Prognostications: Apple in 2004
by Volker Weber
In exactly one week from now, Steve Jobs will be halfway through his keynote at MacWorld San Francisco. Time for a look in the crystal ball. Joe C. Carson has some reasonable prognostications for 2004.
Comments
He misses one product line: xServe. they're in a dire need of an update, the aging 1.33 GHz G4 models are out of date and it would be sweet if Apple would introduce G5-based models
My forecast:
- Faster G5 towers: definite
- Mini-iPods: maybe
- Updated, larger, Cinema Displays: definite
- Updated PowerBooks: not sure, certainly not G5 ones
- G5 iMac: no way, at best an updated yummy enclosure but with G4s
- Waving Motorola good-bye: not yet, too many G4-based products left (would be nice tho)
Oh, and what about that headless, cheap, Mac (xMac or whatever the rumour sites have been referring to it)?
Indeed.
He also misses software. I would not be surprised to see iChatAV for Windows as well as updates to iLife. Particularly iPhoto needs a big performance boost for the photo library. What about AppleWorks. That would need an update dearly.
Last but not least, there is the suprise moment that Jobs loves. Remember the G4 iMac, the iPod (very successful), 17" PowerBook (did not play well in the market, I guess), the iSight. There will be something we don't see yet.
Indeed, except the iPod was introduced at a non-event in late October 2001, it wasn't a MWSF "oh, and one last thing" surprise (not sure Apple thought it would be quite the success it is) :-)
What about "Apple Music Store available outside the USA"?
found on Stefan Tilkov's Random Stuff:
If this article at MACOSX.COM, found via it&w, is true, Apple plans a set-top DVR/DVD device called the iBox.
(http://www.macosx.com/content/article.php?cid=53)