Forget The iPhone Pro. Give Me A MacBook Mini
December 29th, 2008
Yeah – the glossy mockup of an iPhone Pro over at Gizmodo is certainly appealing at first glance. But after pondering it a bit more – I don’t want a bigger iPhone with a slide-out keyboard. But I know what I do want, which is a “MacBook Mini” or to put it in trendier terms, a “Mac netbook.” Here’s my thinking and how I get from an iPhone to there:
- “iPhone Pro” implies I want to get productive with my iPhone, as opposed to playing games and setting off iFarts.
- To do this I’d like several things: a better keyboard. A bigger screen. But most importantly, full OS X – not the limiting iPhone OS that even lacks cut and paste.
- Ergonomically speaking, when I want to get work done I’m sitting down, not standing up. Sitting down and using the iPhone form factor is retarded. I’d rather have the keyboard below me, on my lap, and the monitor a separate piece that can be adjusted for easy viewing.
- The small caveat I’d make is perhaps the laptop cover that could close and the top half turns into a touch screen, as in the tablet PCs Microsoft has been trying to get going for ages but haven’t really taken off. Apple had some patents of this nature (see above). Now that looks slick.
When I consider everything I’d want in an iPhone Pro (full OS X, large screen, large keyboard, clam shell so I can type in my lap with fingers instead of thumbs) – I’m basically describing a small, ultraportable laptop – except it makes phone calls. At this point, I could lose the phone aspect altogether. Yes, it’s a MacBook Mini I really want.
Bascially, I want to see future MacBooks incorporate features of the iPhone (specifically the touch screen) – not MacBook features incorporated into the iPhone. This iPhone Pro concept, while slick looking, IMHO, is completely backwards.
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I love how Gizmodo says the iPhone Pro will happen “because it just makes sense.” It actually makes no sense at all for them to build this device.
When are people going to learn that the best phone isn't the one with every imaginable feature tacked onto it? And when are they going to learn that Apple isn't prone to empty-headed copying of its own success, let alone other people's failures?
I agree, we'll probably see a net book long before we'll see a slide-out keyboard on an iPhone. This Photoshop rendering, as usual, defies the laws of geometry by suggesting that a fold-out keyboard could be included on such a thin device. Apple would never have a slide-out plastic keyboard, no matter how many articles get published, for two obvious reasons:
1. Steve Jobs is obsessed with “thin.” iPhones will get thinner over the next five years, not thicker. No matter what the cost in battery life or lack of extra add-on features.
2. Apple has invested its entire future on touch technology. Adding a physical keyboard would be an admission of defeat and a huge step backwards technologically. Outside of press bashing for the sake of press bashing, the numbers suggest that touch-screen keyboards are just fine for most users. People are buying iPhones in droves without keyboards, and every competitor is making phones with touch keyboards. Why would Apple go backwards to a plastic keyboard, exactly?
Even those with extra long fingernails have accepted the touch keyboard. And many users, myself included, find the touch keyboard EASIER to type on than any plastic keyboard they've ever owned.
Plastic keyboards have way too many shortcomings that slightly easier typing can't make up for. The fact that I can switch to foreign layouts with the press of a button alone makes the touch keyboard worth the price of admission.
Netbooks do not fit me. They are too small to be able to work in a comfortable way and they are too big to carry around. My iPhone is my Netbook. I'm sure iPhone will get new features that we've been missing so far.
To each their own – but if a netbook is too small to work in a comfortable
way, I find my iPhone, which is even smaller, is even less comfortable. And
when one gets into the nitty gritty of productivity apps, there's simply no
comparison between the iPhone and a full-fledged Mac.
Another way of putting it is a basic litmus test. Would I give up my Mac and
try to do all my computing on an iPhone for a month? No way in hell – it
would be impossible. But I could see doing a heck of a lot with a smaller
MacBook.
Yeah – Apple creates products that make sense first, and then comes up with
the name for it, not vice versa. I highly doubt Apple's product development
starts with “X + Nano” or “X + Pro” and develop a product to fit the name.
There is no Cinema Display Nano, or Apple TV Pro. Just as I think an iPhone
Nano is a dumb idea, so be it with an iPhone Pro.
Despite my personal issues with the iPhone touch keyboard, I love the touch
technology for just about everything else – games, navigating around a map,
surfing the web, using the iPod. There's a lot of really innovative stuff
going on in regards to iPhone Apps. All of that would be stifled if Apple
attatched a traditional keyboard to the iPhone. I agree Apple wouldn't take
a step back right when it's on the verge of another GUI revo… (comment via Disqus by webomatica)
Yeah – Apple creates products that make sense first, and then comes up with
the name for it, not vice versa. I highly doubt Apple's product development
starts with “X + Nano” or “X + Pro” and develop a product to fit the name.
There is no Cinema Display Nano, or Apple TV Pro. Just as I think an iPhone
Nano is a dumb idea, so be it with an iPhone Pro.
Despite my personal issues with the iPhone touch keyboard, I love the touch
technology for just about everything else – games, navigating around a map,
surfing the web, using the iPod. There's a lot of really innovative stuff
going on in regards to iPhone Apps. All of that would be stifled if Apple
attatched a traditional keyboard to the iPhone. I agree Apple wouldn't take
a step back right when it's on the verge of another GUI revo… (comment via Disqus by webomatica)
for sure Rutger, even I am waiting for that!
[...] To sum up: If Apple releases a tablet, I want full OS X. And something that is more similar to a current MacBook than an iPod. Some earlier patent art of a MacBook with a sliding screen is what I think most of us are really aft…. [...]
Make it with the full Mac OS X (not just OS X like the iPhone and iPod touch) and we are sold. For full blown Apple Keynote and Microsoft PowerPoint presentations. About 300 g and 5-inch screen. Pocketable. We need thousands for our University. Like the OQO, but a true Mac OS X tablet.