“Gene Munster, a highly respected senior research analyst at the investment firm Piper Jaffray, says representatives of an Asian component manufacturer told him that they had received orders from Apple for parts to build a tablet computer — a project code-named ‘Touch,'” Maxim Lott reports for FOXNews.
“The tablet, Munster says, would most likely sell for between $500 and $700, have a 10-inch touch screen, and use an operating system similar to that of the iPhone,” Lott reports. “Munster believes that applications would be sold through the Apple app store, but that the tablet’s larger screen would allow multiple applications to run simultaneously.”
Lott reports, “He declined to release specifics about the Asian parts maker. ‘I don’t want attribution back to this company because Apple would probably fire them,’ he said… Munster estimates that the tablet will be released early next year, and that Apple will sell 2 million units — worth $1.2 billion — in 2010.”
Full article here.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Reader “Davecc” for the heads up.]
Applications running in individual windows?
Type with fingers curled around back while you hold the device?
Maybe with Pre-like multi-tasking? Flick back and forth between apps. Apps need to utilize full screen. There has to be a file system in something like this. Many details still missing. Should make for a fun unveiling, with Mr. Jobs making his first public appearance.
And here goes the BBM: “Big Buzz Machine”!
This will, again, shake the business world and turn it upside down…
This whole tablet thing is getting old. It’s no longer news, at least until Apple makes an announcement.
Please! Enough is enough! Stop this nonsense!
I’ve got to disagree on the yearly sales of the mactouch. ipods sell about 10M a quarter for 40M a year. Say iphones sell 5M a quarter, average, for 20M a year. That’s a total of 60M of these devices yearly. At only 2m yearly sales for the mactouch, that means that only 1 in 30 of the current purchasers of iphones or ipods will switch or move up to a mactouch.
I think this 2M number is way low, the same way the estimates of 10M first year iphones was handily beat.
Munster, I’ll put money where my mouth is; want any action on the over/under?!
I have a MBP and a touch. I cannot see any reason to buy a mactouch or ipad or whatever. Everyone who has a iPod syncs it with a computer already. When the their iPod replacement schedule says it’s time for a new machine then they will buy one. I will buy a 3rd generation as soon as they are released.
All I can say is I really hope they actually release something or the stock might take a big hit. Also, I want one assuming it will do what I need it to regarding school stuff otherwise, guess I’ll be hunting down a dell mini 9 to hack.
Whatever multi-tasking mechanism Apple designs for the iTab should hopefully trickle down to the iPhone/iPod touch with the next major software revision.
also, really hope it runs a hybrid of iPhone and regular OS X so that I can run the previously mentioned school related stuff.
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WHAT!?!?! They are coming out with a tablet? That’s the first I have heard of it.
I tried using regular Mac OS X on a touch screen and I realized it is a no-go. The UI is not suitable for touch. It has to be an OS pretty much like iPhone OS.
Second thing that occurred to me today: for this thing Apple should build on iPod brand not Mac. So it should be named iPod touch XXX
who says anything about using it on the touch screen? I want to use it with my bluetooth keyboard and mouse.
Apple has already ordered the devices but it won’t be released for 5+ months? Seems too long to me.
You can bet that an Apple “pad” will use an interface that is more iPhone than Mac OS X. If Apple was releasing a tablet that used the Mac GUI, they would have objected to the Axiotron Modbook.
http://www.axiotron.com/index.php?id=modbook
Apple is actually supporting the one-year warranty for the plastic MacBook computing bottom half that is used to make a Modbook. (Any warranty-covered repair is done by Axiotron’s staff, but the MacBook portion is under warranty with Apple for one year.) From Apple’s point-of-view, a Modbook sale is a Mac sale, because a new MacBook needs to be purchased to make a new Modbook.
But if Apple’s tablet was going to use the Mac GUI, they would not have wanted to have a similar product on the market two+ years earlier.
iPad ?
Sorry Dear … No Internet Surfing for you this weekend
Is that time of the month
BC
I think he mis-states when he says the larger screen will allow for multiple apps to run at once. Apple could do that on the iPhone any time they want. They are just trying to preserve battery life while also making sure things don’t crash in the background, at least from what I’ve read here. If the tablet’s OS allows for multiple apps, it will simply be because Apple made it so by choice.
Isn’t analyst and respected an oxymoron?
Personally, I think the “tablet” will have a completely different and new interface. One that makes most sense for the device and its intended purposes. Neither the Mac GUI for the desktop or the iPhone GUI for a small screened mobile would fit into such a device. It would basically be something that sits in between them, that is a blending of both.
“”Munster believes that applications would be sold through the Apple app store, but that the tablet’s larger screen would allow multiple applications to run simultaneously.””
It takes a LARGER SCREEN so that one can run multiple apps. I guess the processor is just there for show. LOL JFLOL
Period, these people are in so much hurt they are making jackasses out of themselves. Period.
Just a thought,
en
Sheesh people…
Announced in September along with new iPod touch and iPod Classic.
Released in January.
Runs iPhone/iPod touch OS.
Hold in one hand… “type” with several fingers from the other hand.
It’ll be a similar size as Captain Picard’s handheld computer from Star Trek The Next Generation. 6″ x 9″±
It may be possible to use with a Bluetooth keyboard.
Stop crying and WAIT. Apple will surely surprise us ALL!
I like the iPad name!
iBook.
it will be called iBook. fcs
Is anyone else getting sick of all the tablet news? So much hype about something that is unconfirmed. What will be even more annoying is when all of this comes and goes and no tablet miraculously appears and everyone will bitch and moan about how it should have happened but never did…