If you’re worried that you haven’t heard an Apple tablet rumour for a while here’s one to get your hopes up. According to Digitimes and their source, a Taiwanese newspaper, Foxconn is negotiating with Apple to manufacture a netbook format product.

Foxconn is already a ‘preferred assembler’ of Apple and currently manufactures the 3G iPhone. Its is also tipped to become Apple’s ‘major notebook shipment growth contributor’.

Rumours have suggested a 10-inch OLED touchscreen perhaps for a miniature version of the MacBook Air or a traditional clamshell device.

Manufacturing is due to begin before the end of May.

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A year almost to the day since the Apple’s MacBook Air launch Intel has got together with Olida to introduce the Olidata Conte, a new ultra-thin notebook. The sharp-looking machine was brought to us by U-Leader Design at CES 2009 in Las Vegas following an interview in April 2008 when the first whisperings of such a device was first mooted.

Antonio Masenza, president of U-Leader Design says the following of the Conte:

“U-Leader Design is not only this new notebook,” explained Masenza, “is the brand of an entire line of products that Olidata is developing with the help of Intel Corporation. These products represent a milestone in the IT market mainly for two reasons, firstly because it will give notebook users with innovative and state of the art technologies at an affordable price and secondly for the strategic vision that sustains Design U-Leader. “…

…”The notebook-Leader U Design will be available worldwide through a network of close alliances with Olidata the major international systems integrator. Through this alliance, all the best-known OEMs will be able to introduce innovative mobile PCs and competitive in its home market. In this way, customers will benefit from a more direct and immediate contact with a local company, who resides and has gained credit in the territory. “

Masenza makes no secret of the link between the new ultraportable Olidata and the Apple MacBook Air:

“The reference point is, of course, the MacBook Air, a notebook extraordinary, both as a design that integrated technical solutions as we do to better, in terms of design, weight, scope for expansion and price. In particular the cost to the end user will be considerably lower than Apple dell’ultraportatile “he said in the spring of 2008.

The notebook design is futuristic and cutting edge. The wedge-shape profile measures just 2.18 at its thickest point and weighs in at a mere 1,6 Kg. It seems that the designers (U-Design Leader) has managed to find the right balance between a sophisticated modern aesthetic and efficient organizain of the internal space for internal components.

The Conte comes with the following:

• Centrino 2 processors with Intel Core 2 Duo SFF (Small Form Factor)
• Solid-state drive for file storage
• LED display

Like the MacBook Air, the Conte has no optical drive. Users who have an absolute necessity could use an external DVD burner. The space saved was used to insert more capacious batteries. Olidata quotes a battery life of more than 4 hours with the standard battery and 7 hours with auxiliary battery.

The high-end Conte will be equipped with a 13.3-inch LCD with 16:10 ratio and WXGA resolution (1280×800) and will benefit from the following additional features:

• Intel Turbo Memory (Robson)
• Fingerprint Reader combined the indispensable TPM chip
• 3GB of DDR2 RAM
• SSD mechanism for easy opening
• open backlit keyboard.

Conte low-end, however, will have a new LCD display with a 13.3-inch 16:9 HD format and HD WXGA resolution of 1366×768 pixels, 1GB of RAM and DDR2 traditional magnetic hard disk.

Both models will be available with optional MiMAX or 3G for permenant connectivity on the go or during trips abroad, while WiFi and Bluetooth will be integrated.

Mooly Eden, vice president of Intel Mobile Platform Group, praised the initiative:

“The product of U-Leader Design is a great example of how you can make something interesting and innovative new processors using the low voltage Family Intel Core 2 Duo. This notebook is the result of a joint design effort on the part of Olidata and Intel, and it is good to see that the commitment of OEMs may bear fruit so interesting! “

U-Leader Conte will be marketed worldwide as of May 2009 with a price of less than $1300 for both versions: A sexy machine at a sexy price!

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Seven months after its first announcement at the Apple WWDC in January rumours are surfacing of the first upgrade to the MacBook Air by replacing the existing Merom class processor with a standard Penryn Core 2 Duo.

The Memron CPU had been modified by Intel specifically to accommodate the (then) unique demands of the MacBook Air. As a result of the constraints of mobile computing in such a thin profile the Merom was only available in 1.6GHz and 1.8GHz versions. Not so the Penryn which could range from 2.26GHz to 3.0Ghz with a 1,066MHz front side bus.

This increase in performance would come at a cost in power consumption and it is assumed that not only would a larger battery be necessary but also a more powerful (60W up from 45W) AC adapter (as used on standard MacBooks). Because of this the Air will lose some of it’s ‘ultralight mobility’ credentials.

Let’s not forget that internal storage costs have fallen in the last seven months so an increase in this area should also be taken into account. Expect 120GB to 160GB option to be available along with the SSD versions

The appearance of the MacBook Air should remain unchanged (Well thank the Gods for that!).

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Steve Jobs is no stranger to the corporate presentation and with his usual flair he launched Apple’s latest computer product, removing it from it’s wrapping — a standard sized manila envelope!

Yes, the new micro-thin MacBook Air sub-notebook fits in an envelope roughly A4 in size and yet still boasts a 13.3 inch screen and a full-sized keyboard. It is indeed the World’s thinnest notebook at 0.16 inches to 0.76 inches thick (the keyboard section is slightly thinner at the front. The screen is LED back-lit and has an integrated iSight camera. The machine weighs 3.0 pounds, Steve saying that rivals have made too many compromises in the pursuit of low weight notebooks.

The MultiTouch trackpad supports all of the gestures that we have come to love on the iPhone and iTouch.

The hard disk is based on those used in iPods and are 80 GB or 64 GB SSD and the processors are 1.6Ghz or 1.8Ghz Intel Core 2 Duo. 2 GB RAM is standard memory configuration. The circuits are flame retardant and made with some eco-friendly/recycled components including the aluminium case.

Here are the general specs

• 13.3-inch LED-backlit glossy widescreen display with 1280×800 resolution
• 1.6 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor with 4MB L2 cache
• 800 MHz front-side bus
• 2GB of 667 MHz DDR2 SDRAM
• 80GB hard disk drive with Sudden Motion Sensor
• Intel Graphics Media Accelerator X3100
• Micro-DVI port (includes Micro-DVI to VGA and Micro-DVI to DVI Adapters)
• Built-in iSight video camera
• Built-in AirPort Extreme 802.11n wireless networking and Bluetooth 2.1+EDR
• One USB 2.0 port
• One headphone port
• Multi-touch TrackPad with support for advanced multi-touch gestures including tap, scroll, pinch, rotate and swipe
• 45 Watt MagSafe Power Adapter

Unfortunately some users may miss a few features that Apple had to forego in order to meet the dimensional constraints. We all know by now that there is no optical drive — users will have to plug in an external device. Apple has introduced an option in the Air’s implementation of Finder called Remote Disk which will allow Air users to install software without the need of an internal optical so this may not be such a problem. But it also means you can’t boot from an inserted DVD and there is no information at the time of writing as to whether you can boot from an external optical drive. This has proven essential at times when the hard disk is corrupted or the OS unavailable for some reason and you need to recover data.

The Battery is not user replaceable so you may have to return the machine to Apple when the installed battery gives up the ghost and battery swapping to extend on-the-road charge life is not an option.

There is no FireWire port. This also means no Target Disk mode, essential for troubleshooting and data recovery. It also means that all those peripherals that you have that are FireWire connected are of no use on this machine.

No built-in Ethernet means no network boot without a $20 USB-to-Ethernet adapter.

Some of these problems may be solved by whatever software installation Apple comes up with. The others are just going to cost you money!

The MacBook Air is available for pre-order now from the Mac Store for $1799 for the base configuration and ships in two weeks.

Related Posts:

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• Apple’s MacBook Air gets a Penryn speed boost