January 11th, 2006
MacBook Pro: What's in a name?
Back in July 2005 I suggested that it was time for Apple to retire the name PowerBook in favor something that would depart from its "Power"PC heritage (even though the original PowerBook predates the PowerPC) and move into the 21st century and reflect Apple’s commitment to use silicon from Intel.
Yesterday’s announcement of the MacBook Pro notebook was a surprise to most and it’s interesting to see that Apple finally dropped the PowerBook from the product line. It’s about time, they’ve used that term for about 15 years and, frankly it’s getting a little long-in-the-tooth. But where to they go from here?
The fact that MacBook has the word "Pro" appended to the end is an indication that a consumer version of the MacBook is coming. It’s only common sense that Apple would replace the wildly popular iBook line with a new lower-cost computer targeted at students, children and those that don’t want to pony up US$2k for a pro notebook. But what are they going to call it?
This new naming convention has got me thinking. If they call the professional notebook the MacBook Pro, then is the consumer version going to be the MacBook Lite? It could also be the MacBook mini, which would make it a relative of the consumer desktop Mac mini. Another thought was that the consumer model could fall under the consumer desktop, the iMac, and it could be called the iMacBook. Then all the professional machines would be Macs and the consumer machines would be iMacs: Mac Pro, MacBook Pro, iMac and iMacBook.
Either way it’s a mouthful.
What’s your take the name "MacBook Pro?" Sound off in the TalkBack.
Jason D. O'Grady is the editor of PowerPage.org, which has been publishing daily mobile technology news since December 1995. For disclosures on Jason's industry affiliations, click here or to view Jason's full profile click here.
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