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Netbook or Tablet Device: Place Your Bets
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DawnTreader
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Is Apple planning a low-cost netbook or a tablet-style device with a 10” diagonal screen?
Whatever it is, I’m sure it will be a device designed to sell songs, sell apps and integrate handsomely with MobileMe.
What do you think? A netbook or a other product to fit somewhere between the iPhone/iPod touch and the popular MacBook line.
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Tablet.
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“Once we roared like lions for liberty; now we bleat like sheep for security! The solution for America’s problem is not in terms of big government, but it is in big men over whom nobody stands in control but God.” ?Norman Vincent Peale
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It would have to be a tablet.
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Throughout all my years of investing I’ve found that the big money was never made in the buying or the selling. The big money was made in the waiting. ? Jesse Livermore
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Tablet with bluetooth for a keyboard
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This is too easy. Two earnings calls in a row we’ve heard how Apple thinks netbooks are ‘inferior’, but that ‘we’ve got interesting ideas here’. Add that to the tablet rumour that’s been around for so long, and it’s just got to be a new tablet device. The only question is ‘when’, and “will I get one”.
Will you get one?
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I’ll vote Tablet also. But I haven’t a clue to what degree Apple will make it more computer like or more iPhone like. While I don’t have one, I’ve always liked the Wacom tablet/monitors. Using a stylus one can draw/paint directly on the screen as if it were an digital sheet of paper. But it is also a monitor and can be taken from your lap and stood on the desktop for e-mail, word processing, etc. I’m hoping that Apple will create a product that is more along those lines a computer running OSX that also has full multi-touch controls, but also responds to keyboard, mouse, etc. I’d be disappointed it it were merely a larger form factor of the iPod Touch/iPhone. While the App Store has some really good values, very few apps there are comparable to a full desktop app. Perhaps Apple has plans for Cloud apps, like Google is implementing. And the future lies not in full featured apps, but in document tools that you load from the Cloud as needed.
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I vote for the digital picture frame. With all the Itouch goodness. Stream movies/pictures from Itunes via Wifi soft keyboard or bluetooth. Digital audio out and stereo speakers so you can take it to grandma’s and give slide shows of the kids or via mobile me send current video/pictures to grandma. The technology will be Apple’s SOC using ARM and PowerVR IP. Multi-processor with GPU to make the most of Snow Leopard or Iphone OS 3.0. Works with the App store. Existing Apps look pretty good due to resolution independence a core functionality of the new OS. A 64 GB flash drive so you have room for some pic/movies/software. GPS so you can pimp out the auto and of course a 10 mega pixel camera so you can do portrait shots of the family to send to grandma. And of course all for the low price of 100$ with no contract.
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Tablet. Total touch screen: 10” diagonal. 64GB SSD. 1.6 Ghz. 2 GB Ram. Very nice sleeve to protect glass (glossy). A superior gaming platform. Minimal ports. The perfect bridge between the iPhone and MacBook Air. Cost: $700 - $900.
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Pats, funny you mention the digital picture frame. Today I was gazing at my digital frame in the family room and was imaging it instead being my new tablet being used as your describe.
What about having more than one size option for the tablet? I might prefer a more portable 7” version for myself while giving the standard 10” to my wife.
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Tablet, please please please. Something about the size of a DVD case would be perfect, as I’ve opined before. This is the reason Apple is slimming down Leopard with the new Snow Leopard, putting all kinds of things as ‘core’, moving iApps to the cloud, and bought their own processor manufacturer. Their new ‘coiled and flattened’ battery technology will be the key enabler. I think a 32gb version (600) and a 64gb (750) would do the trick.
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DawnTreader
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Wow. The tablet appears to be the clear winner in sentiment and appeal. I don’t see a reason for Apple to debase the MacBook line with a netbook. I do see real value in the market for a tablet and it further differentiates the Apple product line. In other words, competitors won’t be apt to match the release with a similar product and Apple will have a year to eighteen months to build a market without real competition.
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Tablet is the clear gap in the line, not a netbook. Looking at a very portable option to my new 17” - a MacBook is still too heavy, and an Air is too expensive… a 10” slim tablet, that can connect via bluetooth to keyboard and mouse back at the office would be the PERFECT device!
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My 2c:
It’s a tablet, Jim, but not as we know it. Many people would buy a powerbook 12” replacement, but the PC era is ending, and that space has been kept clear by Apple for years to give the new product maximum mind share at launch. It has to be wildly successful. This is Apple’s big play to win the game, IMO, and it has to be a product that others can’t easily copy. It has to leave netbooks dead in the water.
However, Apple has had its share of flops, so the ten inch version has to come first to guide the real high volume version. If it’s successful at ten inches, the DVD case sized version comes as soon as practical thereafter. For Apple, that may unfortunately be as much as a year. It can take that long to set up manufacturing and component supplies.
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My 2c: the PC era is ending, and that space has been kept clear by Apple for years to give the new product maximum mind share at launch.
Nicely done! I’ve set my browser window to 10” diagonal and will run it that way for a while. Looks like a size I can live with.
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Use your powers for good.
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Here my 2 cents: the clues come from the new little, little iPod Shuffle, where the controls have been moved to the earphones. The new device would be more like a big iPod Touch, think 6” or so screen, cd player, dvd burner, etc., with wifi, bluetooth, etc., in the netbook; it would have touchscreen, big enough to be a book reader; however, it will tether by wifi to the iPhone for internet connectivity, phone calls, etc., using the iPhone as a remote. The iPhone could be a trackpad and keyboard maybe. .... Just thinking out loud… gps visual presentation would be on the netbook if you mounted it in the car. Maybe you could hook your new MacMini into it ... The netbook would also be touchscreen only (no physical keyboard, but you could plug one into it. .....
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Hocus pokus, hope it don’t poke us in the eye.
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I’ve used Apple laptops, as my primary computer, for the past 6+ years. I was thinking aloud with my Dad today about getting an iMac for my next computer and using an iPhone/iPod Touch for casual use while traveling (non-work related). A 6-10” tablet with limited iWork and remote access would be enough to handle most on the road needs.
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“Once we roared like lions for liberty; now we bleat like sheep for security! The solution for America’s problem is not in terms of big government, but it is in big men over whom nobody stands in control but God.” ?Norman Vincent Peale
