyst Chris Whitmore (via Fortune ) is right, the next iPhone(s) may well be worth the wait. Whitmore says the bank’s clients should expect two iPhones this fall, one a true next-generation iPhone 5 device, and the other an “iPhone 4S” that would basically resemble the iPhone 4 in most regards, but would be sold unlocked for use with pre-paid service for $349. Whitmore points out that this would be a smart move for Apple if the company wants to continue growing in emerging markets like Africa, Asia and Latin American, where pre-paid contracts make up the vast majority of all cellular service.

Whitmore doesn’t cite any specific sources for his prediction, and a lower-cost iPhone has long been a popular theme among Apple watchers and analysts, but this year is the first time Apple has given any indication it could have designs in that direction. Apple COO Tim Cook said in an interview with Bernstein analyst Toni Saccognaghi that Apple was indeed interested in producing cheaper hardware for customers who might have tighter budgets than the average current iPhone buyer. Apple also recently started selling the iPhone 4 unlocked in the U.S., indicating it’s at least interested in appealing more to the contract-wary customer.

Apple is already doing well in key emerging markets, like China, where it saw 250 percent growth during the company’s second quarter. That doesn’t mean it couldn’t stand to do better by embracing a sales model in keeping with what smartphone shoppers in international markets are more familiar with. Choice is still a primary driver of smartphone sales, which is why Android’s multi-vendor licensing model has proven so successful. Pre-paid is also on the rise as a service option even in the U.S., which means Apple could capitalize both at home and abroad with a device aimed at that growing category of users.

Morgan Stanley analyst Katy Huberty made some predictions about the next iPhone over the weekend, reporting production of a new model should begin in the last half of August, with the intent to ship devices in late September. Such a timeline would make sense if Apple were revamping the annual iPod refresh, and instead making the iPhone the star of the show.

If Apple does have two iPhone hardware choices on offer come fall, one with more features but a higher price and tied to a contract, and one with older tech but a lower cost of entry and fewer strings attached, which would you opt for?

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I’m going to try my best to use Chrome as my default browser for a decent length of time, in order to give it a fair shake. But I am a little worried about potential feature scarcity. As has been reported before, the Chrome beta is missing some things that its Windows counterpart offers. Below is a brief list of what’s been omitted, and why it worries me that some of these things aren’t there with this new beta.

• App Mode: One of Chrome’s greatest strengths is its ability to create Fluid-like single site browser instances that work more like apps than websites. It’s great for Gmail, Google Docs, and any other web app that has its own dashboard, menus, etc. The option is there, it’s just grayed out for now.
• Gears: I know Gears is dead in general, as per a recent announcement, but for now the existing implementation is much appreciated. I’d like to hold on to it as long as possible, pending HTML 5′s gradual rollout, but the Chrome Beta isn’t onboard.
• Multi-touch Gestures: Both the trackpad and the Magic Mouse’s multi-touch gestures won’t work in this beta of Chrome. That’s a big omission when you’ve become as dependent on multi-touch as I have, especially in terms of mobile computing.
• 64-bit Support: Chrome is 32-bit only, despite Snow Leopard’s focus on 64-bit performance. It’s not a major strike against it, since the browser is still blazingly fast in my experience, but it could become an issue down the road if Google doesn’t give its browser a bump up.

There are other things I’ve left off my list, like full-screen browsing, for the simple fact that I don’t use them that often and they probably won’t affect my experience. And despite my complaints about what isn’t in this beta, what is there is very impressive indeed. The speed with which Chrome renders pages never ceases to impress, no matter how many times I take the browser out for a spin on either Windows or Mac machines.

Tabs also still do run as isolated processes, which is the major advantage Chrome brought to the table in the first place. Now when I have 57 tabs open across five windows on three screens, a badly coded Flash ad on one of them won’t force me to start fresh. Wait, that might not be a good thing…

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I’m getting a copy (might pick up a burger, too), but for me it’s a legitimate business expense, so the decision, even without an upgrade path (I’ve just been using the Windows 7 RC on my iMac, and don’t have an existing retail license), it makes financial sense for me to have access to a Windows machine. Maybe you’re in the same boat.

The question isn’t really whether Mac users are also Windows users, since recent research on the subject seems to indicate that yes, there is in fact plenty of crossover. I’m wondering whether it might be the case that Apple fans not only buy Windows, but that we might also represent a big chunk of the early adopter crowd for this new incarnation.

Everyone I know who is buying a copy of Windows 7, upgrade or otherwise, uses a Mac. It may not be their primary machine (yes, that does actually happen), but they have one nonetheless. Most of those people are planning on installing Windows 7 on a boot camp partition or a virtualized PC using Parallels or VMware Fusion.

I know you’re thinking that I probably surround myself with like-minded people, and as a result have a lot of Mac-using friends, but that isn’t the case. The majority of people I know are exclusively PC users, and not a single one that I’ve talked to plans on upgrading today, or even in the near future.

As Mac users, we have a tendency to also be gadget addicts. I’ve found we’re more interested in all tech, not just our own, perhaps because we consider ourselves connoisseurs in the area thanks to our impeccable taste. For me, and for many others that I know, that interest translates into a pretty heady case of gadget-lust, one of the symptoms of which is early-adopterese. And also a willingness to acknowledge when a company besides our beloved Apple releases a smart, well-designed product.

Fact is, Windows 7 is a huge improvement on its predecessor. I say that as someone who’s been using preview versions since the first beta was released. It’s not Snow Leopard, don’t get me wrong, but that won’t stop me from being among the first to jump on board. Anyone else making that jump today? If you are, what are your reasons? Do you consider yourself an early adopter with tech in general?

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We’ve been covering the rumors, news and leaks on Snow Leopard for what feels like forever. For a whistle-stop tour of how 10.6 has developed over the year and what new features and functionality it brings, follow these links to learn about:

• How much weight Snow Leopard has lost -– system apps are much smaller than ever before now all that old PPC code is a thing of the past.
• How the Finder and Dock have been tweaked to make navigating your files faster and easier than ever before.
• Under-the-hood additions, tweaks and tune-ups that make Snow Leopard the most powerful and sophisticated Mac OS X yet.
• Changes to Apple’s venerable QuickTime media software.
• The introduction of native support for Microsoft Exchange.
• The revolutionary new multicore management technology Grand Central Dispatch.

Finally, just in case you’re not sure where to get started when you upgrade, check out Jon Buy’s Upgrade Strategy: Getting Ready for Snow Leopard and Chris Ryan’s Snow Leopard: The Installation Process.

Of course, in the interest of fair and balanced reporting, you could always read Dave Greenbaum’s Why I’ll Wait on Snow Leopard, and Why Maybe You Should Too.

But of course, you won’t be doing a Greenbaum. You’ll be rushing out to buy your copy. And why not? It’s cheap. If you are upgrading from Leopard (and maybe even if not), a single-installation license will cost only $29. For a 5-license Family Pack, it’s just $49.

Bottom line: It runs faster than Leopard. It gives you back a lot of hard drive space. It’s packed full of next-generation technology and it’s a lot cheaper than the competition. Snow Leopard is available now.

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It’s not really that shocking, since one Mac mini reportedly already shipped with Snow Leopard in Japan. This means users will be able to physically get their hands on the new OS two months before Windows 7 is scheduled to arrive, marking a significant win for Apple over Microsoft.

In the official press release, Apple SVP of Software Engineering Bertrand Serlet gave the following quote, which seems to indicate that the company is hoping this latest release will help bolster their enterprise business, since he focuses on Exchange:

“Snow Leopard builds on our most successful operating system ever and we’re happy to get it to users earlier than expected. For just $29, Leopard users get a smooth upgrade to the world’s most advanced operating system and the only system with built in Exchange support.”

Serlet also cues in on the price, mentioning the $29 single-user license fee for upgrading from Leopard to Snow Leopard. For only $49, users can pick up a family pack, which is a bargain even for Mac owners with only two computers, though the license covers up to five separate installations. Those upgrading from 10.4.x (aka Tiger) have the option of picking up the Mac Box Set with iLife and iWork for $169, or $229 for a family pack.

I don’t know about you, but I’m looking forward to a labor-intensive Friday, with four Macs to upgrade (a fifth is PowerPC-based, and so can’t run 10.6). You can check out our preparatory guide by Jon Buys to make things easier, or just drool over some of the details of the upcoming release.

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You may already be running Firefox 3.5, if you grabbed it early from Mozilla’s FTP servers, where it’s been available for a little while now, but if not, head over to Mozilla.com to update. I’ve been using the Beta and the Release Candidate versions for some time, and aside from the usual incompatibility with a few add-ons, I can tell you that 3.5 not only works great, but also packs some useful new features.

For most users, the first thing you’ll notice is how much faster Firefox 3.5 is compared with the previous version. There are a lot of reasons for the speed improvements, but one of them is the new TraceMonkey JavaScript engine that is much more efficient when dealing with resource-hogging web apps. There’s a great post over at WebWorkerDaily that goes into more detail about how that works and what it means.

My personal favorite new feature is the ability to tear off tabs and move them to new windows, something which I used to have to use a plug-in to accomplish. I can’t count how many times I need to do this on a daily basis when I’m referencing something for an article, or for debugging code and HTML.

Here’s a brief list of some of the highlights of the new version to whet your appetite (and more here):

• Private Browsing and Clear Recent History features.
• Location aware browsing via geolocation.
• Gecko engine 1.9.1, with many rendering process improvements.
• HTML5, downloadable fonts and other new CSS property support, JavaScript query selectors, HTML5 offline data storage for applications, and SVG transforms.
• Open video support, meaning that you won’t have to download any plug-ins or use external viewers to watch web video content.
• Improvements to session restore, anti-phishing and malware, the Awesome Bar, and browser customization.

Check out the full Release Notes for 3.5 from Mozilla for a complete list of new features and additions.

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Open Office comprises of several applications: a word processor (Writer), spreadsheet (Calc), presentation package (Impress), drawing app (Draw), and database tools (Base).

Some of the features heralded in the new release include:

• A new splash screen upon launch (see above)
• The ability to import Microsoft Office (.doc, .ppt, .xls) and Office 2007/Office 2008 for Mac (.docx, .xlsx, .pptx) files (though it still isn’t possible to save to these formats)
• Support for sharing Excel workbooks
• Support for Excel sheets with up to 1024 columns
• A solver component for solving optimization problems
• Better polished crop and drawing tools
• The display of multiple Writer pages while editing
• Inclusion of Office commenting / change tracking in the document margin
• Some support for Visual Basic macros (a feature dropped by the Microsoft Office team)
• Enhanced support for PDF exporting, including password protection
• Support for Open Office extensions, allowing further features to be created by developers (similar to Firefox)
• No more reliance on X11

Open Office 3.0 is completely free to download and try out. If you are struggling with the Open Office site being overwhelmed with requests for the new software, it’s worth trying this mirror. Installation is far simpler than in previous versions and you can be up and running in a few minutes.

Let us know whether you’ll be switching from Microsoft Office!

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Apple is on a software-release roll. Yesterday they released Leopard 10.5.2 and today they have released Aperture 2.

Aperture is Apple’s pro-level photograph editing and management software that has been picking up a lot of steam in the past couple of years.

There are over 100 new features in Aperture 2, some of which are:

• Updated user interface
• Quick preview mode
• Larger project management
• .Mac Web Gallery integration
• Tethered shooting support
• Duplicate detection

You can see the full list of updates here.

Also worth noting is the price as now dropped from $299 to just $199 for a full version and $99 to upgrade.

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Given that it supports Photoshop .psd files, iSight, and much more, it may be a fantastic mid-way application for those not willing or able to plunk down the cash for Photoshop CS3.

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