Rumor: Apple May be Building a ‘Netbook’

An unannounced Apple product with a display somewhere between an iPhone and a MacBook is lurking out there somewhere, according to an anonymous source at an unnamed search engine company.

Buried in an update to his post about Steve Jobs’ participation on yesterday’s Apple 4Q earnings call, New York Times technology writer John Markoff says a source to whom he promised anonymity confirmed the search engine company has spotted visits from an Apple product with a display that is neither iPhone nor MacBook.

Should we be looking for iPhone 3.0 or NetMac 1.0?

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Lonnie Lazar is a writer-musician-web designer-attorney. He writes about Apple for Cult of Mac and Mac|Life, and about VoIP and telecommunications for Voxilla. Follow Lonnie on Twitter @LonnieLazar, join the Cult of Mac on Facebook, and find Lonnie's photos on Flickr.

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Posted in Apple, Hardware, Quickies, Rumors |

AaronS
I call BS. No way Apple lets an unannounced product out and about, even around campus.
CM
They’re basing this on screen resolution and os stats on their server. They’re probably just picking up visits from hackintosh netbooks. I wouldn’t get my hopes too far up.
John Doe
Mac Mini 2.0
SCOTT
neither…doubt that a tablet mac will be made by Apple anytime soon…
Jobs himself said that he considers the iphone to be a netbook…because it does all the same things a netbook can do…i dont know that i completely agree with that philosophy but since we have no idea what is going to happen with the Mac Mini that other posts have stated are not being shipped any more…
which that doesnt make any sense because with the xmas season coming real fast…i dont see them releasing an update or new product for its replacement before xmas…and they would definitely sell a bunch of them over the xmas shopping season…
chances are slim that there will be a different iphone platform and a macbook nano is not going to happen either because of the cost factor…just my opinions …and i have been wrong…i was wrong about the macbook event
http://www.theappleofmyi.com/blog Jon Moss
I really, REALLY hope this is true. A 10/11″ MacBook with no drive would be feasible and perfect for a lot of people.
It would sell like hot cakes!
Bob
Keep in mind, Apple builds test mules for hardware and software testing that obscure the true form factor or UI of an upcoming product. Perhaps this person saw one of those test chassis…
Dave
I agree with CM- I bet that this is simply an instance of one of those recent posts that have raved about how people are installing osX on their dells and eee pc’s…
Darcy McGee
Bet they’re not.
Bet a bunch of “netbook” users get tired of their underpowered machines quicker than most think, and switch back to more full featured small notebooks.
Bet the MacBook is well positioned for that market.
Apple’s got a good history of not releasing craptastic underpowered, underresourced notebooks. It means there’s a bit of sticker shock at first, but sales keep growing so perhaps the strategy is working.
http://url.ie/h1b?902358666 design
Is this coming before or after the MacTablet?
thewellbalancedgeek
After reading “Inside Steve’s Brain”, I’m sure Apple has lots of netbook prototypes, in all sizes, shapes and configurations. Probably well guarded, knowing Steve. But this one recently seen may have advanced far enough to get out into semi-public view.
Any of these prototypes would probably blow our socks off but they may not be good enough for Steve. As a result we may never see them. Or they are working on a device far beyond the “netbook” as we think of it. The way Steve thinks seems to be way ahead of the rest of us. I can’t imagine Apple putting out just a netbook, a shrunk version of the Macbook. Steve would bring out something way beyond that or not at all, I’m guessing.
cd
if i could download photos from my camera to an iPhone i’d consider it a netbook. it’s still just a smartphone.