I forgot to mention the original purpose of opening up this comment reply to your posting: I checked out the site you added to the link section of your comment and it’s very nicely done! Wanted to compliment you on that and wish you well in your future endeavours in Web publishing

You’re somewhat close to the mark…..the big hint dropped during the recent quarterly financial results conference call regarding Apple planning to shrink its margins to make an ever more aggressive assault on the rest of the computing/tech/device world has stirred up a whirlwind of speculation; much of it fairly well thought out and based in reality, but when it comes down to the details, most are getting it wrong.

There is definitely a new portable product, with an emphasis on bridging the Multi-Touch iDevice world to the emerging Multi-Touch portable computer (e.g. laptop, tablet, other portable form factors of otherwise “full blown” computers rather than pure-bred iDevices — a line which will only be getting fuzzier as time goes by!) offerings such as its latest laptops…..but a lot of the juiciest details are under firm embargo by our sources — much as many other rumor-mongers are now holding the cards close to their chests, hedging their bets and trying not to compromise their sources.

Nonetheless, this new bridge between Macs & iDevices will be only the beginning of a huge move on Apple’s part to compete aggressively on value and further diversify its offerings.

Expect several new products this year, along with aggressive revisions of its high-end systems like the Mac Pro & Xserve to start pulling in major large-scale projects that can help offset its aggressive margin-shrinking moves.

As for the Macbook Air….Steve and everyone in the Executive Suite know better than to let this become another PowerMac G4 Cube fiasco. The upcoming revision will be, I suspect, even more aggressive and exciting than we have thus far predicted….

Given some of Oppenheimer’s comments in Apple’s 3Q conference call, I’m thinking the price is going to be the same as netbooks from HP but with dramatically better functionality…say $499?

I previously worked for Dynamac, the first manufacturer of portable Apple computers. For projected hardware and software specs, along with an analysis of pricing drivers see http://tinyurl.com/57fgm9