I've been struggling with something for a long time. You there, come sit down and listen to my tale. Please tell me I make sense. It's about my dreams for the Mac and iPad. Wait, don't walk away.
For a very long time, Apple has made iPads and also made MacBooks. Once upon a time, they were quite different. But even back in the early days, I dreamed of iPads working like Macs. Apple has gotten closer, by degrees. True, iPadOS is not MacOS, but they're sharing more ideas and software than ever. Keyboards and trackpads can turn iPads into laptop-like work devices with multiple windows on-screen. Macs and iPads even share the same M-series chips.
And now there's a new MacBook, called Neo, that runs on an iPhone-level chip and costs the same as the new iPad Air. Meanwhile, reliable reports say the first touchscreen MacBook is coming by the end of this year.
I feel vindicated by this news. I tell my wife as I pace around at home with a morning coffee, taking in the MacBook Neo news: This is it. They're practically the same thing. Why can't one become the other? Why can't I turn an iPad, truly, into a Mac?
I've brought this up about once a year for, oh, the past decade and a half. It's my mantra. I believe it in my soul. And when I asked my wife if that made sense, that clearly it needed to happen, she said: I think you're getting a bit too het up about this.
Watch this: First Look at Apple's New MacBook Neo, a Colorful and Budget Laptop 00:23
I asked her: Wouldn't you want an iPad you bought to be able to be a Mac if you needed it? She said no. She doesn't care. She likes her iPad.
I took my passions upstairs. Thought some more. Paced around. Got my MacBook Air out to begin writing, even though half the time I also go to the nearby keyboarded iPad to write. And I thought, damn it, I'm right about this.
But maybe, just maybe, no one cares. And no one needs to care.
Tell me: Which is it? Ease my mind.
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