There's rumors of a shakeup going around in Apple's laptop lines. AppleInsider claims, according to "people familiar with Apple's roadmap that Apple is aiming to completely revamp its notebook lines sometime this year, basically making the MacBook Air's style the standard. MacBook Pros would essentially be discontinued as we know them, and instead, the MacBook Pro would take on the Air format: Super thin, no optical drives, centered almost completely around digital distribution and portability. This is a story we've heard before
There has been word from overseas of a MacBook Air style notebook with a 15 inch screen coming out of the manufacturers in China, and this murmuring would seem to support those rumors. It's not much of a stretch, either -- the MacBook Air has been extremely popular (I've seen them almost replace any other Mac notebook models already at the two electronics conventions I've been to this year), and clearly customers have shown that they're ready to go with a slimmer model designed around downloading software rather than installing it from a disc.
Of course, there will always be holdouts: It's hard to believe that Apple will release a 17" MacBook Air-style model, and certainly there are plenty of users who would rather have a huge laptop that's almost used more as a desktop computer than something more portable. But this is Apple we're talking about -- have they ever waited for users to be comfortable with the new before moving forward?
At any rate, don't get too excited yet, as these are just rumors for now. But it does seem likely that by the end of this year, we'll see thinner, lighter laptops in Apple's portable computer lines.
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