Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

Apple PDA/Digital Devices?

Will Apple release a PDA? No. Does Apple already have the Newton 3? Yes, and Disney is using it. What if the devices people are seeing are new prototypes for Disney, and only Disney, just like the current Apple PDAs? Apple is *not* a B-C only company, they do a lot more B-B than people think.

Now all that being said, I'm a little upset at Apple. Look at all the people going ga ga over the IDEA of an Apple PDA. Mac users, PC users, anyone who has heard of Apple wants a PDA. Personally, when I turn on my Newton 2100 every morning I just hope that Apple will surprise me and release a new Newton 3000. I think even John C Dvorak wants Apple to release a PDA!! With all these people screaming for Apple to give them a PDA, why don't they deliver? Use some of the millions that they pumped into the Newton project to create the ultimate PDA. Make sure it only works with Macintosh to try and drive PC users to the Mac. This has the potential to be a real money maker for Apple, and could increase their market share more than 'ol Steve can imagine.

Oh well, I have come to terms with Apple not releasing a new PDA. It upsets me greatly and I don't like the idea, but I'm 99% sure it's true. bad move by Apple, but throughout history Apple has been known for bad moves like this.

Just my $0.02. Some of my facts may be wrong, so please don't take this as gospel.

-Dragon
 
Doubtless Mac could produce an extremely sophisticated and versatile handheld computer which could almost function as a replacement for a laptop, and which would be a very ‘high end’ PDA.

But a handheld doesn't have to be a PDA and I’m not convinced that there’s much point in Apple making a PDA, however cool looking it might be. Nor does Apple need a product which would directly compete with the iBook and TiBook.

If you want to predict what an Apple handheld might be, maybe you need to Think Different. And that rules out another electronic rolodex and diary, which would be like most existing PDAs.

If you look at the iPod, maybe it offers further clues – a device with no real autonomous functionality, completely reliant on the user having a Mac laptop or desktop. A real world replacement for existing technology alternatives (the Walkman) which are already popular and accepted. At the end of the day the iPod is an Apple computer-reliant music player.

I’d see a potentially huge market a firewire based note-pad, broadly equivalent to the iPod, but with text files rather than MP3 music tracks.

This would be a device which would take what you scribble on it, convert it to simple text and then later squirt it down the firewire cable into a new application on your computer (let’s call it 'iNotes'), from where you could then export it into an e-mail, or MS word, or Works, or Quark, or Publisher, or Entourage, or whatever. You should also be able to import MS word and simple text documents into 'iNotes' to then be worked on, added to or edited using the device - perhaps as you commute to work on a crowded train. Maybe you could have a facility to draw pictures or graphs on it which would be stored as GIFs, maybe not. Maybe you could use it to read e-books, maybe not. Maybe you could have some facility for linking to a phone so that you could send SMS text messages or even eMails, maybe not. Perhaps Bluetooth would help here? Maybe (like the iPod) it could double as a hard drive? Crucially, because nothing like it exists, it would be a powerful reason for buying a Mac rather than a PC, just as the iPod is. And it would replace a real world existing technology alternative – the paper notebook!!

Who'd use it? Journos, secretaries, teachers, doctors, even school kids. (Even my wife, doing the shopping list!). In short anyone who ever has to write a note on a piece of paper, a notebook, or an exercise book and then work with that data on a computer.

It would have to have great natural handwriting recognition, since using graffiti makes the Palms unuseable for any more than 'single sentence notes'. It wouldn’t need and shouldn’t have a diary, an address book, or a calculator. It should have no extraneous bull$hit at all. It would just be an electronic jotter and it would be cheap enough to be a must-have.

It would have to be light, cheap, and portable, yet with a big enough screen and writing area to be useful. It would have to be small enough to be carried anywhere, in a big pocket. It would be like a thin Newton, perhaps, and probably with a separate screen and writing area.

Who here wouldn't buy such a device?
 
Re: iGO or iPad

Originally posted by Matt_d


Of corse they will not have a PDA, it will be something like iGO or iPad. ;)
Click to expand...

iGo - eh? That's definetly a new one. I suppose that they will be releasing an iYield and an iStop shortly after that, right? :D (I mean that in the respects of a stop sign.)

:rolleyes:
 
...

I just find it interesting that on the same subject I was shot down on, it could possibly be something in the woodwork...
I will probably get shot down again, and again, and again! But that is alright. Time will tell this story, whether it is for the good or bad, right or wrong...
 
Re: Inkwell already exists in Apple's stores!

Originally posted by gopher
Go to checkout, and what do you have? A card reader with an Aqua interface that you use a stylus to enter your signature in.
Click to expand...

These devices are not running any version of OS X. All they did was skin the interface. There is no handwriting recognition on the iPOS, it just capture your signature and attaches it to the credit card sale.

-Draco
 
Entertainment on a Palm?? hahahahahaha!!! how fast is that DivX movie going to run on your uber 66mhz 68k Palm!!!
HAHAHAHA, what we need are apple pocketpcs :)) 400mhz Xscale and such, or... are they going to use Palm OS 5, and an Xscale/Motorola MX1?? who knows!!! All i know is that i can already play 30fps 320x240x24bit DivX movies on my pocketpc full speed!! with SOUND!!!
 
response to your palm assesment :-D

jadam,
Just FYI, the new Palm OS 5.0 is going to be a lot faster and the hardware architecture that will accompany this new software will be just as amazing. The hardware will be the new Dragonball processor capable of 200 mHz, and the Intel X-scale processor, which is also capable of 206 mHz. These processors will enable the palms the same abilities that your Pocket PC has; the palm will just handle it more effieciently, and simpler. And unlike M$'s approach to handheld technology, applications written before Palm OS 5.0 will be compatible with it(although there is the possibility certain apps won't work, but for the most part applications will work, or will just need to be recompiled with minimal adjustment) Lastly, the palm will come with 64 mb of ram and 32 for the OS. Since we all know palm apps are much smaller,this is more than enough for most people. And for the more ambitious person, there is also the possibility of using the SD cards from panasonic that are on current palm models.
 
Apple PDA

I want Apple to make a PDA very much; however, I already bought an iPod. I'd imagine that if apple made a PDA it would be revolutionary and would be able to play music and be a 10gig hd. What about the ipods? I already spent 500$$ on one. If they make a PDA then what am i gonna do with it?
 
Apple PDA = Male Bovine Excriment

I've been on Apple's campus many times and I can assure you nothing even remotely resembling beta or "test" hardware EVER appears in public-accessable parts of R&D 1.

THERE WILL BE NO APPLE PDA.

There may be a terminal device similar to M$'s "Mira" project but it will by no stretch of the drug soaked imagination be a PDA.

Get over it quickly newbies.:rolleyes:
 
Mischief,

You speak with such authority, and make me (a mere newbie) respect your considerable expertise and knowledge. Or would do if only you could spell
1) Excrement
2) counsellor
3) Anonymous
or 4) Haemorrhoids (or if you spell colour wrongly, as color, then Hemorrhoids would do)

Get over the arrogant and infantile abuse quickly, Neanderthal!:D
 
Counsellor vs Counselor

Both spellings are acceptable.

And you missed "accessible".

Jack'- Good luck trying to enforce strict grammar and spelling on these boards. I've been here long enough to stop worrying about it.
 
Spelling

Yes, you can really tell who uses OmniWeb, and who uses IE5.1-X here.

Posters using OmniWeb will get it....
 
Re: Spelling

Originally posted by MasterX (OSiX)
Yes, you can really tell who uses OmniWeb, and who uses IE5.1-X here.

Posters using OmniWeb will get it....
Click to expand...

OmniWeb's for wimps! :p

I don't use it...all those spelling bees I participated in as a child warped my brain.

I still make the occasional typographical error, though. ;)
 
oh yeah the TOPIC

If we see an Apple "PDA" it'll be one of two things:

1) Uber simple screen, for remote eMail, Web, and text (might need to be within range of mac, maybe not)

2) Super '**** your pants' power 'pda' which kicks so much ass it's sad. 350Mhz ARM2 CPU, with additional tasks to accelerate 'Quartz Lite' making an Aqua-style portable OS. But unlike PocketPC OS (WinCE is Win Pocket now? I dont even pretend to remember) Apple wouldn't chop off the start bar and call it an OS. It'd probably use the farmilliar 'buttons' that Palm OS has (buttons for fast use apps) and a scroll wheel in the center. But apple would be smart enough to add in a dock instead of the writing space/function buttons in Palms, then use that space for a fixed-height dock. I'd bet it'd have slots, instead of variable size in OSX (say 8 slots). The thing would definatly use InkWell handwriting recog system, and if they were OH SO DARING, voice commands/notation. [tangent] THAT would be a feature. I'd like to see a no-screen PDA, i think apple could pull it off, you'd have to work it all by voice, and it'd speak back to you? NAH, oh well just an idea. [/tangent] ANYWAY, i think the voice feature is a real idea, even if it just has voice recording, then you could add a name, to listen to it later. I think streaming off QTSS/QuickTime Broadcaster is a MUST, so it'd have some kind of internet connection. Ideally you could also play a wide variety of other QT6 formats, esp QT Trailers, Sorrenson Video 1/2/3, MPEG4, and the QT STreaming formats.

Weather they go with the low-powered cheap Airport-tablet (call it the iTool) or some super PDA (i wish so bad) I'm sure Apple knows what they're doing, and eventually they'll get around to making a sub-laptop device. In the meantime a Super TiVO w/Superdrive will just have to do. Time will tell, see you at MWNY. 
 
Re: Re: Spelling

Originally posted by Rower_CPU


OmniWeb's for wimps! :p

I don't use it...all those spelling bees I participated in as a child warped my brain.

I still make the occasional typographical error, though. ;)
Click to expand...

OmniWeb is for people with really fast DP G4s, which is why i have wimpered back to IE5 again, until Quartz Extreme at least :¬)

Didn't buy a $290 Radeon8500 for giggles and sh**s
 
all new apple newton

hey everyone just think, the old newton with all new hardware, color, and a newton os somewhat like 10.1. I mean do any of you guys use a newton. THey work great, they are just big and old.
 
Rower-CPU,

Just 'pissed' (in the English sense) and therefore more aggressive than usual, and wanting to burst his arrogant bubble. Who really cares about spellong after all?;)
 
Not Arrogance, proximity to Cupertino.

Leave it to a drunken Brit to dodge hard facts over Typography and Syntax.

It's exactly that kind of idiocy that keeps me out of the Article section most of the time.

I will say this as plainly as I can: Steve Jobs will not lead Apple to develop a device credited to Scully, nor will he dedicate Apple resources to R&D for a doomed market.

PDA's are an "in" product with no long term future for innovation at any reasonable price point. The only major shift in store for the PDA is integration with G3 wireless devices as demonstrated in the Asia Pacific market. In addition, Apple's base market here in the US will not see G3 wireless soon enough or on a wide enough scale to justify entering that most precarious of markets.

BTW: Your credibility suffers more than mine for attacking my use of language while ignoring my points.:p :rolleyes:
 
um yeah... stuffed stuff with all this stuff stuff that you guys say be the stuff but sometimes its scary stuff.... :-D
 
RE:

Mischief,

Your proximity to Cupertino, nor thae amount of posts you have made have any bearing at all on your knowledge of future apple products, you know as little as the rest of us, and frankly seem a little short sighted. And you dont do your credibility any good by generalizing a nation to sooth your damaged ego, relax. I believe Jobs will develop a device and take credit for it, because it will include much more than what is available now. The PDA market is "doomed" id say stagnant, because there is no innovation right now, which is exactly what apple can give it just like they did the MP3 player market. I would have never bought an MP3 player previous to the iPod I never even thought about it, and I am sure many people felt the same way. The same thing will happen with an apple PDA it will not only push that market forward but introduce it to a new audience. This is my opinion, and I dont claim to know when.
 
... XScale runs at 400mhz with 1GHZ planned for next year. Palm OS with 32mb ROM?? WTF??? its only going to be 16mb ROM at MOST!! and 64mb RAM?? hahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha, the new Sony NR has only 16mb RAM!! not to mention the boxy screen!! Palm isnt doing away with graffiti! they are keeping a 320x320 resolution,... sure thats more than PocketPC's, but its a box!!! but... you could run 320x240 on it in portriat...

I just want a Dual 1.4GHZ G4!!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back