MacBook with Blu-Ray, Networked HDTV from Apple?

[MacRumors]

More rumors are trickling out in the days before Apple's notebook media event scheduled on October 14th, 2008.

EdibleApple reports that Kevin Rose revealed a new rumor at a live recording of the Diggnation podcast (not yet available). According to the report Rose said that the new MacBooks will support Blu-Ray drives.

Meanwhile, Jason Calacanis founder of Weblogs, Inc, claims that Apple is working on a networked television.

These LCD HDTVs will be fully networked, with the ability to stream all your iTunes content from your Mac or PC. In fact, Calacanis told me they'll function like a standard TV with an Apple TV box, only without the need for the box.

Weblogs, Inc was the original parent company for Engadget and was sold to AOL for an estimated $25 million in 2005.

Rose was recently quite accurate in his iPod and iTunes predictions for Apple's September event. We've never heard a previous rumor from Calacanis, so it's unknown how accurate his sources tend to be.


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[emaja]

If the Mac Books have a BD drive at the current price points, that would be a HUGE victory for Apple. A high powered, dual core laptop running OS X with BluRay? AWESOME!

[puckhead193]

cool now if it made its way into the macpro line a lot of people would be happy.
But i can't wait for tuesday!!!! Maybe i should have waited with my new sony... :/

[thecritix]

fantastic...

Making me wish I had some £ for a MPB rather than my 06 MB..

[Grimace]

Doing full TVs could be pretty awesome -- although would it be a real Apple TV? Is the TV box done for good?

[dohardthings]

this is interesting it may be a replacement for the mini and tv that are current

[Low]

if blue-ray then i guess apple will be getting over 15k of my money!! hurry up!!

[justflie]

ummm......... YES PLEASE!!!

If true, Apple is really making a move to make anything related to entertainment in your house have their logo on it. I'm ok with that

[Grimace]

I can't see the stock MacBooks have a Blu-ray drive - maybe as an upgrade option.

Frankly, I think the same of the MBP -- the 17" and pricier 15" will have it, but not the baseline 15".

[KindredMAC]

Before everyone creams their underoos please take another look at the rumor....
It says "Support Blu-ray". It does not say INCLUDES Blu-Ray.... "Support".

I'll believe it on Tuesday. It is too far fetched to be accurate to have Blu-Ray as a BTO at this point when the MacPros and iMacs don't even have it.

Remember people the EXTERNAL BDRs are $500-$700.

What I really think this means is that 10.5.6 is coming out on Tuesday that will have built in support instead of having to use Toast.

[dohardthings]

will the and one more thing be a game console

[Vaphoron]

It almost sounds that Bluray would be more like an add-on than something standard with wording like "support."

[MezicanGangxtah]

finaly blu-ray!!!!!!.....hm and maybe tv....tuners on macs? awesome!

[spyker3292]

A... a... a.... TV!!!!!???? I hope it isn't too big, my 50" HDTV is still working fine. A 30" would be nice for upstairs .

[vendettabass]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 2_1 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/525.18.1 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/3.1.1 Mobile/5F136 Safari/525.20)

I was there last night at the live diggnation. Kevin said his sources weren't that strong for this, in fact he said he has a set of good sources and the some not so good. These rumours weren't from his good sources.

[Eidorian]

Apple please remember that you were a computer company...

[mr.light]

Well then it may have been worth the wait. It is most likely to be an upgrade option not likely available on the entry model.

[emaja]

Originally Posted by KindredMAC

Remember people the EXTERNAL BDRs are $500-$700.

LiteON has an external BD for $135 at Newegg. I think it is well within reason that Apple could offer an internal BD drive with CD/DVD RW capabilities in the Mac Book line.

[mault89]

*SIGH*---- lol figures...after i just bought my first large screen LCD HDTV....i find out apple has been working on producing one..............


OH WELL...ill prolly still buy it anyways...lol


THINGS I WANT TO SEE APPLE MAKE:

-Tablet Mac
-An apple inspired car...i think i saw this idea in macworld or maclife...or something......
-TV

[bendodson]

Surely blu-ray support will require an OS upgrade - does this mean 10.5.6 is going to be released on the 14th??

[MasterNile]

Originally Posted by vendettabass

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 2_1 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/525.18.1 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/3.1.1 Mobile/5F136 Safari/525.20)

I was there last night at the live diggnation. Kevinbsaid his sources weren't that strong for this, in fact he said he has a set of good sources and the rest. These rumours weren't from his good sources.

Yes, this is mentioned in the article and as previously posted he said the new notebooks will support Blu-Ray, which does not mean they will have an internal Blu-Ray drive, it could just mean they'll support external Blu-Ray drives

Edit-The TV thing is curious though, how big? and if large screen size (above 42" I believe) will it still be LCD which is said to be worse than plasma screen?

[marvel2]

At the least, the new macs should support Blu-Ray.

[Vaphoron]

Originally Posted by vendettabass

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 2_1 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/525.18.1 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/3.1.1 Mobile/5F136 Safari/525.20)

I was there last night at the live diggnation. Kevinbsaid his sources weren't that strong for this, in fact he said he has a set of good sources and the rest. These rumours weren't from his good sources.

Interesting. I seriously doubt the validity of this rumor but I would absolutely love to be wrong. I just don't see there being much of a chance considering the Mac Pros don't have them yet but I could see Apple adding them in to both simultaneously. They would have to be playback only drives though, not for burning otherwise they'd be far too expensive.

[ArtOfWarfare]

While I do see an Apple television down the road 5 years from now (it'll be some kind of hybrid iMac/Apple TV/HDTV,) I just don't think it's coming so soon.

As for Blue-Ray... well, it's going to happen sooner or later. People have been pinpointing dates for the past year and a half now if I'm not mistaken and they've all been wrong. Maybe this one will finally be right for a change. And maybe it won't.

Also, didn't Kevin Rose already say Blue-Ray support was coming in Mac OS X 10.5.6? We're only at 10.5.4 so far (unless am I by chance not up to date?) So unless Apple wants to release 10.5.5 on Monday and immediately follow up with 10.5.6 on Tuesday, one of the two rumors are going to be proved incorrect.

[Thegaber777]

I'm very skeptical about Apple adding a blu-ray player to the macbooks (although I would LOVE it).

From what I have seen from Apple's direction for the future is digital download. They did not want Blu-ray or HDDVD to win, they supported iTunes.
You can see this furthermore with the MacBook Air, no cd drive at all. I feel it more likely that we see no cd drive (though I REALLY hope not) than a Blu-ray drive.
If you also look at things like compressor, it has presets for HD video but they never updated it with a preset for Blu-ray, only HDDVD. More hints toward not liking blu-ray.

I hope I am dead wrong but we'll see Tuesday.