Your keyboard lights up, so why shouldn’t your trackpad?
If you’ve got a fairly recent MacBook Air or MacBook Pro, you’ll know that typing in a dark room is a breeze thanks to its backlit keyboard. It now seems as though Apple is looking to extend this feature to the trackpad as well. In a new patent filing entitled “Illuminated Touchpad”, the Cupertino company describes a new touch-sensitive input technology that doesn’t just light up, but also provides an “improved feedback mechanism.”
Photo by For Inspiration Only - http://flic.kr/p/7PxBMW
With billions in the bank, sometimes it is cheaper to pay a few bucks rather than spend time in court. That apparently is the logic behind a $5 million settlement announced in a patent-infringement lawsuit filed against Apple. Despite little chance of a courtroom win, a Taiwan-based touchpad maker is proclaiming victory.
Despite being overshadowed by the MacBook and other mobile devices, Apple’s venerable iMac accounts for nearly a third of the 14.5 million all-in-one desktop computers sold in 2010. The strength of iMac demand put Apple ahead of Lenovo and HP, expecting to unveil two new desktop computers at next week’s Consumer Electronics Show.
How did HP get into such a mess with webOS? Essentially, the company shot itself in the foot as a parade of managers streamed through the corporate suites in a nightmare scenario reminding one of the worst days of Apple. Ousted HP CEO Leo Apotheker must take the blame, a former webOS head said.
Remember the Motorola Xoom tablet, Google’s first attempt to compete against Apple’s iPad? It was only a bad dream. Google Chairman Eric Schmidt is now promising a purely Android tablet “of the highest quality” in six months.
High-profile PC makers such as HP and Dell may be preparing to “gradually phase out” of the tablet business, leaving the market to Apple’s iPad, Amazon’s Kindle Fire and Barnes and Noble’s Nook tablets. The rumored sea change follows the realization that best-selling tablets make money from the content they pump out, not from selling the hardware.
Blackberry PlayBook (Photo by clintonjeff - http://flic.kr/p/9HDmuJ)
Retailers have found getting rid of non-iPad tablets can be like selling Halloween candy in November. Retail giant Staples is taking a cue from other failed attempts to rival the Apple device and cutting up to $300 off RIM’s PlayBook, just in time for Christmas.
If there’s one thing that seems to go hand-in-hand with struggling tablets, it’s generous price cuts. As Apple’s iPad continues to gain overwhelming popularity, tablets that attempt to fight the beast are falling short, and manufactures are being forced to drop their prices to shift their stock.
When HP killed its TouchPad, dropping the price to $99, the PC maker set off a firestorm of interest in the tablet that nobody previously wanted. Now HP said it will restart manufacturing for a limited time to meet what it says is “unfulfilled demand.”
The HP TouchPad, which the company killed last week due to few sales and retailer rejections, might live again if the firm spins-off its PC manufacturing business, an executive in China said Tuesday.
![PC Makers Wave the White Flag: You Win, iPad [Report]](http://cdn.cultofmac.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/ipad2land.jpg "ipad2land")
