Coming Soon: New Apple Toys For Mac, iPod Users.

It’s time to dust off the Kayhill Crystal Ball™ and take a look into the not-too-distant future for Apple products.

What do I see? New Macs, new Cinema Displays, the iPhones, iPods, and a Newton. See how easy it is to prognosticate the future for Mac users?

What? You were expecting details? Too much of the internet’s content is free. Mac360 readers would appreciate my prognosticating capabilities more if there was a fee involved.

As it stands, Mac360 has thousands of readers which would quickly be reduced to about two or three (family members) if there was a price tag on the Kayhill Crystal Ball™ Prognostications. So, let me give it to you straight and free. Change is coming.

Apple is rolling along and doing no wrong even when what they do is not as cool as it could be. iPod touch? It’s crippled. WiFi but no Mail. How silly is that? iPhone has a camera but can’t record movies. See?

One thing Apple is doing better than any competitor in any of their many industries (music, movies, TV shows, portable music players, personal computers, operating systems, professional software) is managing change. The past five years have seen Apple revolutionarily evolve itself. Change is the name of the game.

What’s coming? What changes will we see in Macs, iPhones, iPod, for 2008? Here’s my list. Grab a pencil to see if you concur, agree, or become nauseous.

January 2008 will see Macworld Appleworld ‘08 and with it a new line of MacBooks. Yes, it’s Apple’s best selling line, but look what Apple did with the iPod mini. They ditched it in favor of something arguably better, the iPod nano.

The notebook form factor is aging. MacBook and MacBook Pro are in need of a refresh, since what you see is mostly carry over from the old Titanium PowerBook days, cum aluminum in 2003. That’s ages ago. Apple will start with the MacBook, then go to the MacBook Pro. In between we’ll see a MacBook Pro mini-- an ultra light Mac sub-notebook. Can you say ”Flash memory?”

January looks promising for new Cinema Displays, too. Why? Same reason. The form factor is long in the tooth, the iMac and notebooks come with a built-in iSight video camera, yet the separate iSight Firewire camera is nowhere to be seen. What’s with that? Oh, it needs to be USB. Right.

You know what I’d like to see? An LED Cinema Display in 20-inch, 24-inch, and 30-inch models. Better yet, incorporate the built-in video camera right inside the screen. Apple has a patent on that. It’s time to use it. People won’t continue to pay an outrageous price for Apple’s displays unless they cough up some cool new features.

Not to stray too far from the Mac, but, yes, the iPhone will go 3G, and probably early in 2008 as Apple ramps up manufacturing. Expect the 3G phone to be a little more expensive than the current not-3G phone, which is made for AT&T’s aging EDGE network. When I use my iPhone in the car I long for the next Starbucks and a little WiFi with my latte.

Look for more memory for the iPods, too. I know what you’re thinking. ”Duh, Alexis.” It’s gotta happen, though.

Whither art thou, oh lovely Newton? The battle cry is sounding loud and clear. Mac users want a Mac in their pockets and it ain’t the iPhone or the iPod touch. Yet. Mac360’s founding queen of bits and bytes, Tera Patricks, dreamed of an iPad device that ran Mac OS X, was fully wireless with a touch screen, had a built-in camera, and all the goodies not in the iPod touch. She was on to something.

I love a good rumor, especially when it is fully unsubstantiated, like the AppleInsider piece about Apple resurrecting the Newton. OK, they’re not going to resurrect the Newton. It’s dead. It’s not coming back. End those silly Newton User Groups, OK?

Buy all the Apple stock you can afford because Dr. Who’s “transmogrification” is coming in the form of a handheld Mac. It may not be called a Mac, but it’ll be a Mac in your hand. Smaller than a breadbox and larger than an iPhone, those of us keeping the Newton Faith Alive™ will have our day. It just won’t look like, act like, or feel like a Newton. But the spirit will be there.

That’s the Kayhill Crystal Ball™ for today. What’s on your radar list?

Off Topic Note: Have you ever noticed how much Apple’s “I’m a Mac, I’m a PC” television commercials remind you of Road Runner and Wile E. Coyote? Seriously.