iPod Touch

Apple fans won’t even have to worry about the sleek designs being compromised by the panels – as they will be hidden inside. The cells will be housed behind the touch screen and a transparent back will allow it to draw twice the amount of energy. The patent application has been filed in the US by Apple engineer Michael Rosenblatt. This is yet another example of Apple ‘pushing the envelope’, said Flora Graham, mobile phone editor at technology website CNET. ‘What Apple is great at doing is taking existing technology and refining it – we saw it with touch screens and we’ve just seen it with the announcement of video phone calls for the iPhone 4. ‘The problem with solar charging is it takes a long time and we have relatively little sunshine in the UK. ‘However, if Apple applies its mastery of technology to getting it right I’m sure it would work very well.’

It is unlikely Apple will bring in the panels this year. ‘Certainly solar technology is quite advanced so we’re not talking about something way off in the future,’ added Ms Graham. Last week, Apple boss Steve Jobs unveiled the iPhone 4, which has a new glass back, possibly paving the way for the solar panels.  Article First  Published in Metro — By Aidan Radnedge

Apple iPod Touch Pocket Computer

Apple shares are worth more than ten times what they were a decade ago after churning out hit product after hit product such as the iPod, iPhone and MacBook laptops. That trend looks set to continue as today sees the launch in Britain of Apple’s iPad tablet computer, a format Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates mooted in 2001 but was shot down. And next month Apple boss Steve Jobs will unveil the next generation iPhone – the device that Microsoft boss Steve Ballmer dismissed back in 2007 as having ‘no chance’. Microsoft, whose operating systems run on 90 per cent of the world’s personal computers, has not been able to match growth rates from the 1990s.

Its stock is down 20 per cent from ten years ago. Apple, which struggled By Joel Taylor to get its products into the mainstream, resorted to a £103million investment from Microsoft in 1997. Microsoft has suffered because the consumer market, Apple’s focus, has outpaced the growth of spending on technology by businesses, Microsoft’s stronghold, said David Yoffie, a Harvard Business School professor. ‘Apple has had the wind at its back,’ he added. ‘Microsoft is playing catch-up.’   Article First  Published in Metro — By Joel Taylor