“iPad hoopla” has passed, according to a survey by electronics shopping site Retrevo, and consumers have lost interest after the product’s unveiling less than two weeks ago. More than twice as many respondents said they were uninterested after the iPad was announced compared to a week prior. Of course, there are lies, damned lies, and statistics—three times as many said they were confident they would buy one after finding out the product’s details.

Retrevo did similar surveys to gauge interest in Apple’s new portable touchscreen device both before it was announced and after. The week prior to Apple’s big media event, 26 percent of those surveyed said they knew about the device but weren’t interested. After the announcement, that number jumped to 52 percent. However, 3 percent said they would buy an iPad sight unseen. The number that would buy an iPad after Steve Jobs showed it off went up to 9 percent.

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Last week, Microsoft said it was investigating issues in Windows 7 that affect batteries on certain notebooks after hundreds of users reported they thought the OS was to blame. Steven Sinofsky, president of the Windows and Windows Live Division, has posted a lengthy response on the Engineering Windows 7 blog. “At this time we have no reason to believe there is any issue related to Windows 7 in this context,” Sinofsky writes. Here’s his explanation:

Several press articles this past week have drawn attention to blog and forum postings by users claiming Windows 7 is warning them to “consider replacing your battery” in systems which appeared to be operating satisfactorily before upgrading to Windows 7. These articles described posts in the support forums indicating that Windows 7 is not just warning users of failing batteries - as we designed Windows 7 to do this - but also implying Windows 7 is falsely reporting this situation or even worse, causing these batteries to fail. To the very best of the collective ecosystem knowledge, Windows 7 is correctly warning batteries that are in fact failing and Windows 7 is neither incorrectly reporting on battery status nor in any way whatsoever causing batteries to reach this state. In every case we have been able to identify the battery being reported on was in fact in need of recommended replacement.

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Benchmark results for a Core i7-powered “MacBookPro6,1″ has popped up in Geekbench’s database. It may be sign that improved MacBook Pros are nearing release.

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MacRumors

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According to a post on the Zune Forums, owners of the Zune Pass are having a bit of trouble accessing the music they’re paying for with their subscription, as first reported by Engadget. In less than two weeks, the thread in question has passed 50 replies as users complain and list what they can no longer access: specific songs, entire albums, or even everything produced by an artist.

The sixth reply in the thread is thankfully one from a Microsoft representative. “Hey all—we’re hearing you! We are investigating your reported missing albums indicated in this post—and will come back to you as soon as we understand why they’re missing,” Michelle A. of the Zune Product Team writes. “It is extremely helpful that you advise the album title and artist names to us, so that we can include them into our investigation.” As a result, the rest of the thread is filled with lists of missing tracks. Apart from the initial response, Microsoft has not posted an explanation of what has gone wrong or how it plans to fix the issue. Customers affected are confused and annoyed as they are constantly seeing errors when trying to play parts of their music collection.

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As developers dug into the iPad SDK and unearthed previously unknown gems, there was more discussion about 27″ iMac issues, Flash support in iPhone OS, and why the Apple TV remains a hobby in Apple’s eyes. Oh, and did you know that the 2010 Macworld Expo is next week?

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The Apple press has been all about iPads since January 27—and how can you blame them? There’s a lot to talk about before the device gets into our grubby little hands. But there are other things going on in the Apple space in the meantime. One such thing is the new, improved, and Apple-free 2010 Macworld Expo which is taking place next week.

Did you forget about Macworld? Some did, while others (largely on Twitter) have been ramping up the chatter about what to expect without Apple there. You may remember that, in late 2008, Apple announced that it would no longer be attending the Expo after 2009, throwing the conference world into an uproar and eventually leading to the 2010 Expo’s dates being moved from January to February of this year. And now, it’s only a few days away: the conference begins next Tuesday, February 9 and runs through Saturday, the 13th.

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Like ‘em or not, Superbowl halftime performers definitely get a post-game album sales bump—to the tune of 555 percent, on average.

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Nielsen Blog

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In a recent post to its iPhone Developers news site, Apple warned developers not to use location data to serve location-specific ads in their apps. The move comes shortly after Apple acquired its own mobile advertising firm, Quattro Wireless.

Apple wants developers to use CoreLocation, the API that allows developers to find your location based on GPS coordinates and other data, to give users “beneficial information.” This concept is at work when Yelp shows you nearby restaurants, or when RunKeeper tracks your jogging progress on a map.

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Popular find-a-restaurant app Urbanspoon has arrived on the Android platform.

Read More:
Mashable

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Apple is reportedly offering UK iMac owners full refunds plus 15 percent of the original purchase price for 27″ iMacs suffering any of the maladies that have plagued the model since its release in October of 2009. According to an Apple Authorized shop speaking to Gizmodo, Apple has already completed the transaction with two of the shop’s customers. Apple seems to be brokering the deals due to a shortage in parts needed to repair the units, as well as a repair backlog of over 200 machines.

The 27″ iMacs have had problems from the get-go with some users reporting issues with discolored displays and others reporting flickering screens. Most recently, there were reports of an internal support document telling technicians to explain that slight screen variations are normal, but if the customer continued to complain, to say that the machine could be repaired in “approximately three weeks.” If that wasn’t enough, they were told to offer a refund, but not a replacement.

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