Quote:
Originally Posted by
appleeinstein 
I would love to see them drop the differentiation between the MB and MBP lines - let me get a base configuration 17" or a superpower 13".
One other thing to consider: from patents like
this it's obvious that Apple will be coming out with a multitouch keyboard (they took out another patent that allows the screen to differentiate between contact and pressure and another one that allows for a hidden tactile factor so that you could "feel" the keys) screen for some kind of application. "Unprecedented integration of typing, resting, pointing, scrolling, 3D manipulation, and handwriting." So do you think that the new unified MB line will keep conventional keyboards or have an option for a multitouch dual screen (DS) configuration or what? Will the multitouch keyboard be only for the ultraportable? I would love to see a 17" DS.
A dual-screen device will never be released by Apple. There, I said it.
A desktop with a 12º flat MT keyboard maybe (think 11" X 4.5" high-resolution screen lying almost-flat on desk, capable of displaying anything on it, and when you launch an app you can set it to change to display buttons and present a UI tailored specifically for that app), but when we are talking about a MT portable, I think the writing's on the wall for a single screen MT Mac device, as in a tablet. The whole advantage of MT it that you can get rid of the keyboard, not replace it with a screen. There's a few reasons for this. One, battery life with two screens goes way down, a very bad idea in that regard. Two, if you are going to have a surface separate from the screen most people would simply rather have a physical keyboard.
The whole point of MT is that you can interact with the actual screen itself, and pop-up a keyboard which takes up zero physical space "only" when needed. A space saver, one of the primary importances of a portable, and a new portable personal computer paradigm. Sure on-screen keyboards have been done before, but they weren't done well enough to be taken seriously. The iPhone shows that Apple can pull it off, and on an 11" wide-screen they'll make it even better.
The reasons people (including myself) still buy desktop computers is one, power, and two, screen size. MT on a desktop screen doesn't work because the screen is both too big, and vertical. Touching a big, vertical desktop screen for 5 minutes is tiring, not to mention for a day of work. The separate MT keyboard is an evolution in that regard. The "revolution" is coming on the portable side, even if a MT desktop keyboard may seem like a revolution to some people, and actually would if Apple can find a way to make it also work as a mouse too, thus leap-frogging the mouse problem they have yet to overcome, perhaps by telling it to move the vertical screens' cursor when only one finger rests on it and moves across it? Though I'm not quite sure that would be worth replacing the mouse for, or if it would be near as efficient as the mouse is in the real world.
How would a Mac touch (11" tablet) work in the real world? Well it would be a MT screen with the computer built behind it, it would have SSD internal storage, it "wouldn't" have an optical disk drive, it would be very light, very thin, sweet looking, and it would IMO have a "flip-stand" on that rear, which when "in" would be flush and out of the way, and when flipped out would hold the "Mac touch" at a certain angle when resting upon a tray, a desk or a table that would make it pretty easy to type and look at the screen at the same time, when not using it on your lap, walking around, or sitting on the ground etc.
Sony are already shipping an ultraportable with 250dpi. The iPhone is 163dpi.
