Apple’s Mysterious Media Day Snowballing Into Reality

A traditionally secretive company, Apple is holding an event tomorrow, but only released media invites at the end of last week for the Cupertino event. While much of the pess anticipated that this event could be much ado about nothing based on the release of invites, it seems the notebook focused meeting may have some serious weight behind it.


The image below is a capture of the invite that was sent out to the media:



Some of the more serious rumors going around now:

New models and price points, from 8 to 12 base configurations ranging from $800-$3100
New manufacturing process and facility to produce notebook casings from a single block of solid aluminum
Wider touchpads, slimmer casing, and keyboards matching that found in the MacBook Air
Nvidia integrated GPUs in MacBook line
Possibility of in-built screens in touchpads
Possibility of tablet-type Mac introduction (sadly seems unlikely)

The Apple notebook line is in need of a serious refresher, as there haven’t been too many changes in the last couple years.

Apple notoriously has built mystique over the years by alerting media very late about upcoming releases and announcements, sometimes giving the media only days to prepare for a coming release.

Historical Apple events and invite lead times:

Sept 7, 2005 (Invite: 9 days before)1000 songs in your pocket: first-gen iPod nano

Oct 12, 2005 (Invite: 8 days before)One more thing: first video iPod, iMac with iSight, iTunes 6

Oct 19, 2005 (Invite: 5 days before)Apple’s latest pro innovations: Aperture, PowerBooks with higher-res displays, Power Mac G5 Quad & Power Mac G5 Dual

Feb 28, 2006 (Invite: 7 days before)Fun new products from Apple: iPod Hi-Fi, Mac mini Core Duo, leather iPod cases

March 20, 2007 (Invite: 26 days before)Lights, Camera, Apple: Final Cut Studio 2, Final Cut Server

Sept 12, 2006 (Invite: 7 days before)It's Showtime: Apple TV, second-gen iPod nano, updated video iPods, second-gen iPod shuffle, iTunes 7

Aug 7, 2007 (Invite: 7 days before)Mac announcements: Aluminum iMacs, iLife '08, iWork '08, .Mac upgrade

Sept 5, 2007 (Invite: 8 days before)The beat goes on: iPod touch, WiFi iTunes Store, iPod nano fatboy (3G), iPod classic, iTunes 7.4

March 6, 2008 (Invite: 7 days before)iPhone software roadmap: iPhone SDK, iPhone 2.0 and App Store

Sept 9, 2008 (Invite: 7 days before)Let's Rock: fourth-gen iPod nano, second-gen iPod touch, iTunes 8, HD TV shows