Mac Pro is the only Mac left that has not been upgraded this year. The last Mac Pro update is August 2010. One reason cited for the delay is the lack of a suitable Sandy Bridge Xeon Intel processor, which is said to debut only in earlier 2012. There is also wild speculation at the moment of Apple “rethinking” their Mac Pro line.

Desktop Mac currently consists of Mac Mini, iMac and Mac Pro. With desktop range of Mac declining in sales in favor of notebook Mac,  there is a possibility that Apple might cancel it’s Mac Pro line, in the footstep of Xserve server line which was canceled end January this year. The truth is, Mac Pro is a very niche workstation class of computer, its sales number might not justify its attention for resource inside Apple.

We are hoping Apple will keep the Mac Pro line, with a brand new case design. A case that is smaller than the current one, and is convertible to be rack-mountable. But we see Apple shifting to be more and more focus on the consumer market, and will not be surprised if the end of Mac Pro is announced.

When Apple product release news is published by Wall Street Journal, it is safe bet that it is true. According to report from Taipei, Apple has ordered components for new iPad for a early 2012 launch.

The next generation iPad is expected to feature a high resolution display – 2048 by 1536 compared with 1024 by 768 in the iPad 2 – and Apple’s suppliers have already shipped small quantities of components for the sampling of the iPad 3. Suppliers said Apple has placed orders for a 9.7-inch screen device.

There is no surprise that a new iPad will come in early 2012, if you expect Apple to keep to its annual refresh cycle. This news squashes another rumor suggesting iPad 3 will release this fall for the Christmas shopping season.

Wall Street Journal: Apple developing new iPad

According to MicGadget blog post, China case makers have started the distribution of iPhone 5 cases.  iPhone 5 cases are “everywhere” in China now. It is evident that these makers are confident enough of the design to start mass production. Which leads to high probability of confirmation on how iPhone 5 will look like.

The case suggests that iPhone 5 will be wider and longer than iPhone 4, with slight tapering from top to bottom in thickness. Some has suggested that iPhone 5 is 5 inches x 2.8 inches in dimension. For comparison, iPhone 4 is 4.5 inches x 2.31 inches.

iPhone 5 has a “teardrop” design with round edges, a departure from the more squarish design of iPhone 4. The mute switch opening on the case is now on the opposite side compared with iPhone 4.

MicGadget Blog Post

Rumors are heating up on the Internet on Apple readying a 15″ ultra-thin Mac notebook similar to existing MacBook Air. This is the likely update to Apple’s MacBook Pro range, bringing similar look across all its notebook models.

We are predicting that the next MacBook Pro update will follow some design choices in MacBook Air. The new MacBook Pro is likely to ditch the optical drive, with the use of integrated SSD a prefered option for internal drive. MacBook Pro is likely to sport Thunderbolt, Firewire 800, USB 2 and Gigabit Ethernet as standard ports.

We expect Apple to offer the new MacBook Pro in 13″, 15″ and 17″ display and will release them later in the year before the Christmas shopping season.

MobileMe will soon be free, if the rumor published by MacDailyNews is true. Currently costing US$99 per year, a free MobileMe subscription will be good news to existing subscribers and to all Mac users.

MobileMe consists of many services on the cloud, including storage, email, photo galleries, personal website, Find My iPhone, sync store of contacts/calendars/bookmarks etc. Many useful features that integrates tightly with your Mac/iPhone/iPad but most users are taken back by the price.

We hope this rumor is true as there are many advantages and justification for Apple to make MobileMe free:

• It will be a different ballgame for Apple if MobileMe becomes competitive to similar offering by Google and Microsoft. A free MobileMe will enjoy substantial increase in user base and suddenly makes Apple a major player in the cloud space. This is the necessary move by Apple if it wants to compete in Google’s stronghold, or simply wants to make Google mad.

• The recent purchase of Lala.com points to an imminent launch of a cloud based music service. We believe Apple will tie this new music service to the MobileMe branding. What better ways to attract users than to offer it free? We suspect Apple might launch the music service together with free MobileMe.

• With the world moving to a cloud service and apps (iPhone/iPad) model, it is timely if not slightly late in the game for Apple to focus on cloud services. It is inevitable.

• Apple’s commitment of US$1 billion to a server farm in North Carolina is meant for serving something new and substantial. We believe the new infrastructure is meant for free MobileMe for all users. According to the post by MacDailyNews, the timing for MobileMe to go free could be “sooner than later… depends on certain facilities going operational.”. That facilities could be the one in North Carolina.

Apple please, make MobileMe free. And announce it in your WWDC developer conference and make it available in June.

Several hints and evidence that are uncovered lately signal a likely introduction of next-gen Apple iPhone in June.

• Apple’s marketing cheif Phil Schiller, when outlining Apple’s general product cycles in a post MacWorld 2009 interview, said the plan includes an iPhone cycle in June.
• Recently, a reference to an unknown ‘iPhone 2,1′ string in firmware codes and web server logs indicate that a major hardware revision of iPhone is in the works and being tested. Apple refers to original iPhone as ‘iPhone 1,1′ while iPhone 3G is identified as ‘iPhone 1,2′.
• This week, Mark Davis (Program Director for iPhone at Emirates Communications Etisalat), when spoken to Dow Jones on iPhone 3G’s launch later this month in UAE and Saudi Arabia, said that the “next version of the device, which is due out in June, will be launched in the UAE at the same time.”

Enough info to get the Apple rumor mill spinning hot. Most industry watchers expect new iPhone during mid-year, citing Apple’s history to refresh its iPhone model once a year. The first iPhone was launched in June 29, 2007. iPhone 3G was released July 11, 2008.

Lets wish the new iPhone model includes video recording capability (make it 720p), with a higher resolution flash camera, and with higher capacity option.