secret "product transition" ?

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  • Reply 21 of 23
    hookhook Posts: 42member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by drazztikka View Post


    Maybe everything that has a screen will go touchscreen?



    Personally, I don't see them doing that for a while, especially with the macbook pros. Those keyboard shortcuts are crucial in CS3 (and other professional software). Being able to use them without looking, is part of what makes them great timesavers.



    The macbook pros are still geared towards professionals. Maybe eventually there will be that transition, but it would probably have to go hand in hand with a software transition on the part of Adobe, and other professional grade software makers. To truly take advantage of touch screens there would probably need to be an interface overhaul for a lot of software.



    If that does happen, perhaps the macbooks would see it first. Or maybe even a new product (tablet?). However I'm guessing that something like that is more likely to appear at Macworld.
  • Reply 22 of 23
    MarvinMarvin Posts: 15,310moderator
    The transition is somewhere in the July-September period, which suggests it's Mac related. Snow Leopard isn't until mid-2009 so it can't be OS X for PCs - this is obvious for reasons other than timeframe. It's unlikely to be mobile device (iphone, ipod) related as nothing needs to be done here - the prices are low and people are buying. Touch is too early IMO.



    Recently, clone vendors are cropping up with products that are far cheaper than what Apple offers and we know already that Apple's offerings are usually more expensive than the equivalent PC. I think Apple can shake off the 'Macs are too expensive' reputation without cheapening the brand by doing exactly what is suggested - cutting back on profit margins.



    Given that Montevina is here in this July-September time frame, it makes sense that Apple will have something related to this. I can't see them bringing out a new product like a tablet - not when the emphasis was on profits. I just think we will see cheaper Macs.



    I think if Apple shaved off £100-200 here and there, they'd sell much better. How could anyone say a Mini for £299 was expensive? Even second hand computers aren't that cheap. £599 for a metal Macbook would be very competitive with PC laptops. Dell does advertise laptops at £350 or so but they aren't great machines - maybe if Apple had a £499 laptop, it would help though.



    The Macbook Pro could do with coming down in price. £1300 is a bit steep. It's a nice machine but for that to be the only 15" laptop they have, it's an expensive jump from the Macbook. I would like to see a sub-£1000 15" laptop, even if it was a Macbook Pro with no ExpressCard, FW800 or dedicated GPU.



    It shouldn't bother Macbook Air sales as that's a specialized product and Apple know that. The Mac Pro is quite well priced as it is but anything off is a bonus. Although I don't like the iMac model, I saw the 20" one in the refurb store for £660 once and I couldn't help thinking that it was a pretty good deal. If Apple take the base iMac down to just £699, they're on to a good thing.



    Hopefully these products will arrive sooner rather than later in this July-September period though. Any stock shortages lately?
  • Reply 23 of 23
    wizard69wizard69 Posts: 13,377member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by ksec View Post


    PA Semi? A Special Version of ARM Cortex A9 QuadCore instead of Intel X86?



    Highly unlikely



    Seriously Apple could go a to Cortex A9 in a number of different variants from single to quad core. The advantage to them is huge as Intel just can't get its act together in the mobile space. One only has to look at Talopia and wonder what the hell that was designed for.



    Further if PA Semi in junction with a foundry can deploy a 45nm ARM Cortex A9 the performance per watt ought to be extraordinary.



    In any event one should not worry to much about the number of cores this mystery PA chip may have. The reality is that the iPhone currently has many ARM cores in it. They don't all serve as applications processors but each and everyone of them is very important to being able to deliver all the functionality in an iPhone. Dual core doesn't even have to imply traditional SMP usage of those cores. Broadcom for example expects that one of the cores in its dual core chip would be used mostly for processing the radio spectrum and communications.



    So maybe Quad core won't happen but the reality is that multiple cores are the way to performance and low power usage. Since Apple most definitely needs a low power solution, my bets are on PA Semi developing an ARM implementation that is state of the art and highly optimized as a SoC for Apples needs.



    Dave
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