Ultra-portable Apple notebook to splash down at Macworld Expo

1246715

Comments

  • Reply 61 of 295
    melgrossmelgross Posts: 33,510member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by umijin View Post


    What kind of assinine comment is that? It's been done before by several people, including an acquaintance of mine - at least with Tiger. It's not a secret, or anything new.



    If Apple won't build what we want, we'll make the OS work for us on the hardware we want.



    No you won't. I've see a couple of those machines with OS X on them, done by people who could write an OS from scratch, if they wanted to.



    But, the machines had problems, and ran erratically, woudn't run all software. Some hardwar features didn't work, etc.



    It's done more for a lark than for any serious use. If you saw your friends machine in use for any length of time, you would know that, no matter what he might claim.
  • Reply 62 of 295
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by shanmugam View Post


    no optical drive, this will create huge debate,but it could be good like what happened with Floppy Drives ...



    If you own a Mac, you already own an external optical drive that you could use with this rumored ultra-portable.



    If you boot your current Mac into target disk mode(by holding down the "T" key during the boot sequence), the hard drive and the optical drive can be used by another Mac by simply attaching a FireWire cable.



    Target disk mode is one of the coolest and most useful features of Macs.
  • Reply 63 of 295
    irelandireland Posts: 17,798member
    I don't know how Steve is going to bullshit his way into getting people to believe this is an ultra-portable - I suppose we'll have to wait and see.



    I personally don't expect "the" 11" Mac touch until around September 2008. This is merely a thin 13" Mac notebook.
  • Reply 64 of 295
    shanmugamshanmugam Posts: 1,200member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Johnny Mozzarella View Post


    If you own a Mac, you already own an external optical drive that you could use with this rumored ultra-portable.



    If you boot your current Mac into target disk mode(by holding down the "T" key during the boot sequence), the hard drive and the optical drive can be used by another Mac by simply attaching a FireWire cable.



    Target disk mode is one of the coolest and most useful features of Macs.



    thanks, i am still a basic user, hope to try that one day
  • Reply 65 of 295
    bentonbenton Posts: 161member
    Is incorporation of eReader efficiency technologically feasible in an ultra portable led screen or must eReaders be a dedicated device? If education text ebooks become available with distribution through iTunes store the education market might explode.



    Apple be greener and save trees and the backs of our school children.
  • Reply 66 of 295
    Hurray for Japan who can't seem to want a laptop unless it's a sub-laptop.



    This should help that area.



    For myself? BFD.
  • Reply 67 of 295
    I have to wonder if Apple will ever take down its prices, or use a shiny new computer model to keep its prices $500 or $600 higher than its competitors.



    Here, in Canada, Apple didn't adjust its prices for the rise in value of the Canadian dollar when compared to the U.S. dollar. To quote from the computer specialist on radio, Saturday, just before the Christmas shopping season: "If you go with Apple, you'll pay $500 or $600 more than if you go with the competition".



    Way to sell computers, Apple! We're not all dumb, psychotic or hopeless fanboys. When are you going to get your act together, put an end to your insane, demented CEO and VP bonus policy, and address every market segment with competitively priced computers?



    Some of us are losing patience that you will ever change before you go bankrupt, or Steve Jobs dies, whichever comes first.



    This coming January, are you going to sell a competitively priced Penryn Quad-core Intel iMac, or should I go with an HP computer? My whole family wants to buy Penryn quad-core computers, should we all go with HP because you can't get your act together?



  • Reply 68 of 295
    bageljoeybageljoey Posts: 2,004member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Ireland View Post


    I don't know how Steve is going to bullshit his way into getting people to believe this is an ultra-portable - I suppose we'll have to wait and see.



    I personally don't expect "the" 11" Mac touch until around September 2008. This is merely a thin 13" Mac notebook.



    Bummer, I was expecting you to be less philosophical about this...
  • Reply 69 of 295
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Ireland View Post


    I don't know how Steve is going to bullshit his way into getting people to believe this is an ultra-portable - I suppose we'll have to wait and see.



    I personally don't expect "the" 11" Mac touch until around September 2008. This is merely a thin 13" Mac notebook.



    Everywhere, people around the internets are saying the same thing. People are complaining about a possible 13" screen, keyboard style, lack of HD space, lack of optical drive, etc.



    Wait until January, see what they are going to release, I know once Steve uses his RDF, everyone's gonna be bustin' out the credit cards.
  • Reply 70 of 295
    Maybe it's the new über-secret Apple CheckBook!
  • Reply 71 of 295
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by AppleInsider View Post


    In a detailed research report last month, she explained that a launch early next year could help the company achieve her current "Bull Case" scenario, which would include per-share earnings of $7.00 for the 2008 calendar year.



    "We continue to believe our bull case scenario of $7 earnings-per-share and a $225 stock is increasingly likely given operating leverage and the upcoming launch of an ultramobile Mac," Huberty told clients.



    Other analysts who've weighed in with their thoughts on the matter include American Technology Research analyst Shaw Wu and Piper Jaffray analyst Gene Munster.



    Can anyone explain why AAPL is crashing the past week? I don't see any news that is so negative for Apple that people would be dumping shares and yet AAPL has lost almost $40 since it peaked at $192.68. I'd buy some more at today's price except I figure I'll wait another day or two to see if it drops further. This is crazy.



    Mark
  • Reply 72 of 295
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by barney View Post


    FINALLY! a replacement for my 12" PB



    I second that!. My PB 12" 1GHZ is getting old. Optical drive was always picky with certain discs and now it doesn't work at all. I had to replace my dead HDD a a couple years ago. It was my primary machine at the time.



    Looking forward to getting a new ultraportable to replace it. I'll turn my PB 12" into a network video surveillance appliance.
  • Reply 73 of 295
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Magic_Al View Post


    I can't believe anybody's excited by this rumor coming up for the umpteenth time. I'll believe it when it's not a rumor.



    I for one am not at all excited that this might actually be true, because if it is then it means that we won't have any reasonably-priced tower any time soon.



    I can't believe Apple is ready to address a niche market instead of concentrating on filling the gap between the iMac and the Mac Pro. I currently have an iMac Core 2 Duo (white), and I'm not at all happy with the general reliability of the machine, nor the quality of its monitor. If Apple continues to insist in not providing us one of the most popular computer form factors, I will look elsewhere next time I need to renew my hardware and then I'll go and install Mac OS X on it.
  • Reply 74 of 295
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Mark Dodel View Post


    Can anyone explain why AAPL is crashing the past week? I don't see any news that is so negative for Apple that people would be dumping shares and yet AAPL has lost almost $40 since it peaked at $192.68. I'd buy some more at today's price except I figure I'll wait another day or two to see if it drops further. This is crazy.



    Mark



    It's simple really, over-evaluation. Apple's market capitalisation is currently above IBM's, which when you think about it sounds pretty crazy...
  • Reply 75 of 295
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Ireland View Post


    I don't know how Steve is going to bullshit his way into getting people to believe this is an ultra-portable - I suppose we'll have to wait and see.



    I personally don't expect "the" 11" Mac touch until around September 2008. This is merely a thin 13" Mac notebook.



    Call it whatever you like. Ultraportable, subnotebook, notebook, laptop, none of these terms are 'defined'. I'm looking for a really light and small portable computer from Apple. That rules out anything below 11" widescreen and 12" 4:3 screen because below that the keyboard gets too cramped, and consequently I wouldn't call it (sub-)notebook computer any more. Then again, 11" widescreen laptops do not offer enough screen height I think, judging from all those Sony subnotebooks. 13" widescreen is perfect in my eyes, and the actual computer might come out a little smaller than the MacBook as you can shave off quite a bit all around the screen.

    Furthermore, 3lb with decent battery life (at least 5h of real if light use such as word processing or web surfing should be feasible) is better than 2.5lb with a so-called small battery that will just survive a few secs of power outage...
  • Reply 76 of 295
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by camimac View Post


    It's simple really, over-evaluation. Apple's market capitalisation is currently above IBM's, which when you think about it sounds pretty crazy...



    IBM is really a shell of its former self. They have jettisoned a lot of their software products and unloaded their pc lines. That leaves them their server and mainframe market. Still sizable, but no one buys an all-IBM solution any more. They are mostly a service/support company now with lots of competition from others including m$ft.



    Mark
  • Reply 77 of 295
    crees!crees! Posts: 501member
    Quote:

    Anyway.. I won't be missing an optical drive, I use it very rarely. Though it's crucial to me that i does have FireWire and USB2 .... If it slims down to crazy slim Apple has to make some kind of slim multi-cable or something in order to connect it to external devices..



    Obviously, since no one buys software these days and just pirates it off the net, then stores it on an external drive. Who needs an optical drive.
  • Reply 78 of 295
    Add me to the chorus of current 12" PowerBook users wanting a thinner, lighter replacement. Fingers' crossed this rumour eventually becomes reality. I need a new portable for the month out of the office come February.



    Whether or not you consider it a subnotebook or ultraportable or whatnot, the old 12" G4 Powerbook form-factor is about as small as you want to go. I own a couple of Toshiba Librettos which are tiny little things with 7" screens and mini keyboards, but you just can't type on them. The old Duos and Powerbook 2400 keyboards are pretty much on the limit - still usable but people with big mits found them a struggle.



    I'd be happy with this: take the 12" PB shape, shorten the lid and base by about 25mm/1" and change the screen to a 1440x900 high pixel density (think iPhone, iPod Nano) wide screen LCD; remove the Superdrive completely and use a solid state HD - at least 60Gb - so the base thickness is halved; give it 2 USB2 ports, 1 FW800, 1 FW400, audio I/O, ethernet, mini DVI and an ExpressCard slot, the fastest processor that can be installed without burning a hole in it and - most importantly - give it a proper video card, to differentiate it from the MacBooks.



    Oh, and make it black-anodised aluminium. Or carbon fibre!



    An external USB Superdrive would be included in the price; I'm not sure if the world is ready to ditch DVD just yet, especially as much of the software you need to install still comes on DVD or CD. Maybe when Apple start selling digital downloads of OSX... ;-)



    An optional docking station would be cool, though assuming all the ports can physically fit on the subnotebook then it would just be a nice way of plugging into your "office" set up without having to unplug 5-6 cables.



    Whether or not it could or should include a multi-touch screen, I'm not sure. Apple could make it a convertible notebook but they seem to have fizzled on the PC market. A work colleague has a Compaq tc4400 which is quite cool but pretty expensive, and they don't seem to offer anything like it any more. As for a full on tablet Mac - iPhone+SDK may solve that.



    Cost will be important. There's still a big gap between the top MacBook and bottom 15" MacBookPro. The 12" PB used to fill that void, so presumably a new premium subportable would too. The cost of the SSD alone would make it fairly pricey and pushing the 15" MacBook Pro price bracket, which would make multitouch less likely.



    Anyway, all pie-in-the-sky dreaming... January can roll on quick enough.
  • Reply 79 of 295
    aplnubaplnub Posts: 2,605member
    I am #1 on the I want an ultra-portable band wagon but a 13" screen does not meet my definition. I want a 10" or 11" screen 16:9 ratio.



    13" Dang, might as well be 17" on the go.



    With 13" no reason to leave out the optical drive as the point of the ultra-portable is to be portable and a 13" screen works against that.



    I'll still buy it, but I won't be totally happy about it.
  • Reply 80 of 295
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by aplnub View Post


    With 13" no reason to leave out the optical drive as the point of the ultra-portable is to be portable and a 13" screen works against that.



    Thickness, weight, and battery life are three other factors that affect portability. 13 inches would be the mininum screen size that's I'd want. That's for sure.
Sign In or Register to comment.