“In 1989, I wrote a piece in one of my internationally syndicated columns about a mobile computing concept that was very modular in nature,” Tim Bajarin writes for Tech.pinions. “Back then, portable computers were pretty bulky and heavy and having to lug them with me around the world was a pain. That led me to think about what future portable computing might look like and I took a stab at this idea of a modular approach to personal computing.”
“In hindsight this was ridiculously wishful thinking on my part more than anything else since the technology at that time was not there then to make those current portable computers smaller and lighter let alone modular,” Bajarin writes.
“But what if we could have that same kind of modular functionality in a ‘brick’ that fits in your pocket? A very small device that houses a powerful CPU, OS/custom UI and data files and can be docked with a multitude of screens that are accessible around the office, school, home, shopping malls, etc.,” Bajarin writes. “As far out as this seems, I believe that this is exactly the vision Apple has for the future of the iPhone.”
Read more in the full article here.
Hey, when computers used to be large and bulky, I predicted that someday that would be less large and less bulky.
I must be some kind of genius!
I don’t think for the foreseeable future the iPhone will displace the Mac for real computing needs, the heavy lifting that’s required to produce, edit and review complex documents. The input method and screen size would be too limiting, even if you attached an external keyboard and screen to it – that assumes you can scale ‘low resolution’ apps up to the size of a normal 21″ LCD screen without deep, annoying pixelation.
This is already here with Bluetooth keyboards and airplay. Add the cloud and voila!
Ding ding ding ding! We have a winner. 😉
I think that Tim is missing the point here and living in the past. Apple these days is all about wireless.
I think that Apple will use the wireless advantage they’ve started building with AirPlay and continue to expand o its capabilities. And your iPhone won’t even need to come out of your pocket to work.
It’s coming.
It’s already here! We’re just in the baby stages.
Isn’t this what Motorola tried to this year with the Aatrix? All the processing and memory was in a phone. You could insert the phone into a dock with screen and keyboard to make it a laptop.
The Aatrix is on some of the lists of the worst tech of 2011 that I have seen recently.