thinking out loud

I don’t currently own a laptop of any kind. All my mobility computing is in my iPhone and in my work laptop. For some reason I found myself thinking back over the various portable machines I’ve had (including during that stretch where I was entitled to any Apple laptop I wanted for work/home use…and other times when work just sort of provided). In roughly reverse chronological order…

Dell netbook (Mini 1012)

2nd-gen black MacBook

1st-gen black MacBook

pre-production original MacBook Pro 15″

12″ Powerbook G4

12″ iBook G4

15″ Titanium PowerBook G4

original gray iBook G3 SE

original bronze PowerBook G3

14″ 233Mhz “Main Street” PowerBook G3 (first laptop, bought in 1999)

The common theme here seems to be “consumer-grade low-cost and small”. Note that the move to a larger system has always been occasioned by a more powerful processor, and has always been succeeded by a smaller device with the same processor. (Aside from the netbook experiment, which was a special circumstance solely occasioned by the availability of Dell credit and birthday money.) On paper, at least, anything less than a 2.66 Ghz Core 2 Duo or 4 GB of RAM is a non-starter at this point.

I bring this up because this time next week we’ll know what’s doing with the iPad 2. Which I have to think will include some sort of iOS update, whether to a notional iOS 5 or just a bump in 4. The combination of iPhone and Kindle has pretty much done for my previous bouts of iPad glee, but I’m still tempted – maybe because of the constant allure of Alan Kay’s notional Dynabook in the back of my head, maybe because I think I might actually do more blogging and writing and try to make something of it besides sharing the misery of Vanderbilt sports.

But I’m definitely saving my birthday money for a bit.