Apple Imagines Mac-Inside-a-Keyboard Device Evocative of 80s Home Computers
macrumors.com
macrumors.com
I wonder if this is about education.
Essentially I think Apple have realised their new developer pipe is drying up; the devices are too expensive for hobbyists and they are vastly too expensive for almost all schools on earth.
The Pi 400 is a wholly credible device in those markets; it solves a lot of the practicality issues of the earlier machines.
A device with even an old style A14 or the M1 in an M2 future, tucked inside a keyboard, could be made viable for this market, I think, and it's seemed obvious to me for some time that the only reason Apple don't make the Apple TV into a general purpose education computing device is that they don't care about the market.
If they've started to care about that market again, it's a good thing.
There is no reason why it cant be squeezed down to $299. Basically the iPad ( $329 ) without screen. Or more like with A14 but $399.
Cool idea, the problem is I still dont understand where the target market are, the two above doesn't seems very Apple to me. There are ~700M business PC ( both laptop and desktop ), I would imagine this is attractive enough for Apple to make exception.
Is this actually happening? New iOS apps seem to be coming along in a flood like usual.
Design patents only protect key aspects of product design, they are more limited, and -- evidently like this one -- they're kept secret until they are granted.
There's a good chance this device is actually going to happen.
If it's not a design patent then they are really only claiming one or two small elements of this as innovation. Read any patent; they're all like this at some level.
This is to protect (somewhat) against lookalikes.
One interesting part is that they mention an inductive charging coil. Cursory reading didn’t tell me whether that’s for keeping a mouse charged or for charging the device.
Right. Fits with my understanding. Basically they (and others -- HP/LG) use these patent classes to protect aspects of technical designs in the way that Coca Cola used design patents to protect their classic bottle shape.
So possibly not an actual design patent but something with the same narrow scope.
I guess it's an open question as to whether they should be allowed, but they surely seem largely to be easy to avoid in good faith.
You can't embed a Pi 400 in a robot, you wouldn't stick it on the side of a 3D printer, turn it into a streaming media player, etc.
I suspect the Pi 400 sells better at specific times of the year -- at Christmas and when schools are spending their rare IT budgets. But it's also the first product of its kind from them.
I don't really see the benefit here, all you get are some drawbacks you usually see with laptops. I understand the all-in-one inside a screen, but integrating it with one of the parts most exposed to wear?
Plus, this could be an affordable option due to BYOScreen.
They could potentially use it for wider adoption of the purported VR headset.
Heck, I have a 2009 iMac that I'm using as an external monitor right now.
Evidence suggests they have, with the new design.
What was striking about Apple's recent keyboard woes is precisely that is that in general keyboards do _not_ routinely fail; they last for a very long time.
2) The article https://www.macrumors.com/2022/02/25/apple-explores-mac-insi... links to
3) This other article https://www.patentlyapple.com/patently-apple/2022/02/apple-i... which links to
4) The patent filing https://appft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=...
5) If you would like to review it yourself. As you review it, you will likely find out for yourself why patents are useless and exist only to create monopolies and harm innovation.
I'm not absolutely certain it's a design patent application, actually. I thought it was, but I would very happily be corrected by someone with deeper knowledge, and please please ignore me if I am wrong!
Apple definitely uses patents in some of the same international classes to protect their product designs.
e.g. they are using the international class G06F 1/16 20060101 G06F001/16 for this one, among others.
Here's another Apple patent in that class that seems to cover aspects of the use of in-display cameras (by covering the idea of an extended display area around a notch).
https://uspto.report/patent/app/20190043452
Apple also uses it for very specific design aspects of an accessory keyboard hinge:
https://uspto.report/patent/app/20200301480
Here's an HP laptop-related patent in that class, that seems to cover really very narrow aspects of the design of a laptop enclosure:
https://uspto.report/patent/app/20200381801
And here's a touch panel design for an LG domestic appliance:
https://uspto.report/patent/app/20210048935
Whatever it is about this particular class of patents (whether they become design patents or not) does not seem to really be holding back innovation.
So instead of seeing these used as a "we thought of this whole new thing, you can't make anything remotely like it" patent for a new technology, these are more "these are the minute aspects of our designs that we claim are our work that you shouldn't copy".
It hasn't stopped other manufacturers using a notch, or an in-display camera.
It's more like they are a way to register a design that can be brought up in court when e.g. Apple accuses Samsung of stealing design IP.
I'm in.
It would probably still require 8 GB RAM to be useful unless Apple manages to reduce the RAM requirements of macOS significantly. This amount of RAM will probably be too expensive for a low-cost device.
Edit: fixed CPU info for the ARM Mac DTK
I can't imagine using i(Pad)OS with mouse and keyboard only right now, though I know it's possible.
If anything, this a step backwards from what an iMac is. It adds a completely unnecessary second wire.
That’s before you look at price. The M1 iMac is US$ 1,299. Or the lack of Retina resolution USB-C monitors on the market.
If you want something this compact, Apple would have you get a MacBook Air for US$ 999.
They could be putting hardware as modest as an A14 iPad in there, basically. We know that hardware can run macOS.
Are there not displays with USB-C power buses now?
Retina display.
Decent-enough monitors are cheap as hell, schools should be buying bulk displays given how fast they can be damaged. It's a lot cheaper to swap out an older Dell display than it is to replace a whole iMac.
Even our fucked up patent system is unlikely to grant this, so why are they even trying? Is this just busy work for their overpaid legal teams?
They are seemingly a way to register a product's technical design for protection, rather than an outrageous fictitious claim of innovation over something that has been around 40 years. They contain unusually detailed (rather than abstracted) sketches, they contain some very specific measurements in specific claims.
I think some of the more egregious uses of patents in the past have blinded us to the sheer scale of the use of the international patent system to protect designs from copycats and to allow companies to develop unique design languages.
I think we may often misunderstand why patent claims are structured as they are with seemingly obvious introductory claims. It's because a patent has to be self-contained, as far as I understand it at least?
This could easily be a return to a $500 entry level computer for Apple. Will they do it? Who knows. It might not have the margins or volume they are looking for, but it also could a great entry point to introduce people to the Mac.
Dibs on patenting the computer inside a mouse.
Personally: I'd rather have a laptop with a detachable screen; or some kind of clamshell I could slip the keyboard into.
I think there's a very good chance that this device is close to market.