Today, on the last day of 2009, it’s time to talk about something that’s been a hot-topic in 2009 but something I’ve never talked about on Carrypad before.
It’s the Apple ‘Pad’ , ‘Slate’ , ‘Tablet’ or whatever you’d like to call it and the reason I want to talk about it is that is that many rumors and news items are converging on an Apple Event that has been ‘confirmed’ for the 26th of Jan in San Francisco. Everything points to a mobility event and commentators (that mostly means over-excited keyword-stuffing analysts, journalists and bloggers) appear to be feeling confident that it’s going to be a new device that is larger than the iPhone. Possibly a tablet.
Based on the progress of mobile platforms at the moment, I’d put the chances of a large-format tablet at about 1:5 purely because bigger needs to be better in most peoples eyes and there isn’t a mobile computing platform out there that can really deliver what’s needed for Apple at over 7 inch right now. ARM Cortex A8 will be too slow for full web activities and everything else is either not ready or to big, hot and heavy.
What I do think is possible is an iPod-Plus, something we wrote about last year on our sister publication, UMPCPortal. Expectations of speed, power and productivity will be less on a a 5 inch-7 inch device and it’s here where an ARM Cortex A8-powered platform fits the bill nicely. Apple doesn’t need to break completely new and dangerous ground with a tablet or mini-netbook but a large-format iPod Plus really fits the bill nicely. A low risk device that enables a new category of HD video and Ebook sales through iTunes.
Of course, even if someone does spill the beans on the real story, the amount of ‘noise’ being broadcast around this rumor is so great that it will be hard to spot it but we’ll keep focused here at Carrypad and bring you an update the next time we think we’ve spotted the real news.
Apple Event news via FOXnews
I’ve heard two rumors:
6″/7″ iPhone OS X based tablet
10″ Mac OS X based (with a re-worked UI) tablet
I’d be highly interested in the latter. Not at all interested in the former. And, if the 10″ one doesn’t come out, I’ll almost certainly end up buying a Notion Ink Adam, or a EnTourage eDGe, instead.
Apple owns a chip manufacturer (PA Semi). I would guess that they have not been resting in the years since being purchased by Apple. Who knows what they may have come up with.
This is defaintely something to consider, you’re right. If PA Semi have come up with something more powerful than current platforms, it would well fit into the 7″+ space better than anything else.
Listening to Twit podcast today, Robert Scoble and Kevin Rose appear almost convinced that it’s a larger tablet-style device.
I blogged about how much this device might cost about a week ago. I’ve been waiting for this for the last two years.
Mark
techreviewonline.co.uk
My 1st-gen iPod Touch is winding down its useful life. I’d like to replace it with a 7″ pad running either iPhone OS or Android: something that isn’t (necessarily) a phone, but is focused on web content, preferably with a reasonable camera on it, WiFi and also Bluetooth, with option to use a BT keyboard. But I’d settle for a 5″ screen running 800×480. Bring it on!
My wish/hope is that this would be a successor to the ol’ MP2100 Newton…in a more modern up-to-date package than was possible back then; thinner, lighter, OSX, color display, WiFi, ethernet (yes, some of us still need it at times…), USB ports, storage card slot, and handwriting recognition!!!
I know this is wishful thinking, but I can dream, can’t I??
My fear is that this will just turn out to be Apple’s take on the Kindle or some other sort of dedicated or limited type of device; ie, ebook reader + movies/music videos, etc….
Not saying this is bad, or wouldn’t be successful, just not what I wish for….
Just my 2¢ as we say….
Happy New Year!
Good points here, I think you are right that Apple isn’t going to do a large tablet. I don’t think they’ll release a device that isn’t pocketable.