09.20.03

Now The Perfect PowerBook Maybe

Posted in General at 11 am

Of course, this week, Apple introduced their Wireless Mouse that uses Bluetooth. This is fixes the ‘one step away’ issue I noted about the Kensington PocketMouse Pro Wireless. See, once your laptop has Bluetooth built-in, the receiver dongle goes away completely! So now all I’ve got to do is buy a new laptop. The most recent one I’m drooling over is the latest rev of the 12″ Powerbook.

I’ve talked about why I would not have wanted one of the Rev A 12 Inch PowerBooks:

  • same RAM limits (640 MB Max) as iBook
  • no DVI connector

Both of these issues have been dealt with. The new 12″ goes to 1.25 GBs and the previous Mini-VGA port that requires an adapter is now a Mini-DVI port that requires an adapter, but also supports VGA.

There’s still no FireWire 800, and no PC Card slot, but I think those balance out with the new items noted above… and below.

From what I’ve read it’s got two things that I *really* want: The first is the Bluetooth built-in (like the last version) in order to get that dongle-less mousing solution. Now that Apple has committed actual hardware to BlueTooth for desktop stuff, I’m ready to hop on board.

But also I saw mention (somewhere) that the 12″ can run while its lid is closed! This is a big deal, because I could use it as a portable music device. And maybe more.

Admittedly, a small MP3 player would be more portable, but the real value comes when A) I have the machine running and in a backpack, B) I plug in a microphone and maybe headphones, and C) I can control the machine with voice commands and have it respond with speech synthesis.

Suddenly it becomes a Wearable computer!

Going beyond that, I could get a VGA headset that would give me the floating screen. How much would that rock!?!

Of course I haven’t seen confirmation of the ‘run-closed’ ability, but I’m looking for it. If I can get it confirmed, I just might have to figure out a way to get it…

Anyone interested in buying a great iBook?

Update: I found it. Confirmation. I just watched the webcast of the introduction, and both the 12″ and the 15″ have “Lid-Closed” operation specifically noted… drooooool….

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