Macworld is coming up in a couple of days, and although I will be on a plane during the breathlessly awaited keynote, I still have some thoughts on what may be coming up… about 95% of people writing online have thoughts on it, too.

After last year’s fantasy-fulfilling iPhone announcement, expectations are high for this Macworld. It seems very unlikely that Apple will top that, but here’s what I think you may see.

We’ll see hardware refreshes. Now that Apple is using Intel chips, we know a lot more about the release schedule of the processors they’re using, since Intel publishes a processor roadmap and is very vocal about new chips. Intel is in the process of pushing out new CPUs, the “Penryn” line, mobile, desktop and server, and I think we’ll see some new Apple machines using them – specifically new MacBook Pros and likely MacBooks as well, and an iMac speed bump.

The iMacs just had a significant refresh last summer and I can’t see Apple doing any major changes to them beyond giving them new CPUs. The MacBook and MacBook Pro lines, however, haven’t had any significant changes in a while. In fact, Apple followed a very clever strategy when they switched to Intel chips – they didn’t make major changes to the appearance of the machines. An end-generation PowerPC iMac or PowerBook doesn’t look much different from a first generation Intel iMac or MacBook Pro. This was a great way to subtly tell people that they were still the same machines.

The MacBook Pro/Power Book has looked the same for a long time now, and while it’s still a great looking machine, I expect that Apple will update it to bring it more in line with the appearance of the new iMac.

Then there’s the long-rumored subnotebook/Mac tablet. I know many people who were very disappointed when the 12″ PowerBook didn’t survive the Intel migration, and I expect that Apple is well aware of how well a subnotebook Mac would do in the market.

Of course the expectation is that if Apple introduces a subnotebook, it won’t just be a smaller MacBook or MacBook Pro; it’ll be a superior beast that will be exceptionally light and exceptionally small – by doing away with the optical drive and replacing the hard drive with flash memory.

And I expect that they’ll intro that kind of device at Macworld.

There are also a lot of rumors/fantasies about a Mac Tablet. The iPhone UI, grown up for a larger screen, would make a great difference on a tablet device and really help separate it from the many less-than-successful Windows tablet devices. And I would love to have one, though to make me happy it would need to be a real Mac, much more substantial than the iPhone, capable of running real Mac applications but with multitouch support in addition to regular Mac input methods (Bluetooth keyboard, for instance).

I don’t see Apple introducing such a device right now, for at least two main reasons. First, it would compete against a subnotebook, both for market-share and mind-share. So at least, I don’t see them bringing out both at the same time, if they bring out both at all. Second, the iPhone OS isn’t very mature yet – seriously, we’re all really running software that amounts to maybe a .5 release of the iPhone OS. Apple says they’ll be shipping a real SDK for native iPhone apps in February. I think it will take a while until this software is mature enough to base another product on it.

iTunes Movie Rentals. This is, I think, a given. Evidence for it has been popping up for months, and there’s been a lot of news reports about Fox and Disney being on board. It’s an obvious direction to go in, and given the lackluster response to iTunes movie purchases, Apple needs to do something to continue to compete in this area. If they do announce iTunes movie rentals, expect software updates to the iPhone, iPod Touch, iPod Classic, iPod Nano, Apple TV, iTunes, Quicktime and MacOS X in order to support them.

iTunes Movie Rentals would also give a big boost the the Apple TV. I think that Apple needed to introduce this hardware in order to show the TV and movie studios that they were serious about video, but the little love they’ve shown it since introducing it has been very disappointing to early adopters. There are a lot of rumors about an Apple TV hardware bump, but what would they do? Maybe throw in a Blu-Ray drive… beyond that… there’s not a lot to be done with it.

We might also see iTunes HD video support; the problem is, it takes a long time to download HD videos, and the speed of the average Internet connection isn’t particularly better this year than last year or the year before. So… we’ll see. They’ll need to to do this at some point but now may just not be the time.

Also in the news has been the idea that movie studios may bundle an iTunes/iPod-friendly protected version of the video for a movie on the film’s DVD. Rumor has it that Fox is already starting to do this. Given that a major sore point for video iPods is the lack of a sanctioned solution for moving DVDs to them, this would be a great way to accomplish this that would make the movie studios and Apple happy, and at least somewhat satisfy consumers. I expect this to appear as well.

Also it seems likely that MacOS X 10.5.2 will be released at Macworld, and Apple can trumpet a pile of features that didn’t make it into 10.5’s initial release. This sounds better than crowing about all the bugs they will have fixed. And please, oh please, can we finally get our iCal to-do lists on our iPhones? Probably not till iPhone 2.0, I’m guessing, February or later.

Blu-Ray support? Apple is rumored to be in the Blu-Ray camp but hasn’t actually said much about it. I’d think that the most recent Mac Pro update (from last week) would have included a Blu-ray option, although that might have stolen some thunder from Macworld. It seems time for it, and with recent happenings in the Blu-ray/HD fight swinging things more decisively to the Blu-ray side, it may be time for Apple to finally support it. That could fit in well with Quicktime and MacOS X 10.5 updates as well.

iPod updates? iLife updates? No, beyond any minor updates to the software, the current versions are all too recent for Apple to make significant updates.

A new rev of the iPhone? Not unless they’re ready to ship it today. And I don’t see that happening. Apple is likely to wait until June 2008 to intro a new rev of the iPhone; let it have at least a year before any major hardware updates. It would be insane to announce new iPhone hardware six months before it ships; it would cannibalize existing iPhone sales for those six months. I wouldn’t say it’s impossible that we’d see a minor update, possibly a 16GB iPhone, but I’d be shocked if Apple did more than a minor storage size bump.

One more thing… with its new “OS X” software that powers the iPhone, iPod Touch and likely the Apple TV… Apple is well-poised to expand into other devices. An Apple car head-end unit? Possible.

[update: It's "Macworld" not "MacWorld". Thanks.]
[tags]apple, macworld, predictions, ipod, iphone, apple tv, move rentals, macbook, macbook pro, penryn, blu-ray[/tags]

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