Rumor: 9to5Mac says The Brick is 'a block of aluminum'

I'd get it, but ONLY if Apple give it its proper UK English spelling (Aluminium) over here in Blighty!

I am sold on the MB if apple puts an Nvidia chipset in there and updates the trackpad/button, and display.

The current MB are really cheap and shitty in my opinion. Almost as bad as the ipods. Screw outsourcing.

Just looking forward to the headlines October 14. "Apple Ships Brick"

It wouldn't be a regular, "inexpensive" MacBook if they made it out of a solid block. That form of manufacture is VERY expensive.

Maybe the circuit board etc. will be etched right on back of the case?
ie no circuit board to screw in.

or maybe the brick is a central processing unit for the whole house connected wirelessly, tv, stereo, computer, keyboard, screen, printer, phone, etc.

highly automated laser cut manufacturing + "me.com" = made on demand custom laptop

it's NikeID meets the PC

what will you etch into yours?

Still chewing on this old bone?

Hi guys;

I suspect that there have been some communicatios errors with respect to the material that started this thread. The probability that Apple would carve a laptop out of an aluminum block is so close to zero as to not be worth talking about. Now that doesn't mean some of the content is wrong just that I believe there have been misunderstandings about modern manufacturing.

Take Lasers for example, they are used for all sorts of things in a modern manufacturing plant. One application is cutting stampings and deep drawn parts to final size. If you want to see a live example of such tale the factory tour at Harley Davidsons York PA plant.

Given some of Apples recent patents I would suspect that they would be cutting composite structures to size. Composite in the sense of a stamped Aluminum housing with the circuitry bonded to the shell. Apple had a recent patent along these lines. In a highly automated plant a shell might not reach final dimensions until after it has progressed through the production line. Think progressive dies extended with several assembly stations beyound the forming ones.

All this being said what will really make me happy is if this plant ends up back in the USA. I'm really tired of all the crappy Chinese stuff coming into the US.

On a side note if Apple did go to something like the bonded structures they have patented you can kiss repairing your machine good by. I don't think disassembly would be possible.


Dave

Urm this doesn't seem at all right.

I am a product designer and I can tell you that milling a laptop enclosure out of a solid block would be an extremely wasteful (as far as material) and time consuming process not at all suited to high-volume manufacture of such thin-walled parts.

Consider the existing aluminum shell of a macbook pro, now imagine the wasted material (not to mention huge amount of time milling, grinding and polishing) that would be generated if you were to take a block of aluminum that size and mill out 99% of the material to arrive at the thin-walled part we are discussing.

Patently insane.

This person is dangerously mis-informed.

Now if you were talking hydro-forming or stamping you would be discussing a process that is much more suitable for high-volume manufacture of thin-walled parts.

Casting of magnesium parts (such as for the next cube) is also viable when wall thicknesses are a little higher.

This entire premise is bogus.

Like others here have said, what would make me buy a MacBook is a nice, non-glossy screen. The spec could be as it is now and I'd buy it, but I just hate the shiny screen yet I don't want to replace my 15" PowerBook with another large laptop as my usage has evolved over the years and I'm now more mobile.