Next MacBook to Include Glass Trackpad, Due in September?

[probably]

it would certanly be great to have a hole lot of menus and possibilities in the trackpad... but what happens to the hole porpouse of the trackpad then? how would i control the mouse with lots of icons and buttons taking space?

anyways... very excited to september

This is solved by...not covering it with icons.

This would be a really weird design departure though. I can't visualize two illuminated surfaces on their normally harmonious and monolithic arrangements.

 

[mixmacface]

as great as this sounds, and as disappointed as i am since i JUST ordered a new macbook (should be here today or tomorrow), i think i'll still be happy with what i ordered. i needed a macbook now, and i got one. and i agree with whoever said it's impossible to always have the most recent up-to-date piece of technology. technology is always moving, always changing. but idk if i'd like the glass trackpad. we'll see.

 

[morespce54]

The trackpad on the new notebook is to be made of glass and support multi-touch and the use of gestures, but the notebook will not incorporate a multi-touch screen.

I'm sorry for the (possibly dumb) question but what exactly is a "trackpad made of glass"?

Are the current MBP trackpads made of glass?

 

[JfcA09]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 2_0 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/525.18.1 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/3.1.1 Mobile/5A347 Safari/525.20)

It seems like Apple will lose a lot of back-to-school business if they don't release the new laptops in August. Myself included.

 

[50548]

i would not mind a september update. that's about the time i'll be due for a notebook upgrade

Same here, this is excellent news indeed..!

Although I am not a heavy portable computing user, it's about time to replace my good ol' iBook G3, especially when I am facing 3 weeks of outside meetings...bring it on, Apple!

Ideal specs for me:

- any reasonably fast C2D processor;
- 12" or 13" screen;
- no optical;
- all standard wireless connections PLUS FW, USB and Ethernet;
- multitouch trackpad and full-sized keyboard;
- at least some low-end dedicated GPU;
- 2Gb RAM built-in.

 

[OS X Dude]

Or...iPhone *screen* where the trackpad is.

An extra small display with contextual displays and menus/purpose?

A loupe for taking a manipulable look at things?

That does vaguely fit (and so do a thousand other ideas/directions) under the conference call notion that they are going to take a margin hit for 'technology no one else can compete with.'

It won't be cost effective if it was like a second screen with icons and the like. Look at the Optimus keyboard.

 

[wadejc85]

Apple would lose alot of business with the college kids that are hoping to get an update before school starts

Yes they would (and will if they have a late release date)!! Let's hope for late August or early September!

 

[Ironduke]

A glass trackpad? That just doesn't sound right!

but it feels right, many of us have been controlling our macs with our iphones/touches for a while

 

[OS X Dude]

I'm sorry for the (possibly dumb) question but what exactly is a "trackpad made of glass"?

Are the current MBP trackpads made of glass?

All laptops (most actually, not all) have a little square at the bottom you use as a mouse. That's a trackpad. Imagine that made of glass.

 

[orion123]

Why is everyone complaining about smudges? The majority of the time you'd be using the glass-screen trackpad would be without looking at it: you'd be pointing and scrolling and rotating and pinching and all the other new gestures, but your eyes would be on the primary screen, which wouldn't be getting smudged.

When there WAS something to look at on the mini-screen, it wouldn't be high info-density, it'd just be icons and buttons and the like, which - if you've used an iPhone - don't get bothered by smudges at all as the screen is so bright.

This will be very cool and well thought-out. I could see occasional contextual uses of a little iphone screen on my trackpad: say I'm editing an image and need to draw on it: perhaps the image itself is placed on the trackpad. Someone else here suggested a zooming loupe over text or photos which would be a great application of this.

I need a new laptop in September so this would be perfect timing.

 

[newborn]

Hopefully MBP update really in late September! Back to school promo will start around 15 Sep. here in Europe.

 

[orion123]

It won't be cost effective if it was like a second screen with icons and the like. Look at the Optimus keyboard.

Hence Apple's lowered margin guidance for '09

 

[faffoo]

Reality Distortion Field

So you believe there will be a Apple Special Event in August. If so what do you think will be anounced there besides this. New iMac, Tablet Mac Book or what???

 

[olakthepolak]

Well my personal thought is that this will be held off, and become a new product.

Also this sounds like a bad ideo business wise, I personally think this new MacBook will definitely be more expensive, and myself included liked the choice between plastic and aluminum.

 

[orion123]

So you believe there will be a Apple Special Event in August. If so what do you think will be anounced there besides this. New iMac, Tablet Mac Book or what???

My unscientific guess would be an Apple event in the first 2 weeks of September announcing new iPods (nano and touch) shipping immediately, and the new Mac Books and MBPs, shipping in the last couple days of September.

 

[andrewdale]

All I've got to say, is the wife is really wanting a MBP right now. We're waiting until 2009 so it can be a write-off for that year since we've got her D300 and 17-55 lens on this years.

However, this just may make things one step harder to handle!

 

[smootling]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 2_0 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/525.18.1 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/3.1.1 Mobile/5A347 Safari/525.20)

It seems like Apple will lose a lot of back-to-school business if they don't release the new laptops in August. Myself included.

Agreed. I've already got the Asus model I want lined up at newegg. I can justify the apple tax to an extent, but If i'm going to get last year's model, it might as well be for a great price.

 

[iOrlando]

Looks like I will be going with the iPod promotional instead. Oh well.

My only question is all this talk about quarter margins being squeezed. Obviously, the quarter ends at the end of september, so this product wouldnt have too much impact on financials if it is released the final days of the quarter. Where are margins being squeezed? The ipod promotional or did they mean the October quarter? Very confusing. But it makes sense. No way they will update any products with this iphone shortage still going on. And any big release would get a big show off not a subtle release.

The back to school crowd got served though with the macs. At least they get ipod touches.

 

[thedarkhorse]

I submitted the idea of using an screen like the iphone's in place of a trackpad last year to apple.

What it displays would dynamically change depending on the open app and cursor position. It would have side buttons like iphone icons on the screen and their action would depend on what the mouse is over. So if it's hovering over an image on a wepage the buttons are perhaps "save image, print image, copy image, copy image url, etc." then when the mouse is over a link it might say "open in new tab, new window, copy link, download linked file". Pretty much a lot of the options you get when right clicking on an object but without the clicking. The middle of the screen could be used to display animations on how to do different gestures, like a pinch zooming animation when you have a photo open in iphoto.

And adding 3.5" touch screens wouldn't add a whole lot of cost, look at the teardown costs of an iphone and look at what the screen costs, not very significant when you look at the price of a macbook pro. It wouldn't be near what an optimus keyboard costs with all it's tiny screens.

 

[ipodtouchy333]

This may actually force me to finally move to mac. Anyways, what do you guys think the prices may be? Around $1500 or 3 different prices exactly like right now? I better start saving.............

 

[aapl.jlo]

So let me think about this. If you make a glass touchpad, what would be the difference. If they do this, it would only make sense if they had another screen down there. Say for instance you were using DVD player, the touchpad could change into a controller--play, skip, volume buttons--and with the large MacBook Air touchpad, I couldn't imagine the new Macbooks with anything smaller. This is a huge bound for Apple

 

[Scathach]

End of September... okay thats cool I know what I am spending my left over financial aid money on now. I love the idea of a glass trackpad, I hate how grungy the trackpad gets after a year of use.

 

[Holmes89]

The only thing is we also heard rumors that the next release would be June but that turned out to be inaccurate.... I think that they can't afford to not but the new chips in until the end of September.....

 

[macworkerbee]

If the macbook is revised as described by this rumor AND comes down to a price point below $1000 then I would be VERY interested.

 

[bigmc6000]

Well glass would only be useful if there's a screen behind it but that seems pretty stupid to have on a laptop. I mean, unless you're a "hunt and peck"-er then you don't look at the keyboard and all the multi-touch stuff doesn't need glass (as is evident in the MBP). I think he's just grasping at straws here as putting a glass touchpad in only for the purpose of having it be glass is just stupid and Apple wouldn't waste money on something so pointless. Just give it the multi-touch trackpad of the MBP and call it a day on that front...