Apple Plans Mystery "Product Transition"

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Apple, still reeling from its recent stock drop has announced plans for a mysterious product transition before the end of September. No other details were given.

While notions of what this transition entails are likely to become clearer soon, several product categories are just now reaching the ends of their typical cycles, with updated MacBooks, the Mac mini, and new iPods all due for refreshes or replacements in the near future.
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Product Transistion..

hmmmm..

They need to combine the iPod touch and Classic line in to one with the 1.8" drive's capacity and the touch interface and size... That would be a welcome transition.
 
I think the product transition is to do away with the desktop and enterprise (server) Macs and start focusing on the mobile (laptop) machines only. Apple has been driving that way for some time now.
 
svet-am said:
I think the product transition is to do away with the desktop and enterprise (server) Macs and start focusing on the mobile (laptop) machines only.
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That would surprise the hell out of me. The iMac is a pretty decent seller for Apple, and the Mac Pro is, well, pretty much vital for Final Cut pros. Perhaps they intend to merge the two machines together somehow -- I don't know.

My guess? I think we may be talking about touch functionality across the entire spectrum of Apple products, maybe starting with the notebooks and the iMac, as well as new LED-powered Cinema Displays. I could definitely see a merging of the iPod Touch and Classic into one super-DAP.

Or maybe I'm just an idiot and not thinking clearly.
 
svet-am said:
I think the product transition is to do away with the desktop and enterprise (server) Macs and start focusing on the mobile (laptop) machines only. Apple has been driving that way for some time now.
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Yeah they are abandoning thier workstation/server platform more and more
 
svet-am said:
I think the product transition is to do away with the desktop and enterprise (server) Macs and start focusing on the mobile (laptop) machines only. Apple has been driving that way for some time now.
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That would be a mighty transition..

I dont think they can just "off" their enterprise solutions though, but I can see them toughting a "business" class of notebooks to do-away with all but their workstation grade desktops.
 
Im betting its its a public announcement that Snow Leopard (10.6) is Intel only. Which most people up on Apple products already know.
 
necrosis said:
Im betting its its a public announcement that Snow Leopard (10.6) is Intel only. Which most people up on Apple products already know.
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This is actually quite likely now that I think about it. And in normal Reality Distortion Field fashion, they trump this announcement up to be much more earth-shattering than it really is.
 
svet-am said:
Is Ballmer really looking for work already?
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Nah. They have tapped GW Bush to replace Jobs and run apple. :p

heheheh

Maybe Apple is moving more in to the home entertainment market.. Apple HD TVs and Home Projectors?

(Ok.. that was really out of left field)
 
TheBluePill said:
Maybe Jobs is Dying and the "transition" is new leadership.
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No way it's possible. Dreams don't come true.

Okay, that was a little uncalled for.


I have a feeling its to do with thier home entertainment offerings... netflix announced a unit with some partner company for unlimited movies... the box was only $99... they might be following the same concept.
 
svet-am said:
Imagine it, GW Bush as President of the company and Gore on the board of directors. Classic!!:D
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With that configuration, nothing worthy will be produced... oh wait :D
 
For someone in the market for a laptop, this really throws me for a loop. I dunno if I should buy now or wait a couple months....:(
 
TheBluePill said:
Product Transistion..

hmmmm..

They need to combine the iPod touch and Classic line in to one with the 1.8" drive's capacity and the touch interface and size... That would be a welcome transition.
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Depending on the price point, they might acutally move quite a bit of units if they released a product like that. It would help to finally support some formats other than MP3 and Quicktime, and for jeebus sake make the library searchable!

I won't hold my breath but it would be nice.
 
Firstly, anyone who thinks Apple would just outright abandon the workstation and server market is completely blind to the fact that Apple has quite a large market in this space. Pixar (animation), Troublemaker Studios (film), The Crystal Method & Moby (music), Dark Horse (comics/film), The Metropolitan Theater (live drama), and so many more all use Apple servers and workstations to get their work done. Heck, the university I work for uses Apple servers in the medical and arts/sciences schools. IF Apple were to even consider moving away from this market, they would piss off a good chunk of their customer base.

Secondly, part of the 'transition' is related to their laptop line. Apple is going to appear late to the Centrino 2 party, but they will arrive in fashion. Not one to keep up with the Jones', the MacBook and MacBook Pro will rev after the back-to-school season is over rather than scrambling a new fleet of products like Dell and Lenovo have already (which won't be available until August anyway). The MacBook Pro will get the re-design it's needed for such a long time, though it probably won't be such a radical difference as some might think. The MacBook will get a speeds-and-feeds update, and it might shed a few ounces of weight. Solid-state storage and blu-ray will be an option for one or both of them, capitalizing on the capabilities of Centrino 2's new video codec acceleration. Apple will also promote the use of the iPhone as a remote for FrontRow and AppleTV (the Apple universal remote hasn't come with any desktop or laptop for the past generation or two).

The next part of Apple's transition towards consumer multimedia is the iPod line. The current educational promotion for students/staff/faculty is eliminating stock of the 8GB Nano and all three iPod Touch models, though the rebate encompasses the cost of the 8GB Touch. The Touch will get a simple re-design to look like the iPhone, and the 8GB will be dropped in favor of a price-reduced 16GB and 32GB. The Nano is a bigger question-mark, though, since the rebate targets specifically the 8GB and completely omits the 4GB which is very curious. I've heard everything from a simple storage boost (instead of 4 or 8GB, now 8 or 16GB) to the iPod Touch Nano (which was once rumored to be the iPhone Nano). The truth will come as the rebate time period winds down (September 15th, though Apple revised the iPod line-up last year a week before the rebate period expired).

To round everything out, the iMac will rev towards the end of September with Centrino 2 tech and all the good stuff that shows up in the laptop line, though no solid-state storage obviously. Something will happen with the Mac Mini as well, but to what extent is yet to be determined. More than likely, the Mini will get similar specs to the upcoming MacBook rev (storage, speed, and all), especially since it's been languishing with older Core 2 Duo processors and a 945G chipset. With a Centrino 2 platform, Apple will effectively beat all copycat slim desktop machines running off of the Atom chip in power and capability.
 
The Donut said:
Macbook Pro Vista :p
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I lol'd, its funny because of how much negative crap Apple's ads shovel about Vista.

...Then I remembered Apple's ad campaign blasting intel chips (I'm sure you guys remember the Pentium snails), and how Apple now uses intel processors.

Then I lol'd again. Maybe its not as far-fetched as I thought... :D
 
SexTreX said:
I lol'd, its funny because of how much negative crap Apple's ads shovel about Vista.

...Then I remembered Apple's ad campaign blasting intel chips (I'm sure you guys remember the Pentium snails), and how Apple now uses intel processors.

Then I lol'd again. Maybe its not as far-fetched as I thought... :D
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With apple, anything is possible.

I really hope for an Apple OS that is open for all platforms, basically eliminating desktop apple hardware as the requirement and taking direct aim at microsoft. I think this would be not only good for us PC boys, but great for the integration of everything.
 
One doesn't announce Snow Leapord with full compatability with Exchange server in order to 'abandon' the enterprise market :rolleyes:
 
P.S.: The MacBook Touch you may have heard rumors about probably will not come out until January 2009. Some 'insiders' may claim that it will be out this year, but keep two things in mind:

1.) Apple loves using anniversaries as a launching point for new product revisions (see: iPod revs over the past 3 years, the recent iPhone 3G launch). What better way to celebrate a high-selling 'innovation' than announce it's compliment/replacement on the anniversary of the original launch?

2.) Mac OS 10.6 Snow Leopard will be not only multi-core aware and GPGPU capable, but it includes an impressive catalog of 'touch' capabilities...
 
Ockie said:
With apple, anything is possible.

I really hope for an Apple OS that is open for all platforms, basically eliminating desktop apple hardware as the requirement and taking direct aim at microsoft. I think this would be not only good for us PC boys, but great for the integration of everything.
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i personally can't stand macs, just like linux irritates me...however i can get linux for my hardware so i have a drive on my bootloader for linux...i would happily do the same thing for a max os.

On top of that, as much i like windows to almost (note almost) fanboyism, i think some genuine market competition would be good for them, i mean...look at ati/nvidia, now that we are having competitive products again, we as the consumers benefit. I think it would genuinly be a good thing. especially since i'd rather <insert humorous self-injury> than be caught on apple hardware.
 
Ockie said:
I really hope for an Apple OS that is open for all platforms, basically eliminating desktop apple hardware as the requirement and taking direct aim at microsoft. I think this would be not only good for us PC boys, but great for the integration of everything.
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Over Steve Jobs' dead body. :p (I know, that was in somewhat bad taste, but that was just too tempting to pass up. :D Seriously, I hope his health recovers, as nobody, however much an ass, deserves serious health problems like he reportedly has.)
 
Manaknight said:
On top of that, as much i like windows to almost (note almost) fanboyism, i think some genuine market competition would be good for them, i mean...look at ati/nvidia, now that we are having competitive products again, we as the consumers benefit. I think it would genuinly be a good thing. especially since i'd rather <insert humorous self-injury> than be caught on apple hardware.
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Its already happening. Just look at this memo from Ballmer: http://kara.allthingsd.com/20080723...mers-full-memo-to-the-troops-about-new-reorg/

Then you can go to the memo Jim Allchin sent to Ballmer and Gates way back before Longhorn development had even rebooted. Despite the fact that Windows outsells OS X by a huge margin, Microsoft has been feeling the heat from them for years now. Vista has elements of OS 10.3 and 10.4 in it (laid over a framework that is finally up to snuff with SP1), and lord knows that this isn't the last time Microsoft will be reacting to what Apple is doing (next thing they'll be reacting to OS 10.5 and 10.6).

This is all a-ok by me since I use both operating systems. MS had gotten way too complacent and competition from Apple is the only thing that is going to keep them honest at this point.
 
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