Pictures: Fantasic mockups by Miguel Surez
This is guesswork, but here’s the likely feature list of the new MacBooks due October 14:
* Penryn Core 2 Duo chips: 2.4GHz, 2.66GHz, 2.8GHz, and 3.06GHz.
* 2GB of RAM (MacBook); 4GB of RAM (MacBook Pro).
* Hard drives: 160GB — 320GB.
* Glossy widescreen TFT screens. On the MacBook: 13.3-inch (1,280×800 resolution); MacBook Pro: 13.8-inch (1,366×768).
* Integrated NVIDIA graphics system.
* New, all-aluminum enclosures, white, black and silver. (Would love to see multiple colors, but think its unlikely — it’s an inventory nightmare, especially for high-priced products).
* Enclosure is tapered: very thin at the sides, thicker inthe middle, like the iPhone 3G and MacBook Air.
* Magnetic lid latch on all models (replacing mechanical clasps on the MacBook Pro).
* All ports on left side — including FireWire 800.
* Slot-loading optical drive on right (no Blu-ray).
* Extra-large battery pack running full width of computer at the front, under the touchpad.
* Recessed keypad like MacBook Air. Keys are Chicklet style on MacBooks, black and backlight on Pros.
* Price: Starting at $800. This is the mysterious “product transition” that Apple CFO Peter Oppenheimer said in July would impact Apple’s gross margins.
“We will be delivering state-of-the-art new products that I cannot discuss today that our competitors will not be able to match,” Oppenheimer said during the Q308 conference call.
Leander Kahney is the editor and publisher of Cult of Mac.
Leander is a longtime technology reporter and the author of six acclaimed books about Apple, including two New York Times bestsellers: Jony Ive: The Genius Behind Apple’s Greatest Products and Inside Steve’s Brain, a biography of Steve Jobs.
He’s also written a top-selling biography of Apple CEO Tim Cook and authored Cult of Mac and Cult of iPod, which both won prestigious design awards. Most recently, he was co-author of Cult of Mac, 2nd Edition.
Leander has been reporting about Apple and technology for nearly 30 years.
Before founding Cult of Mac as an independent publication, Leander was news editor at Wired.com, where he was responsible for the day-to-day running of the Wired.com website. He headed up a team of six section editors, a dozen reporters and a large pool of freelancers. Together the team produced a daily digest of stories about the impact of science and technology, and won several awards, including several Webby Awards, 2X Knight-Batten Awards for Innovation in Journalism and the 2010 MIN (Magazine Industry Newsletter) award for best blog, among others.
Before being promoted to news editor, Leander was Wired.com’s senior reporter, primarily covering Apple. During that time, Leander published a ton of scoops, including the first in-depth report about the development of the iPod. Leander attended almost every keynote speech and special product launch presented by Steve Jobs, including the historic launches of the iPhone and iPad. He also reported from almost every Macworld Expo in the late ’90s and early ‘2000s, including, sadly, the last shows in Boston, San Francisco and Tokyo. His reporting for Wired.com formed the basis of the first Cult of Mac book, and subsequently this website.
Before joining Wired, Leander was a senior reporter at the legendary MacWeek, the storied and long-running weekly that documented Apple and its community in the 1980s and ’90s.
Leander has written for Wired magazine (including the Issue 16.04 cover story about Steve Jobs’ leadership at Apple, entitled Evil/Genius), Scientific American, The Guardian, The Observer, The San Francisco Chronicle and many other publications.
Leander has a postgrad diploma in artificial intelligence from the University of Aberdeen, and a BSc (Hons) in experimental psychology from the University of Sussex.
He has a diploma in journalism from the UK’s National Council for the Training of Journalists.
Leander lives in San Francisco, California, and is married with four children. He’s an avid biker and has ridden in many long-distance bike events, including California’s legendary Death Ride.
You can find out more about Leander on LinkedIn and Facebook. You can follow him on X at @lkahney or Instagram.
