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Apple Ultra-Portable MacBook Rumor Roundup

not gonna happen

JonasLondon said:
Agree, I'd rather have a "portable optical drive with me sometimes" than a "250 GB portable FW400 hd constantly". I'd still have the 50 GB WB Passport when travelling for backups, but the most important thing is: I would love one of these machines, and pretty most certainly buy one immediately.

I can already picture the various coffee places filled with people using this baby Apple notebook beauty!

Only one long vacation to go, and I'm ready to order right after the San Francisco party! :)
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Apple never repeats a product. At least not exactly the same product.

If, as you are hoping, it has a small HD and an optical drive, it wouldn't be a sub-notebook at all, it would be essentially the 12" PowerBook G4 again. It would also make it hardly any different from the 13.3" MacBook they already offer, except in an aluminium case.

Since most folks already think that the MacBooks are going to be aluminium soon anyway, this makes little sense. Hopefully, they will phase out the ugly plastic MacBooks soon, but the possible ultra-portable and the possible tablet should be different animals altogether. Otherwise, why bother making them at all?
 
any rumors that swirl like this reguarding apple are usually not only met, but exceeded. the first company to find away to integrate a nand hd at an affortable price with make a lot of money. this would bring a whole new range on comumers and business peoople into apples market. Also, think of the rumors surrounding the iphone, and how once it came out, although it was expected, it blew our minds. This new generation laptop will start another revolution like the iphone did.

apologies for the long post.
 
DaBrain said:
Well for some of us with not so great eye sight a larger screen is really a necessity, say 7 in diag or larger. I have a iTouch but the screen is just to small for me to enjoy it. That's just me and me poor eyes!:)
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I agree that a screen that's at least larger than the Touch (but hopefully no bigger than the MB) is necessary in the class of product we're talking about here. I was trying to voice my general opposition to suggestion of another sealed product without the ability to replace the battery.
 
I hope they finally bring larger-than-iPhone multitouch to the customer at a somewhat affordable price. Wishful thinking eh...
 
Sijmen said:
I hope they finally bring larger-than-iPhone multitouch to the customer at a somewhat affordable price. Wishful thinking eh...
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Your choice of the word "finally" has an interesting ring to it.

Apple's version of the technique has only been around for about 6 months now. I'd be surprised if there are enough software development houses out there right now sufficiently versed the paradigm to be able to deliver a complete suite of productivity applications which can truly do justice to integrating the technology (rather than just slapping it on and giving everything a half-finished feel).
 
kornyboy said:
Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU like Mac OS X; en) AppleWebKit/420.1 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/3.0 Mobile/3B48b Safari/419.3)



People also said that it was a dumb idea to get rid of the floppy drive. I'm sure there will be a way to address all of the concerns that you mentioned. Something clever I'm sure.
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We already see this issue dealt with everyday with ultraportables that have been on the market for the last 6-8 years. It is called an external USB DVD Drive. They are quite small and energy efficient now. I am a particular fan of ones that can be powered off of the USB, reducing the need for wires.

fiiptopdvd.jpg
 
Rivix said:
Just update the 15" in some way please :D
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Given the age of the line and assuming the new laptop is an MBP, it would seem likely that the 15inch and 17inch will get a slightly new look in line with whatever style they have for this new 13/12inch. Would have new Intel chips, possible use of SSD (standalone or given the larger footprint with an HDD as well. Oh and new video cards.

Dunno, if LED will be available for 17inch. Obviously Apple and other firms are working to make this happen, but we are in the ramp up stage of this technology.

Note that SSD and LED are the only big new technologies in the last few years and so a laptop with these is really worth a look (waiting won't get you so much).
 
goosnarrggh said:
Your choice of the word "finally" has an interesting ring to it.

Apple's version of the technique has only been around for about 6 months now. I'd be surprised if there are enough software development houses out there right now sufficiently versed the paradigm to be able to deliver a complete suite of productivity applications which can truly do justice to integrating the technology (rather than just slapping it on and giving everything a half-finished feel).
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Yes, maybe you are right. I'm primarily interested from a developer perspective. I'd like to fiddle with it and see what kind of games can be made using it. And 'regular' software of course ;)
 
The battery life would very much interest me: Apple tends to make laptops with better battery life for the same specs than other manufacturers. The ultraportable Sony VAIO G11 (which I'm currently considering buying) gets 9 hours — anything less than that would put it right out of question. A major part of the question will likely be whether they use low voltage or ultra-low voltage CPUs, and Core 2 Solo or Core 2 Duo chips (the former have a TDP of just over half of the latter).
 
Toshiba R500 as benchmark for Apple

The R500 really needs to be our benchmark. 12inch, 2.3lbs with HDD drive option (in this case even includes a DVD drive) and , SSD (which takes weight down to 1.7 (and DVD is out with). This is what I expect Apple to decisively beat - or at least match- in terms of weight, performance and other factors.

1232163


Link with details here:
http://www.toshibadirect.com/td/b2c/pressdetail.jsp?editorialoid=385254

With the SSD and the optical drive removed, it is a fully function 12inch laptop, with a good usuable keyboard for 1.7 lbs.

Note that SSD and LED with an efficient processor allows a smaller battery further saving on weight while still giving you hours of usage...

I am just waiting to see how Apple trumps them. I also still find the 12inch screen painful to use in widescreen (I am writing this on a G4 12inch ibook) and so praying for a 13.3.
 
link92 said:
The battery life would very much interest me: Apple tends to make laptops with better battery life for the same specs than other manufacturers. The ultraportable Sony VAIO G11 (which I'm currently considering buying) gets 9 hours — anything less than that would put it right out of question. A major part of the question will likely be whether they use low voltage or ultra-low voltage CPUs, and Core 2 Solo or Core 2 Duo chips (the former have a TDP of just over half of the latter).
Click to expand...

I don't know if Apple would go with a weaker chip. Do they have a history of this? I do not recall it. My guess is they prefer the energy savings to come from an SSD, LED combo. I lack the technical background to know what kind of energy savings can be gotten from the Core 2 Duo and the new chips due in January (being faster, they can do the same task for less energy than existing chiips right?) But you guys tell me...
 
Based on the rumors you can not compare this to the EeePC. The EeePC is 7" and 2/4/8GB. How can you compare that with 12/13" and 32/64GB? Obviously there is going to be a huge price difference.

External optical is a no-brainier via either USB/FireWire/ExpressCard. You can burn your moves to the NAND drive and still watch them on the plane.

Could you imagine 14Hr battery life?

Multi-touch... Why? it'd be insansely expensive on the actually display. I could see them do it on the touch pad and maybe eliminate the mouse button at the same time... but a display under the touchpad? Why? nobody looks at there touch pad.

Why aren't more people trying to name this thing, or am I not paying attention... MacFolder? MacPaper? DietMacBook? LipoBook?

I fully expect there to be a major MBP update as well since the difference between the new MB and the MBP is so slim at this point. Yeah! that's what I need... unless the price of this new slim laptop is actually cheap enough to justify buying it in combo with an iMac instead of a high end MBP.
 
NYCMacFan said:
The R500 really needs to be our benchmark. 12inch, 2.3lbs with HDD drive option (in this case even includes a DVD drive) and , SSD (which takes weight down to 1.7 (and DVD is out with). This is what I expect Apple to decisively beat - or at least match- in terms of weight, performance and other factors.


Link with details here:
http://www.toshibadirect.com/td/b2c/pressdetail.jsp?editorialoid=385254

With the SSD and the optical drive removed, it is a fully function 12inch laptop, with a good usuable keyboard for 1.7 lbs.

Note that SSD and LED with an efficient processor allows a smaller battery further saving on weight while still giving you hours of usage...

I am just waiting to see how Apple trumps them. I also still find the 12inch screen painful to use in widescreen (I am writing this on a G4 12inch ibook) and so praying for a 13.3.
Click to expand...

Toshiba already untrumped themselves.

From their updated specs page :

Physical Description
• Dimensions (WxDxH Front/H Rear): 11.1” x 8.5” x .77”(f)/1.0”(r) without
feet
 
Ok so this can either go 2 ways:

1. We get a ultra portable macbook pro, which will essentially, be useless to professionals, I hate editing on a 17 inch screen let alone a 13 inch one, so for professional users this will be useless, period.

Btw, what were the dimensions of the powerbook 12inch? Why is it apple could make a decent, fully packed 12 inch laptop, but not a 13inch widescreen one :confused: I know, I know 12 inch 4:3 is a bit bigger than 13 inch 16:9, but still...

2. We get a ultra portable macbook, which will essentially, be ok, should be easy enough if there's no cd drive, although I guess I wouldn't buy it if it didn't have a optical drive on it.

Am I the only person who wants just a macbook with a basic (128mb) dedicated graphics card, and that be the ultra portable macbook?

The technology is already here to make this product work, it just depends on who apple decides to aim/price it at...

I expect full on flaming at me :rolleyes:
 
Sorry to read your post...

BWhaler said:
At this point, I just want Apple to put out quality products.

Sure, innovation is fun.

But the heat, bugs, fit and finish issues, and don't get me started on the displays, and other general quality problems are just getting brutal.

It is stressful to open a new Mac. You just don't know what you are going to get.

I would love to buy something like this to complement my 17", but the quality problems are just too brutal with Apple of late.
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I have had Apple computers since 1988, with only 2 issues, with 1 iBook being sent back for keyboard issues, (keys kept popping off).

i now have a new 24" iMac Extreme, and I could not be happier, even after reading all the problems and complaints and how many times someone exchanged their iMac!
 
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