Digital Lifestyle Device

marksmall50

First post!



I have been reading mac rumor sites for a few years now and there has always been talk of Apple releasing a portable device, whether it be a pda, cellphone, tablet, powerpod, etc. There definately is a demand from Apple's supporters to fill this void. With the personal computer emerging as the digital hub it makes sense for Apple to move in this direction - sitting on so many wonderful technologies (wifi, bluetooth, rendezvous, speech/handwriting recognition, etc.) that when combined would make the perfect handheld.

Personally I think Apple's next device will be a phone. Using the same approach as they did with the iPod they have the potential to redefine the way we communicate. Check out this page:

http://www.zyxel.com/product/P2000W.html

The new product could be little phone with wifi that can use voip to talk to others. It potentially would circumvent tradional charges for longdistance phone use. (www.iphone.org) With a small color touchscreen to use ichat video conferencing and view iTunes/Quicktime content on demand. An interface similar to the iPod would even work - it's touch wheel looks alot like the rotary wheels on vintage telephones. Drop a 2 Gb harddrive and cam in there for picture/video capture. Bluetooth would allow it to sync up with your mac or other devices in the vicenity.

Putting all these features into such a tiny space while keeping the price on earth will be the real challenge. Anyone have any thoughts?

ipodandimac

this gets discussed a lot. i think we're all to the point now where if apple comes out with something like that, then that'll be great, but we're not expecting it. the cellphone market is already dominated by a few companies, and it would be a waste of apple's R & D to put out such a device. i think the closest we'll come to a phone is perhaps nokia or some cell company hooking up with apple and putting OS X and a large capacity hard drive on new phones.