Microsoft has officially conceded the fact that the Apple’s iPad is eating into Windows-powered netbook sales, according to Gavriella Schuster, General Manager for Windows product management with Microsoft:

But the success of the Apple iPad, and the impending Google Android tablets, are beginning to threaten Windows’ hold on the “and” PC market. These [Netbooks] are definitely getting cannibalized. These are really a second device. But they are getting cannibalized.

Microsoft labels netbooks as “and” devices, meaning they aren’t full-fledged PCs but rather augment a user’s computer. However, these ‘secondary device’ sales are being devoured by Apple as a result of their success with the iPad. With the addition of iOS 4.2 coming very soon, essentially adding a multitude of features to an already feature-packed device, we only see this cannibalization progressing. Jonny Evans from ComputerWorld had this to say:

Sales in the netbook segment will continue to dwindle, and as mobile solutions continue to innovate and expand their market, eventually low-tier tablet devices will debut which will more than replace the remnants of the netbook market.

Remember, the iPad is currently believed to hold a 95% share of the tablet market, and over 20% of all consumers plan on purchasing an iPad in the future. Could the iPad eventually send the netbook to its grave?

[The Seattle PI via ComputerWorld]

Apple is finally using the PC word (no not that one) when referring to the iPod touch. Turns out even they think it, and the iPhone, are great pocket computer.

We’ve discussed before how, depending on needs, some folks here (and everywhere) are leaving their laptops and netbooks at home some days and getting by just fine triaging emails, reading docs, searching the webs, and using whatever percentage of those 75,000 apps are useful on-the-go tools.

Apple, for all their talk of gaming, isn’t ignoring that segment either anymore. Right up on Apple.com, they’re promoting the pocket computing process of their mobile platform.

Of course, things won’t get really interesting until we get built-in Bluetooth keyboard support, right Apple?

Ars Technica has once again found references to an iProd 1,1 in Apple firmware, this time iPhone 3.1 Beta 3. iProd was last seen back in May in the iPhone 3.0 betas under the prototype designation iProd 0,1.

For those unfamiliar with Apple versioning, 0,1 is thought to be used for pre-release prototype hardware. 1,1 was used for both the first iPhone (original 2G) and iPod touch. iPhone 3G was 1,2 (minor revision) while the second gen iPod touch was 2,1 (major revision). iPhone 3GS is 2,1 as well, and it’s widely expected that Apple will introduce an iPod touch 3,1 in September.

Says Ars about the new, as yet unnamed iProd(uct):

While it’s easy to speculate that this may be the rumored Apple tablet we keep hearing so much about lately, we have yet to find any evidence that iPhone OS 3.1 is capable of running on a device with a tablet-sized screen. It’s just as possible it may refer to the camera-equipped iPod nano, though we doubt such a device would run iPhone OS. Hell, it might even be an iPhone nano.

To the list of iTablet and iPhone nano, we add iNetbook. Let the speculation increase!

Following up on rumors of a $800 Apple netbook, MacBook, iTablet, etc. VentureBeat reports that Apple might also use the new platform to introduce their long-rumored custom system-on-a-chip.

This would be the result of Apple purchasing fabless chip design firm Palo Alto Semiconductor (PA Semi) and hiring Papermaster from IBM and graphics processor (GPU) gurus x2 from AMD/ATI (though whether or not it includes the ARM and PowerVR licenses for cores found in the iPhone and iPod touch, or beefier Intel chips found in the Mac line is uncertain).

While Steve Jobs said PA Semi was going to be used for iPods and iPhones, VentureBeat claims the team was actually split in two, half for iPod/iPhone and half for the tablet.

TUAW speculates that, given recent news of problems between Apple and Nvidia, who currently makes the Mac integrated chipsets, perhaps Apple will push the custom work into that line as well.

Either way, we’ve seen the huge benefit shared software technology has provided for the iPhone and Mac (Spotlight, QuickTime X to name but two), Apple going in-house with the chipsets could be just as beneficial…

MacRumors is reporting that, according to sources at InfoTimes, Apple is set to release a a 9.7 inch, (multi?)-touch Wintek screen netbook this October:

Because Apple will adopt touch screen technology on its netbooks, Apple will not target low-end consumers, avoiding direct competition with Acer, Asus, as well as their less-than-500-dollars netbooks. Apple’s netbook (or a “tablet” as many call it,) will probably be sold at around $800 USD each.

Does this mean a new line of MacBooks now that the 13″ has gone Pro? And what does this mean for the long-rumored large iPod/tablet form factor?

Looks like Apple is throwing some telecommuting muscle behind their phone support, with up to 450 “At Home Experts” joining the team just in time for… Well, that’s the big question.

The time frame seems to be from July through September, which sounds a tad late for new iPhone hardware, though if Apple has something extra to announce, something that might take a couple extra months for developers to work on before release, something that does for the ultra-portable market what the iPod and iPhone did for MP3 and smartphones…

Well, then, we’d be rumormongering too. cough iTablet cough iNetbook cough.

Here’s all we do know:

Changing the world is all in a day’s work at Apple. If you love innovation, here’s your chance to make a career of it. You’ll work hard. But the job comes with more than a few perks. If fulfillment, inspiration, adventure and advancement are your kind of perks, we’d love to hear from you.

Like to be around people who love technology? Like to be around technology that loves people? Apple offers a work environment unike any other.

[...]

There’s the typical job. Punch in, push paper, punch out, repeat. Then there’s a career at Apple. Where you’re encouraged to defy routine. To explore the far reaches of the possible. To travel uncharted paths. And to be a part of something far bigger than yourself. Because around here, changing the world just comes with the job description.

What do you think?

[Cult of Mac via Ars Technica]

Yeah, this story is thin. iPod nano thin. But Wired (via MacRumors) is claiming that Apple recent Mac OS X 10.5.7 Leopard update gives netbooks running the software (aka Hackintoshs) a significant boost to battery life (up to 33%).

This has led to some speculation that Apple maybe — just maybe — built in better power management and other optimizations for lower end processors like the Intel Atom.

Of course, that type of speculation is but one tiny little step to yet more rumors of Apple preparing to launch a netbook-like laptop of their own (or perhaps a full own OS X iTablet).

Hope springs eternal… especially when spring is right before WWDC. TiPb’s still leaning towards a larger-screened iPod touch as being more likely, but what do you think?

Also covered on today’s Apple Q2 2009 financial results call were Chief Operating Officer, Tim Cook’s description of netbooks, as currently on the market, having:

cramped keyboards, terrible software, junky hardware, very small screens, and just not a consumer experience… that we would put the Mac brand on, quite frankly.

So where does that put all the rumors about an Apple netbook being all but imminent? Either once again shoved on the back burner like the iPhone nano, or — really imminent. (Apple has a history of trash talking product spaces and denying interest right up until they launch their own offering, like video on iPods, or, you know, smartphones).

Does this mean we’ll more likely see an Apple tablet? Mac OS X or iPhone OS X based? Opinions vary but Cook gave nothing away. Instead, to costumers who might want mobile web and email, he offered this advice:

They might want to look at an iPhone or iPod touch instead.

Okay, so I’ll admit that I leave my laptop at home now and just use an iPhone far more often than I ever would have guessed I would, but as a full on mobile replacement? Is it really there yet?

And what do you see, if anything, as Apple’s now near-mythical entry into the pseudo-netbook space? One of the above, or something else entirely?

Is it real, or is it photoshop-fiction? Almost certainly the latter, but since our editor-in-chief, Dieter, went and bought himself a Dell Mini 9, it stands to reason Apple leaked this just to give him a little pay back for the stray Mac.

Gizmodo runs down the speculative specs:

• 10.4″ WXGA display.
• 1280 x 768 pixel with LED backlighting.
• NVIDIA MCP79
• Intel Atom Z740 1.83GHz with 1MB L2 cache.
• 2GB DDR3-800.
• NVIDIA GeForce 9400M
• 64GB Solid State Drive.
• Bluetooth 2.1 + EDR, Wi-Fi 802.11a/b/g/n
• 1 x USB 2.0
• 1 x Mini Display Port
• Battery Li-Ion 5100mA

Do we want a low-yield baby Mac? Would it be even more interesting if, as Apple Insider reported some other rumors suggest, carriers like AT&T, Orange, etc. start offering subsidized MacBook’s when you sign a contract for a data card?

Okay, technically one was on Monday, but following up the story on Apple ordering netbook-class panels, Dow Jones (via MacRumors) is following up with the always popular anonymous sources, said to be two people close to the situation:

The mini laptop computers will likely have monitor screens that are between 9.7-inches and 10-inches, one person, who declined to be named, said.

Will this be the 12″ Powerbook replacement many have been clamoring for? Will Apple really leave iTablet and large-size iPod touch demanders hanging again? Or will they combine the two products and make a netbook-sized device with a detachable multitouch-screen that works like a tablet?

It would have to move components from the keyboard section to the screen, making the top thicker and the bottom thinner (a la HTC Advantage).

Would it run iPhone OS X, however, or would people demand Mac OS X, paving the way for a really small, highly optimized version of Snow Leopard? It is building in multi-touch and CoreLocation… And could it be combined with the next generation MobileMe for online storage and cloud functionality, synced both to the full-sized Mac and even more portable iPhone…

Either way, TiPb predicts a fun, rumor-filled 2009!

MacRumors is reporting on a Digitimes story that says Taiwan-based supplier:

Wintek revealed that it is currently working with Apple to develop some new products, but it said it does not know what applications the new products are for.

Apple has denied interest in producing both a tablet and a netbook in the past, which is what they do both when they really have no interest, and also when they’re about the release something. What with all the new hardware Apple dropped last week, TiPb has speculated that the March 24th date for a rumored Apple Event could be used to debut the iPhone OS 3.0 beta, a higher resolution iPhone HD… or an iTablet form factor.

If Apple does release a new device, would it really be a netbook scale version of Mac OS X or a large-size iPod touch running the iPhone version of OS X? Either way, developers would need time to ramp up (or down) their apps. Either way, could this be more fuel for that fire, or simply more grist for the rumor-mill?

MobiFrance points us to this intriguing company: http://olo-computer.com/. It looks like they’re intending on developing a low-cost sort of Netbook, but with a difference — it will be powered by the iPhone. The idea is you plug your iPhone into the bottom and it not only becomes the touchpad for the Netbook, it also powers the thing entirely, the rest of the hardware is simply a keyboard, screen, and a few other bits to make it all run.

It’s an idea that’s already been done with Windows Mobile in the form of the Redfly.

Of course, based on the rendering above, which pretty much just looks like a shiny-ified MacBook, the idea is very far from being implemented. It also would almost certainly not work on a non-jailbroken iPhone, either. With Apple set to announce (possibly inexpensive) new notebooks next week, it’s also difficult to say whether or not the olo concept will even find a market. All in all, there are a lot of cards stacked up against this thing.

The Redfly is certainly intriguing and useful for a set of people — would you want to see the same sort of thing applied to the iPhone?