An Apple patent application (20080002350) for “Integrated monitor and docking station” published today shows an Apple portable (looks like an ultra-thin, ultra-light one – hint, hint) sliding into an Apple monitor (or iMac-type computer).
MacDailyNews Note: This patent was filed quite some time ago: on July 3, 2006 and just published today.
Apple’s Abstract:
A docking station is disclosed. The docking station includes a display and a housing configured to hold the display in a manner that exposes a viewing surface of the display to view. The housing defines a docking area configured to receive a portable computer; The docking area is at least partly obscured by the display when viewed from the viewing surface side of the display at an angle substantially orthogonal to the viewing surface.
Apple’s description:
Traditionally a portable computer docking station requires a separate external monitor to be connected (e.g., by cable) to the docking station when a display other than the integrated display of the portable computer is desired to be used with the docking station. Often a significant amount of desk space is required for placement of this docking station and separate display. Attempts have been made to conserve the required amount of desk space by allowing the external display to be stacked on top of the docking station. However, the stacked combination still occupies a large amount of space and is cumbersome to move and transport. Therefore there exists a need for a docking station and display combination that is configured in a more efficient form.
The full patent app is here.
Gizmodo has a nice image of how this might really look here.
[Attribution: Gizmodo. Thanks to MacDailyNews Readers “Davey” and “Linux Guy And Mac Prodigal Son” for the heads up.]
MacDailyNews Take: Aren’t we (long over)due for a new monitor lineup right about now? And an ultra-portable, too? Do you think this is something Apple might actually be pursuing or is it just a ruse intended to throw competition off-track?
… and when you buy the multi-touch Mac tablet it comes inclusive with the “dock”. If it is simply a glorified iPod case (for the glorified big-azz “iPod”), it will not add too much to the cost.
Size? The tablet could be 13.3″- together they might constitute an iMac mini.
I think:
A. brilliant idea- elegant
B. people are way overthinking what they are seeing.
wow, i am amazed at the negative comments….
if this thing is a real iMac in its own right, that would be VERY impressive. imagine if you had a duo core iMac and a duo core ultra thin, 2 seperate machines, and when docked you got a quad core.
that said, even if it is only a monitor/drive, that is incredible. i want it….
I invented that first.
No you didn’t, I did.
I thought only Tom Cruise understood the history of Apple docking patents.
hi,
Small point ! Can anyone say Apple PowerBook Duo . This is not a new idea ! Thanks.
No. Really. I did invent it first.
We’re going to introduce it at the 2010 International CES.
Steve Balmer will run on stage, pumping his fist in the air and shouting, “Woot, woot, woot!” because that’s a really modern thing to say right now.
Two interesting phenomena.. First, Clients of Retail Apple Products (Crapples) will buy anything with the approipriate logo. Second, we need to clean out the patent office. Prior art mean anything?
“Crapples”
I’ve never heard that before. Did you come up with that all by yourself?
Perhaps this is the new slate-loading desktop from Apple?
This would be fantastic as a sublaptop which docks to a larger monitor so that you have a 24″ desktop monitor and a very portable laptop, all in one. Your optical drive, additional hard drive space, and other ports could be located on the dock. Would be fantastic for my business.
Holy … You are correct in what you say – one computer, one screen. This confused me, at first. Then it really confused me.
112 does not show through the entire 104 “window”
112 does not overlap the 115 ports
AND … it looks like 112 is being inserted screen-to-the-rear
This is not an Apple design, or it is a poorly-described Apple design. I can easily accept that this is a 20″ or 24″ dock for a Mac Tablet, but not with the included text. Place a power supply, HD and SuperDrive on the side opposite the docking slot and you’ve built a sweet docking station. As a hollow aluminum shell … Apple doesn’t do that sort of thing. WORST case, the parts would fit together better.
My Take: the text is wrong. The proposed dock is a little more than an iMac with much of the workings removed, replaced by those in the Tablet. This allows you to have a sufficiently substantial desktop at home and a seriously portable tablet when you are traveling, with a minimum of wasted space. Will Apple do this? The 13.3″ LED screens they are buying seem a bit large for a tablet … but, what do I know!
Dave
I would suggest that people read the text of the patent application.
If necessary, look up the definition of some of the words used. I suspect that many who have commented about “slates” etc are reading things that are not there.
The screen of the docked laptop will not be visible. Those who think that it “requires you to invest in an additional screen, etc” have not considered the number of docks used by road warriors of all sort in the corporate world.
There is simply not a single docking solution currently on the market that is elegant in the same way that this would be.
This is the logical sucessor to the PowerBook Duo/ Duo Dock combination that was introduced in October of 1992.
If Steve announces this on the 15th, it will sell faster than the original 1st Gen iPod.
As soon as these appear on a desktop in a corporate office, demand will soar.
A combo drive would be awesome but instead of just Blue Ray & HD DVD Combined, It might as well be a SuperCombo Drive where it supports CD RW, DVD DL RW, HD DVD RW, & Blue Ray RW.
With this combination, you can use anything u want.
It would be too risky if Apple were to Standardize Blue Ray Across the line on a Drive thats still not well planted into the Market, Same Goes for HD DVD.
“I see no point in this design. Just plug a display into your macbook and you are done. I call fake.”
You fail at understanding docking stations. You don’t have any of those things called “peripherals?”
When I bring my laptop home I plug in a monitor, a power cable, a real mouse, an audio cable for high-fidelity music output, and an Ethernet cable for maximum network speed. And sometimes an external drive or two. THAT is what a docking station is for.
(That said, I don’t like this design. It’s like the inflexible iMac design combined with vendor lock-in for the ultimate in single point of failure. If it needs to go in for service you’re out a dock and a monitor.)
Could you imagine if this were to be used with an ultra-portable and 30″ monitor? Design a digital camera that could wirelessly download pictures directly into the U-P in the field, preview the pictures on the U-P, go home and get to work on the 30″ display WITHOUT having to transfer files. The photographers would go nuts.
Hell why stop at pictures, let the U-P do video capture like a QuickStreamDV?
I would LOVE to have a 12″ ultra-portable that is powerful enough to plug into a 24″ display with a big hard drive in it to back up my FLASH memory using Time Machine, and also to allow me to shed unneeded files to the “mother ship”. But the processor would have to be fast enough, with enough RAM and video processor for good enough performance.
If this was available, I would FIND a way to afford it!
Now this little baby is a killer design… buy a desktop and get a laptop in the bargain… he best of both worlds!
For such a solution… I would even rob a bank to get the cash to buy one! <GRIN>
For sure my trusted Quicksilver would find itself on the block, i.e eBay.
Bottom line Apple releases this one and you’re hear “SOLD” AROUND THE WORLD!
This is where you discover how far back people go with Apple.
The PowerBook Duo models existed way back starting in the early Nineties (210/230/270c, 68030-powered) and ending in 1995 with the PowerPC-powered 2300c.
The basic concept was a sub-10″ sub-notebook that was unbelievably light and strong; in fact, it was so light that the user would often forget whether they were carrying it, leave it on their car roof and then drive away which inevitably led to a smashed Duo – thankfully, it was so so strong that (even though the screen would be mullahed by the experience) the units would still boot up nine times out of ten.
The sub-notebook would be inserted into the DuoDock and, after about 1.5″, the dock would take over and “suck” the Duo into place and properly connect the docking expansion connector without any threat of a heavy-handed user bending pins or warping the connector in any way. Ejection was just as elegant – hit Eject, the Dock would send the Duo to sleep and then eject it as if it were nothing more than a floppy disc.
The appeal of these things was quite unique, given that it occurred at the start of the first age of remote working (remember Apple Remote Access, Shiva and Dayna?): IT departments from people like BP and several of the major accounting firms could purchase DuoDocks to suit the number of hot desks in the office, whilst Duo base units were provided to the so-called road warriors of the day.
The DuoDock family was also unbelievably clever: dock your Duo and the CPU was immediately endowed with super-digital powers. In the final iteration, you got two NuBus slots, support for 19″ displays, Ethernet and 68882 maths co-processor on a logical daughterboard arrangement.
Anyone who thinks that WinDell has ever come up with anything as elegant to the Duo/DuoDock concept is a walking example of SPJ’s comment about Microsoft people having no taste. They never have – because they don’t understand innovation. They never will – because they have no ambition. They never could – because they can’t make the software and hardware reliably interact in 2007 in the manner that Apple made the Duo work FIFTEEN YEARS AGO.
The Apple Powerbook Duo:
Commercial:
Specs: http://www.everymac.com/systems/apple/powerbook_duo/stats/mac_powerbook_duo280.html
Not too shabby for 1994.
Very interesting idea, but I doubt it’s anything more that a concept patent. It’s unlikely we’ll see anything like it from Apple.
Of course I thought Apple was going to flop big time with the iPod, so what do I know?
nobodi…
You could be right, although it’s interesting that this revision of the original Duo concept was filed pretty much around the end of any patent protection that would have existed for the original.
My guess is that Apple wanted to re-establish patent protection for a new incarnation based on how the concept would be re-interpreted today; I’d love it to be true and Penryn and its successors will make that a real possibility.
I am amazed at how people are interpreting this patent.
It seems like a lot of comments here are based on looking at the drawing (and not very carefully at that) and then making up the rest as they go along.
It does not describe a single product, it describes a concept with a host of options that could be incorporated (or not) in a future product.
It is very clear that the dock/display does not use the display of the sub note book inserted into it… even the drawings show the book inserted part way into the dock with the docks display larger than the notebook itself. the patent even talks about the possibility that the book might not be flush with the dock on one side to aid in its removal.
The patent also makes it very clear that the dock/display can be powered from the note book inserted in it. Power to or from the inserted note book will be transfered by induction (i.e no plug and sockets). This could be interpreted that the dock/display could also be portable…. Make the docks display a touch screen and what have you got? A tablet to die for.
The drawing clearly shows the inserted notebook has an optical drive and the patent explains that this could be used when inserted into the dock/display.
Apple have mentioned the use of wireless in the design extensively. Apple also has invested in extremely high speed wireless technologies over short distances… If Apple did bring this to market they might even do away with physical connections between the notebook and the dock/screen altogether.
If you read the patent Apple also describe several methods of dealing with the heat (fans, large heat conductive surface, fluid cooling).
For those who say it cant be done… what on earth do you think is inside an iMac? (answer: the motherboard of a MacBook Pro).
I just want to say it once more… This is a patent on a set of concepts… Its not a product description.
OK, how about this for a guess. The device that is able to slide into the iMac is a 13″ flash drive/hard drive, that can easily be slipped in to the yet to be announced “ultra thin” laptop also. One HD, used on 2 computers. Looks like 2008 might be S. J.’s “year of the HD”.
There is some interesting speculation on how an Portable Internet Device could work in connection to such a dock at http://huibert-aalbers.com/blog/archives/161