Apple September 2015 Event Liveblog; iPad Pro, Apple TV, iPhone 6S, and more

Hello, and welcome to our liveblog for Apple’s big “Hey Siri” event starting today at 10.30 AM at the massive Bill Graham Civic Auditorium in San Francisco. We will be updating this page as with the most pertinent information about Apple’s new launches as and when they take place.

So grab a drink, sit back, and take in all that Tim Cook & Co. has planned for today. This is going to be a long day. Keep refreshing.

Quick recap: Apple is expected to unveil its latest iPhones – thought to be called the iPhone 6s and 6s Plus – as well as a new version of the Apple TV set-top box and possibly an iPad Pro today.

The event haven’t started yet, but people have started queuing up for them anyway. What other tech company inspires this kind of religious fervor? Answer: None.

Oh my. Peak Apple. Someone is queuing in Sydney before THEY HAVE EVEN ANNOUNCED ANYTHING!!! pic.twitter.com/G16X0ze8eN

— Seamus Byrne (@seamus) September 8, 2015

With the capacity to seat 7,000 attendees, the Bill Graham Civic Auditorium, is a lot bigger than Apple’s usual venues – last year it used the Flint Centre which seats 2,400. What gives? It’s unlikely Apple is inviting this many journalists, PRs and other assorted special guests. Here’s a bit of speculation from well-connected Apple blogger John Gruber:

Remember that white pop-up building Apple built outside the Flint Center last year? It was a big hands-on area for all the new stuff that had been announced that day. My guess is that Apple is building something similar again this year — inside the auditorium. It would be like the world’s biggest Apple Store, for one day only.

Apple always has a big “hands on” area at its events. If it’s unveiling an Apple TV, it’s going to need a lot of space for a lot of televisions.

As usual, the Apple online store is down, and will be updated with today’s new products as soon as the event wraps up. Try not to panic.

We all know Tim Cook is an early riser and he proves it yet again.

Just a few hours to go here in SF! We can’t wait to show you what we’ve been working on. http://t.co/DeBsAD67p5 pic.twitter.com/DLIPTK2m1L — Tim Cook (@tim_cook) September 9, 2015

And so is Eddy Cue.

It’s a big day for the big screen! http://t.co/AqyAcdE2Su — Eddy Cue (@cue) September 9, 2015

Anytime now. Tim Cook takes the stage to huge applause. His shirt is tucked in today. Interesting. A quick recap of Apple Watch, WatchOS, Siri, Apple Pay et al. You know the drill. GoPro is working on an app to turn the Apple Watch into a view finder. AirStrip cofounder Dr. Cameron Powell onto the stage to demonstrate it. Physician viewing daily schedule and rounds on watch face. Can time travel to see notifications. Messages arrives, can show lab results and wave form of a patient right on the watch. Can get live cardiac waveforms and other health data on the Apple Watch. New watch partnership with Hermes. The leather strap wraps around the wrist twice. These will be available in select stores from October. “When we created Apple Watch, we knew it had to be a personal expression of your personal tastes and style. Today, we’re introducing even more options” Introducing two new Apple Watch finishes – rose gold and anodised aluminium, and a bunch of new straps – including that rumoured red sports band. New models shipping today, and watchOS 2 from September 16. That’s it for the Apple Watch. Onto the iPad now. “The biggest news in iPad since the iPad”. Steel yourselves. Introducing the iPad Pro, the “the most powerful and capable iPad created.” Don’t they say that about every new device at every event? “iPad is the clearest expression of our vision of the future of personal computing. A simple, multitouch piece of glass that transforms into anything you want it to be.” Video time.

Phil Schiller, yaay. He is so full of energy at every event.

You can have a fill size software keyboard, a piano keyboard, and the multi-tasking in iOS 9 were designed with this in mind.

The iPad Pro has a 12.9-inch display, which is the same as the Macbook. It has 5.6 million pixels.

The new A9X chip is 1.8x faster – which Schiller claims is desktop-class performance -a nd the GPU performance has gone up 360 times. He claims it’s 80 per cent faster than 80 per cent of the portable PCs available today.

iPad Pro has a 4-speaker audio system which balances left and right. Despite having a larger spcreen area, it only weighs 3lbs more than the iPad Air.

Oh man, the iPad Pro is so big.

iPad Pro comes with portable keyboard, which looks a lot like the ones that comes with the Microsoft Surface Pro. It has a smart connector for transferring power and data.

There’s a stylus!! It’s called Apple Pencil. Steve Jobs will be turning in his grave.

“This began by reengineering the touch system to measure both finger and stylus input with maximum accuracy.” Jony Ive on the Apple Pencil

A video about the pencil. Of course.

It’s force sensitive; pressing lighter or harder will be able to adjust paint brush thickness and stroke opacity.

You can use your finger for one behavior and the stylus for another. They demonstrate this with someone using their hand to move a on-screen ruler while the stylus draws. That’s.. kind of freakin’ awesome.

Whoa, stop the press. Microsoft has taken the stage to demo Microsoft Office on the iPad Pro.

Next demo: Adobe

Hey, that doesn’t look like Edward Snowden.

Ahh yes, it is Eric Snowden… from Adobe.

iPad Pro pricing.

Apple Pencil and Keyboard pricing.

These things are expensive.

Oh yeah, there’s an iPad Mini 4 too, with “the same power as the iPad air 2” in a mini package.

Apple TV time. Please don’t let us down.

Cook is back: “I’d like to talk about an even larger screen: your TV”

Cook announces the new Apple TV and plays a video.

Eddy Cue now talking about voice and touch. With the Siri remote, you hold down the Siri button and say something like “show me funny TV shows”, and it will bring up a list of comedies.

AppleTV is getting a new OS, a new user experience, and an App Store

Ooh, the new remote is pretty. The top half is a glass surface.

Now a demo of the game Crossy Road on Apple TV. There’s a multiplayer mode that lets you play with family and friends.

Apple TV features a 64-bit A8 chip, and power, HDMI and ethernet connections. The remote communicates by Bluetooth, and can also control TV volume so no need for another remote. There’s a built-in accelerometer and gyroscope, and 3-month battery life. TV OS is available for developers today. Oh, and it will cost $149.

Tim Cook is back and we’re onto iPhones.

“iPhone 6 is the most popular iPhone… ever”

“At a worldwide level, the iPhone grew at 3 1/2 times the rest of the industry”

Phil Schiller onstage to speak about the new iPhone 6S and 6S Plus

Made from aerospace-grade aluminium, and there’s a rose gold version. They feature “3D Touch” (which presumably is the same idea as force touch). As well as gestures, the iPhone now recognises force, for “peeking” and certain functions.

Apple now has a more advances method of haptic feedback. The taptic engine has been updates so it can give different feedback for different gesture touch commands.

Product video with Jony Ive time.

Andy Wafer from Pixeltoys is showing how the A9 chip makes his game look great on an iPhone 6s. Loads of special effects simultaneously at 60fps.

4K on an iPhone, finally.

12 megapixel iSight cameras on the rear of both 6S/6S Plus

iOS9 will be available from September 16th. Capacity for iCloud from 50GB for $0.99 per month.

Pricing same as iPhone 6 and 6 Plus. Tht’s $199 up to $399 for the 6, and $299 to $399 for the 6 Plus. Meanwhile, the 6 and 6 Plus both decrease by $100. You can preorder from Sepetember 12th and they’ll be available from September 25th.