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Yeah, I don't really know what people think they will "do" with this multi touch they keep orgasming over. We already have trackpad scrolling and clicking down to a t.

You can even fake multi touch "pinch" zooming if you hold down Ctrl :D
 
How about this:
macbooktouch.jpg


Only a Multi-Touch input device. No touchscreen, just the input has Multi-Touch.
Imagine what you can do with it....

Hmm.. after thinking about how much I really would want this, I've also though about how a touch keyboard, at this point in time anyways, doesn't seem practical. For extended use, you need a physical set of keys you can rattle away on. People just won't be comfortable enough with no tactile feedback.

I'd say the best compromise I could come up with for right now is to basically implement the 'iphone trackpad' idea previously stated. Maybe even make it bigger, say twice the size, taking up a large portion underneath the keyboard, leaving only room to rest your palms. I could see a lot of potential with gestures, and applications to run on the touchscreen portion of the computer. Think of a calculator or basically any widget. I know, it's all been said before, and I feel like talking about this being a reality is about as likely as the Nintendo Wii having 3D effects without the glasses, but I definitely think it would be a great idea. I know Apple will get there eventually, but I'm not sure right now is when we'll see this stuff.
 
How about this....

Make the keyboard a real keyboard, and make the trackpad multi-touch. Lose the big button and make it one really big MT surface. You can even keep the weird black case with silver lining. Give me a real keyboard though.

I don't think the keyboard will go anywhere until something better than it comes along and replaces it.

Please shed some light on this idea for me. As I see it, the track pad is already multi touch, what do you plan on doing with it? Uses, description? When you say make the track pad multi touch, I just don't get what your implying. :confused:

BTW, that multi touch key board photo above looks stellar. I love the idea, and for tactile feedback how about slight vibrations when you hit the keys? Just throwing that out there, heres an idea, trace a key board on a piece of paper and try typing on it, see if you like it. Just a thought.
 
i'd be excited to see a new macbook ultra portable, but am happy with my Macbook now. It'll be a hot seller for travelers when it's released..
 
I think this thread need a nice little bump revival as the rumor mill starts to churn for MacWorld. :p

Yeah.. where are the rumors... I almost start to get worried. :D I will be very pissed if there is noting about any laptop on Mac world :( But we all know, just how steve can suprize us all...On the other side, He is also very good in dissapointing us big time... Like happend couple times before on some loucy keynotes.

Regards,
Bas
 
Please shed some light on this idea for me. As I see it, the track pad is already multi touch, what do you plan on doing with it? Uses, description? When you say make the track pad multi touch, I just don't get what your implying. :confused:

BTW, that multi touch key board photo above looks stellar. I love the idea, and for tactile feedback how about slight vibrations when you hit the keys? Just throwing that out there, heres an idea, trace a key board on a piece of paper and try typing on it, see if you like it. Just a thought.

I don't really know about the mutli touch trackpad, what I do know is that the MT keyboard would be a pain to use. The iPhone's keyboard is horrible IMHO and only IN MY HONEST OPINION (no flames please) so the keyboard on a pro machine or a notebook that is supposed to be used for typing papers would be even worse.

I guess the trackpad could show extra controls or something for Quicktime or for certain apps, maybe they could make the thing really big and use it for some reason unknown to us. Just don't take the real keyboard away and substitute it for a "hey I think this is cool because it's in the iPhone" imaginary keyboard.

I am a Star Trek geek and the fake buttons they hit were pretty big, on a laptop keyboard they are small, so give me REAL keys.

I got one better for you, draw a keyboard on sheet transparency paper and lay that over top of your notebook and see how accurately you can type without looking at the keys. Or pick up an iPhone and hold it so that all you can see is the message that you are typing and try to hit the right keys.
 
touchpanel keyboard like that only needs to have audio "clicks" for it to be much more useable to most people. that would probably do the trick
 
Anyone think there's a possibility that they can at least still fit a decent video card in this laptop? Would be a nice to have at least one that's better than any Intel integrated one for those occasional gaming.
 
touchpanel keyboard like that only needs to have audio "clicks" for it to be much more useable to most people. that would probably do the trick

it may, and dont forget the humps on the F and J key, and the touch panel should be this softish material, otherwise typing would be impossible!!! and altogether, the idea is unrealistic

Hmm.. after thinking about how much I really would want this, I've also though about how a touch keyboard, at this point in time anyways, doesn't seem practical. For extended use, you need a physical set of keys you can rattle away on. People just won't be comfortable enough with no tactile feedback.

I'd say the best compromise I could come up with for right now is to basically implement the 'iphone trackpad' idea previously stated. Maybe even make it bigger, say twice the size, taking up a large portion underneath the keyboard, leaving only room to rest your palms. I could see a lot of potential with gestures, and applications to run on the touchscreen portion of the computer. Think of a calculator or basically any widget. I know, it's all been said before, and I feel like talking about this being a reality is about as likely as the Nintendo Wii having 3D effects without the glasses, but I definitely think it would be a great idea. I know Apple will get there eventually, but I'm not sure right now is when we'll see this stuff.

that is quite a pretty picture, but only if the macbook was aluminum all around, get rid of that touch word, fix up those keys, and make only the screen a glass glossy black bordered thing, it would be nice, and complement the imac a whole lot

I don't really know about the mutli touch trackpad, what I do know is that the MT keyboard would be a pain to use. The iPhone's keyboard is horrible IMHO and only IN MY HONEST OPINION (no flames please) so the keyboard on a pro machine or a notebook that is supposed to be used for typing papers would be even worse.

I guess the trackpad could show extra controls or something for Quicktime or for certain apps, maybe they could make the thing really big and use it for some reason unknown to us. Just don't take the real keyboard away and substitute it for a "hey I think this is cool because it's in the iPhone" imaginary keyboard.

I am a Star Trek geek and the fake buttons they hit were pretty big, on a laptop keyboard they are small, so give me REAL keys.

I got one better for you, draw a keyboard on sheet transparency paper and lay that over top of your notebook and see how accurately you can type without looking at the keys. Or pick up an iPhone and hold it so that all you can see is the message that you are typing and try to hit the right keys.

well, if it were touch keys, they would be bigger, therefore making it easier, but still, as i've said above, it would be useless

Anyone think there's a possibility that they can at least still fit a decent video card in this laptop? Would be a nice to have at least one that's better than any Intel integrated one for those occasional gaming.

i dont think so :(, if this ultra portable becomes part of the family, yes, if it replaces the macbook, no, if its a subnotebook, forget it, the video cards are exclusive to apple's high-end laptops
 
Anyone think there's a possibility that they can at least still fit a decent video card in this laptop? Would be a nice to have at least one that's better than any Intel integrated one for those occasional gaming.

that would definitely be a huge plus... I mean I know heat is an issue, but if other manufacturers can do it, I'm sure Apple can do it better :)
 
I'm looking forward to whatever they come out with. I'm a business traveler. I have a company issued ThinkPad that is okay, but not as lightweight or small as I'd wish. I have a blackberry that has a keyboard that I can't really read without my reading glasses. I'm not happy with it either.

The iphone looks sweet, but it's ATT and that glass screen is a no-no for me as I have a bad habit of dropping my phone in airports and such. I will likely just grab a small windows based smartphone to use to sync to my company outlook stuff.

The only thing on my laptop I really need is contact phone numbers and the ability to surf the net from hotel rooms (boredom eleviation). If this new mac ultraportable is the ****, I'm going to grab one and start leaving the company laptop at home.

I could care a less about multi-touch on it. I have an ipod touch and love it. Great airplane entertainment device. Just give me the tiniest of flash-based ultraportable laptops and I'm going to be really happy. Tablet is not something I'm interested in either. The person that commented about "give me a device three times as big as the itouch and running full leopard" has described my ideal travel solution. I'd say maybe four times the size of the itouch, but if so, multi-touch would be cool.
 
There are a lot of messages here so this may have already been suggested, but I'll bet what we'll see is a 5x7 or 6x8 tablet, with a virtual keyboard of course, integrated graphics (forget 3d), 802.11n, no phone built in, a flip cover, SSD (32 and 64 GB, two models), no optical drive of course but a single USB port to which you can connect a keyboard/mouse/dvd drive, eSATA, and bluetooth. Or, no ports but a dock connection, and an optional dock for it to add a monitor, keyboard, mouse, hard drive, etc.

Basically a supersized iTouch.

Oh, to dream...
 
Small is ok ....

Small is OK, but I would rather have a Blu-Ray DVD in a laptop, why is Sony so much faster then Apple, I thought Apple was the computer for people who work with graphics and video? After a dozen Mac's do I need to go buy an Vaio? So much for Apple being market leaders......

-Hempsci
 
boygenius has posted an article confirming a new apple laptop...
link so click me

oh wow, news:apple:

Small is OK, but I would rather have a Blu-Ray DVD in a laptop, why is Sony so much faster then Apple, I thought Apple was the computer for people who work with graphics and video? After a dozen Mac's do I need to go buy an Vaio? So much for Apple being market leaders......

-Hempsci

apple has been great, but behind in hardware for many years, ever since the intel switch, Apple is catching up with the game, the reason why people are switching to macs now, give it time.

I'm looking forward to whatever they come out with. I'm a business traveler. I have a company issued ThinkPad that is okay, but not as lightweight or small as I'd wish. I have a blackberry that has a keyboard that I can't really read without my reading glasses. I'm not happy with it either.

The iphone looks sweet, but it's ATT and that glass screen is a no-no for me as I have a bad habit of dropping my phone in airports and such. I will likely just grab a small windows based smartphone to use to sync to my company outlook stuff.

The only thing on my laptop I really need is contact phone numbers and the ability to surf the net from hotel rooms (boredom eleviation). If this new mac ultraportable is the ****, I'm going to grab one and start leaving the company laptop at home.

I could care a less about multi-touch on it. I have an ipod touch and love it. Great airplane entertainment device. Just give me the tiniest of flash-based ultraportable laptops and I'm going to be really happy. Tablet is not something I'm interested in either. The person that commented about "give me a device three times as big as the itouch and running full leopard" has described my ideal travel solution. I'd say maybe four times the size of the itouch, but if so, multi-touch would be cool.

at&t isnt bad, you could switch, and there are cases for the iphone
 
What if...
The screen were widescreen, but on the smallish side (12" or less?), and the trackpad was actually a touch screen itself...a wide one that showed the section of the screen you're on, only larger...with the ability to zoom in/out on the visual-touchpad for the area of the screen you're working on.

What if...
the visual touch pad had a easy to hit toggle that switched it from a zoomed copy of the screen segment you're focused on into an on-touchpad keyboard...so your touchpad suddenly had a keyboard on it....removing the need for a large area of the unit to be eaten up by a full keyboard.

Suddenly you'd have a multi-touch trackpad like the iphone/touch...only larger, using a lot of the multi touch logic...including the onscreen keyboard...and have married it to a larger screen with the touch surface now being the primary "multi-function" input device for the unit (toggle-able from touchpad to keyboard with just a flick of a finger)!

Removal of the keyboard alone would allow for dramatically reduced size, but still having the dedicated "bigger non-touch" screen allows you to keep working quickly without having to look around your hands to see what's happening as you work!
 
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