Apple PDA in July '04?

Posted:
in Future Apple Hardware edited January 2014
Hey everybody, I just read an interesting article that gives details on an upcoming Apple PDA! Note that this claim comes along with a report about how Palm is no longer supporting Mac OS X, so it could just be wishful thinking. However, I figured people might want to take a look at the details here:



http://www.macnet2.com/





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SuperMatt
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Comments

  • Reply 1 of 83
    hmurchisonhmurchison Posts: 12,419member
    There will be no "hand wringing" from me over Palms decision. Palm has been a wasteland of ideas for years. I do like the Tungsten PDA's but I'm like many others. Other than basic calendar and contacts I don't have a need for a PDA.



    Apple may get into this area but If they did I'd rather they make a smartphone ala the Treo 600 than a rank and file PDA. The treo is the only thing that has really gotten my interests lately in the PDA arena. Carry two devices is not what I want to do but one device that can accomplish the bread and butter of what I need would get the cash register ringing.
  • Reply 2 of 83
    Yeah. PDA sales are slowing dramatically. Smartphones are the thing at the moment.
  • Reply 3 of 83
    I find it interesting that when companies choose to discontinue support for the Mac for some application (IE, Palm Desktop, Adobe Premier) that the majority response is that the application was crap anyway. This may be true. Don't really know (excpet for IE, which IS crap).



    What appears to be happening is that Apple looks, says "That application is crap. We can do better." They do, then the vendor runs away, tail between legs. Not worth competing.



    Not sure if this is the real dynamic or not. Starting to look that way though.
  • Reply 4 of 83
    tmptmp Posts: 601member
    Palm? C'mon. Everybody here at work is using a BlackBerry.



    I don't need the calendar that much, so I keep addresses on my iPod. Phone numbers I keep in my phone.



    I use my Palm mostly for games at this point.
  • Reply 5 of 83
    hmurchisonhmurchison Posts: 12,419member
    Chris,

    Anytime I see a company that doesn't want to compete for my money I'm leery of supporting that company. Lukewarm interest in getting your product into the hands of as many people as possible should setup a red flag. Generally companies do not do well when they're shrinking the scope of their offerings. Critical Mass is the ultimate goal. Given that Apple ahem, Steves reticence towards PDA's I believe the Apple device would have to be marketed as something "different" than a typical PDA. Hence the Smartphone angle. Bluetooth 1.5 supports headsets right? Therefor it seems that Apple has all the tech they need beyond the actual phone equipment which could be licensed.



    This year may just prove to be just as interesting as 2003. We'll see.
  • Reply 6 of 83
    amorphamorph Posts: 7,112member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by Chris Cuilla

    I find it interesting that when companies choose to discontinue support for the Mac for some application (IE, Palm Desktop, Adobe Premier) that the majority response is that the application was crap anyway. This may be true. Don't really know (excpet for IE, which IS crap).



    This is a fairly refreshing change from even a few years ago, when perfectly good applications would get canned...



    Palm Desktop used to be really sweet, too. Claris Organizer was a nice app. It just languished at Palm, became a Bad Carbon Port(TM), and then languished more.



    Quote:

    What appears to be happening is that Apple looks, says "That application is crap. We can do better." They do, then the vendor runs away, tail between legs. Not worth competing.



    Especially not when you're Palm, and you're preoccupied with trying to keep your head above water.



    iPod is pretty close to handling most of what a PDA is used for, and cell phones are steadily picking up the rest.
  • Reply 7 of 83
    stoostoo Posts: 1,490member
    I wonder... how long before an integrated phone/PDA/half decent digital camera/MP3 player/802.11 device? The Sony Clié TJ 37 is alsmost there but isn't a phone (yet). And needs to use something other than Memory Stick for storage.
  • Reply 8 of 83
    Quote:

    Originally posted by Stoo

    I wonder... how long before an integrated phone/PDA/half decent digital camera/MP3 player/802.11 device? The Sony Clié TJ 37 is alsmost there but isn't a phone (yet). And needs to use something other than Memory Stick for storage.



    bluetooth on the ipod is the last step--wirelessly sync with the comp and phone all the same time. on the road you could still sync with the ipod and phone.
  • Reply 9 of 83
    well, i don't think you'd want to sync your music files with bluetooth. isn't bluetooth rather slow?
  • Reply 10 of 83
    addisonaddison Posts: 1,185member
    I too hope that apple will maintain the link from Palm OS devices to iSync. having just bought a Treo 600 I can't tell y how much I wished that someone had made this thing five years ago. Yes handhelds are dead; long live the phone organiser.



    I dumped my Sony T610, which had bluetooth and would sync perfectly, except it was hopeless for contacts, I couldn't store all of mine, hopeless for email, hopeless for calendaring, hopeless for notes. The Treo just excels at all these things and has a proper browser, what is more I can store a full Swiss train timetable, underground tube maps etc etc.



    Palm has lost it's way but it's product is still streets ahead of the competition. I really hope that once they finally commit to Palm OS6 they can focus one one thing and get it right. The Treo 600 is really only the start, I expect them to address all their short comings, Bluetooth, resolution with the next version.



    I just don't believe that Apple would want to compete with that... having said that they could license the OS, almost as they did with the iPod. I can't see it happening as there are too many balls in the air at the moment. We going to get phones with HDD's, video, organisers, game machines etc etc there is no clear right answer and picking the right route is gong to be very high risk.
  • Reply 11 of 83
    Quote:

    Originally posted by Stoo

    I wonder... how long before an integrated phone/PDA/half decent digital camera/MP3 player/802.11 device? The Sony Clié TJ 37 is alsmost there but isn't a phone (yet). And needs to use something other than Memory Stick for storage.



    You'll have your answer by the end of the summer.
  • Reply 12 of 83
    aries 1baries 1b Posts: 1,009member
    An integrated keyboard?



    When it has Inkwell?



    And how credible is Mr. Manzione?



    Aries 1B
  • Reply 13 of 83
    wmfwmf Posts: 1,164member
    The P900 is the iPDA.



    And if Palm supported SyncML they wouldn't need to "support" OS X because it would Just Work? with iSync.
  • Reply 14 of 83
    amorphamorph Posts: 7,112member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by wmf

    And if Palm supported SyncML they wouldn't need to "support" OS X because it would Just Work with iSync.



    This is a good point, and a possible angle: Perhaps Cobalt will simply support a standard connection protocol, and leave application development to Apple and others. As someone else said in one of these threads (I've lost track!) Apple's basically got most of Palm Desktop implemented in iApps as it is...



    We will see.



    As for Manzione, I have absolutely no idea how credible he is. The way he's sticking his neck out right now I suppose we'll find out soon enough.
  • Reply 15 of 83
    cubistcubist Posts: 954member
    The Manzione article is ridiculous. A Clie-sized PDA, running a "shrunken" MacOS X, using Inkwell, and a hard drive?



    Makes you wonder if the guy really has seen a Clie. Those things are thin and tiny. A Palm-III, a little smaller than an iPod, gets a two-month battery life on its two AAA cells. It has a 68K processor, 2MB of RAM and no hard drive... why, it's pretty much a Mac Plus. The Clie is half the Palm-III's thickness.



    A heavy, hard-drive-based PDA with a battery life measured in hours would make Apple the laughingstock of the industry.
  • Reply 16 of 83
    aries 1baries 1b Posts: 1,009member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by cubist

    The Manzione article is ridiculous. A Clie-sized PDA, running a "shrunken" MacOS X, using Inkwell, and a hard drive?



    Makes you wonder if the guy really has seen a Clie. Those things are thin and tiny. A Palm-III, a little smaller than an iPod, gets a two-month battery life on its two AAA cells. It has a 68K processor, 2MB of RAM and no hard drive... why, it's pretty much a Mac Plus. The Clie is half the Palm-III's thickness.



    A heavy, hard-drive-based PDA with a battery life measured in hours would make Apple the laughingstock of the industry.




    Still, it's nice to see a new, bold, fresh thread about an Apple PDA



    The good old AI days immediately after the demise of the Newton beckon...



    Aries 1B
  • Reply 17 of 83
    outsideroutsider Posts: 6,008member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by cubist



    A heavy, hard-drive-based PDA with a battery life measured in hours would make Apple the laughingstock of the industry.




    Have you seen the battery consumption of PocketPCs? They're measured in hours. Especially when used with WiFi.
  • Reply 18 of 83
    amorphamorph Posts: 7,112member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by cubist

    The Manzione article is ridiculous. A Clie-sized PDA, running a "shrunken" MacOS X, using Inkwell, and a hard drive?



    Any actual information (which means "zero or more actual information") he received would necessarily be filtered through his lack of technical understanding. That's not a flame; he's not a systems guy.



    So, keeping in mind that I'm not saying I believe him, here are a few possibilities:
    1. He mentions a "light" OS X and QuickTime. This is actually possible: It's not widely known, but QuickTime is a complete system API. You could slip a kernel under it and ship it, and have something very close to a fully functional operating system (that was absolute hell to code for, but that's a different problem). So, adapt the OS X kernel, and use QuickTime as the system API. Preferably the long-rumored and eagerly anticipated QuickTime 7.

    2. QuickTime is usable for any kind of data or application that incorporates time or timing in any way. Historically, that's been audio or video, but nothing stops it from running a calendar, as far as I'm aware.

    3. How often are you away from a power source for two months? Sure, it's nice to have that kind of battery life, but if the tradeoff is an anemic machine that you don't use, who cares? It seems to me that something approaching one-day battery life would work well in practice. Just recharge it the same way you recharge an iPod.

    4. A hard drive means no more silly limits about how many addresses or contacts you can store, and it means that you can use it to tote files around as well, and MPEG-4 movies, and photos, etc. The additional capacity would actually allow it to do things that no phone will be doing for a good while yet. This is crucial if you want to give someone a reason to buy this putative PDA instead of a smart phone - in fact, ideally, this thing would compliment your phone.

    5. Why is Apple keeping Ink around again? For the percentage of its users who enjoy writing longhand on their Wacoms? I think not.


    Quote:

    Makes you wonder if the guy really has seen a Clie. Those things are thin and tiny.



    A heavy, hard-drive-based PDA with a battery life measured in hours would make Apple the laughingstock of the industry.




    Not if it couldn't be functionally compared to any of those PDAs - which are currently getting eaten alive by phones, and thus don't really set a standard that anyone should aspire to.
  • Reply 19 of 83
    Quote:

    Originally posted by cubist

    A heavy, hard-drive-based PDA with a battery life measured in hours would make Apple the laughingstock of the industry.



    Take a stroll down to your local Apple dealer in a few days and play with the iPod Mini. It ain't heavy.
  • Reply 20 of 83
    Quote:

    Originally posted by Aries 1B

    An integrated keyboard?



    When it has Inkwell?



    And how credible is Mr. Manzione?



    Aries 1B




    Look at the Sony UX50. It has both an integrated keyboard and handwriting. A keyboard has its uses. PalmOS handles them very poorly (IMO), but that shouldn't be a problem for the UI gurus at Apple.
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