Apple has been unambiguous about the fact that they aren’t just going to plunge into the netbook market. If they ever do release a netbook, expect them to go the Sony route of denying they are releasing a netbook at all, which at this year’s CES came so much across like the most fabulous guy at the George curling up his nose in disgust and shouting “I’m not gay… call me metrosexual!” at the top of his lungs. The term netbook implies cheapness, and Apple’s not going to go that route.
But here’s someone’s optimistic imagining of what a MacBook netbook could look like. Like the Vaio P, it would have a full size keyboard, with a surprisingly wide screen. Unlike the Vaio P, though, the MacBook Mini would feature a fold down leaf for a full track pad… no clitoral nub! All with MacBook Air thickness.
I like this design quite a bit.
MacBook mini [Wired]
One downside is that it looks like you have to put it down on a surface before using it.
Wouldn’t you get a bunch of false positives from your palms on that trackpad while you are typing? I think that trackpad need to be a little bit more narrower… otherwise, very cool idea… well, but I also think the monitor could be wider.. ditch the black space.
The trick would be for it not to feel flimsy. That flip-out touch pad looks like it would wobble all over the place, then eventually break off.
CLAMSHELL MULTITOUCH
CLAMSHELL MULTITOUCH
CLAMSHELL MULTITOUCH
Mmm… I don’t know why it would go with a trackpad instead of just a capacitive touchscreen. They won’t be going for cheap on anything like this, anyway, so why not a touchscreen?
Because a touch screen kind of sucks to use on a laptop.
Lose the trackpad, and give it multi-touch screen as well as a rotatable display so it can be put into a tablet mode and be used like a big ol’ iPhone. Sold.