Yep, it’s that time again. Apple Inc are set to take to a world stage at their media event to be held in Cupertino, California later today. Earlier last week, we saw Apple send out a mail shot reflecting a murky image of a portable notebook, with the attached tag line ‘The spotlight turns to notebooks’ – but what could it mean? …
I have to say this event is going to be pretty interesting – at least I HOPE it’s going to be pretty interesting. God only knows we need it after Lets Rock. A few weeks ago a rumor emerged, later dubbed ‘The Brick’ which pointed towards what was thought to be a possible ‘new’ Macbook model Apple was covering under the code-name, ‘The Brick‘. However, the rumor was eventually extinguished when 9to5Mac announced that the brick was not in fact a new product, but a new state-of-the art manufacturing process which Apple had recently adopted to manufacture it’s Macbook product line. By using water jets, Apple can now allegedly carve a product, in one go, out of a solid block of aluminum (the brick).
With that in mind, this is what is currently expected from Today’s events:
80-100% Probability – Macbook & Macbook Pro
Last refreshes were seen in February, we’re expecting a whole new class of design, taking full advantage of the new ‘brick’ manufacturing process. We recently saw a number of leaked case designs hit the net, along with a fairly questionable video, which seemed to further depict the new Macbook model.
NVIDIA‘s chipsets are also said to be landing on the Macbook product line, bringing with them hugely enhanced graphic power compared to Intel’s current selection.
40-50% Probability – Glass Trackpads
As well as a new overall case design (which to be fair was pretty much expected), the world also heard recent whispers of the next Macbook and Macbook Pro lines receiving ‘Glass’ track pads. We’ve already seen Apple introduce some of it’s multi-touch gesture technology into it’s portable lines with it’s addition of the Macbook Air, and this would take it one step further. Learning from the tactile feedback the glass on iPhone and iPod touch give to their users, various sources cite Apple now want to bring the same experience to their notebooks.
20-30% Probability – Two-toned Aluminium/Plastic Effects
Next, (and might I add, far from confirmed), comes a few other sources on the web citing that the new manufacturing technology Apple have adopted may in-fact allow them to merge both plastic and aluminum together, to end up with a sort of two-toned effect. I’m not sure I want/like this effect – it looks tacky in my opinion, however, if it does become a reality today, I’m sure Apple will do it right.
Below 20% Probability – Everything Else …
There is however the usual ‘OMG I want everything in one event’ wish list, among which lies:
- Blu Ray support
- iLife & iWork ’09
- Networked Television
… and possibly even an advanced showing of the new Macbook Air with actual shipping at Macworld in January 2009. Mac Rumors are yet again not on the guest list, however they will be providing textual/SMS updates through their twitter account twitter.com/macrumors.
The event will take place in Cupertino, California at 10AM Pacific (6PM London). We’ll also be sure to follow the event, and post our unbiased opinion of it shortly after.
Stay Tuned, and let the show, commence …
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