Are you ready for this one people? As if they’re shouting a big F You to MacWorld, Apple have finally come clean and announced that on the 27th of this month the world will be treated to the very first view of their new baby.

The rumours have been running wild for weeks now and a lot of people seem to think this might just be the long awaited tablet mac that some have been waiting for. I must admit it’s the kind of thing that makes me raise my right eye brow like Roger Moore in The Saint, but that doesn’t mean I’m not going to want one in the end.

It’s important to remember that we don’t actually know what’s going to happen, we only know that something is going to happen. If it’s a tablet mac then there are probably going to be a lot of very happy people. However, it’s entirely possible that they’re going to show off the next version of iWork and iLife. That’s going to be like asking for an XBox for Christmas and getting a Wii. It’s not that it’s bad, it’s just not what we asked for.

Lets forget about the bad option and assume that they’re going to release the “iSlate”, although I really doubt that’s what they’ll call it.

First of all this thing is not going to be netbook price. Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the last month you’ll have heard that both Kennedy and I got ourselves new netbooks. While researching which one to buy I found out that it just didn’t matter because they’re all pretty much the same machine. For that reason they all cost pretty much the same, around the mid two hundred pound mark. I can tell you right now that if the iSlate comes out it will be significantly higher priced than that. Apple already make a tablet mac at around £250. It’s the iPod Touch 32GB. They even make a 64GB iPod Touch that’s priced at around £300. Expect a bigger tablet device to start at £450. I haven’t seen anything to make me think that there will be several models but it wouldn’t be any big shock. If there are several models I’d expect the top end to approach MacBook price in the end.

I can live with a £450. That means I didn’t just waste my money on a netbook.

Then we have to ask that all important question that nobody is asking. Exactly what do you want a tablet mac to do? As I sit here right now I can’t come up with a single idea as to what I’d want from a tablet computer. The point of them is that they’re small and don’t have a keyboard. I’m sure Apple will come up with a GUI that will make Microsoft puke with jealousy, but exactly how is it going to improve upon this netbook?  You see in order for it to do that it actually needs to be a fully functioning mac. Not a big iPod. I’m writing this article on Google’s Chrome browser running on Windows 7. Not a mobile edition of a browser that I really wish I could be using, and not running on a mobile OS based on an OS I really wish I could be using. If Apple want my money it needs to do everything my regular mac can do, all be it with an acceptable amount of power loss. I’m not expecting a portable MacPro.

Most of the rumours have said that the device will probably run an enlarged version of the iPod/Phone operating system. Yeah and so what. I can already do everything that OS can do with my iPod. I don’t need to spend £450 on a bigger version. If I’m spending that much I can get an actual proper laptop. Isn’t that the problem though? The fact that there already are two devices that forfill all my desires for portable computing? For quick little portable apps I’ve got an iPod or smart-phone. For anything that needs more power there are laptops whether they’re a net or lap top doesn’t matter.

There are also rumours that the iSlate (it REALLY won’t be called that) will come with some sort of mobile internet connection. That makes things a little more interesting because then it’s entirely possible that the phone companies will subsidise the price of the device. While £450 might be too much for me, what if it was actually £69.99 and then £25 per month?

What if it has a webcam in it? Could this device finally bring the start of mobile video conferencing? That’s something that has been around for a long time too. In the UK when 3G phone networks started to launch they were all showing us how we could use these new 3G phones with front facing cameras to have video call with each other. We’re now a decade further down the road and I have yet to either hold a video call myself or even witness another person having one. That said Apple do have a history of kick starting a technology that previously went nowhere. The iPod certainly wasn’t the first mp3 player, yet these days declaring that your mp3 player isn’t an iPod is something that might get you told to get out of what ever room you’re currently in. It wouldn’t surprise me if Steve came out and said something like “Here’s that tablet Mac you’ve all been talking about. It does things you could have done years ago but decided not to. The difference is now you’re actually going to want to do them.” That’s what Steve does and it’s one reason why he’s a genius. Yeah I know what I said.

I own most things that Apple make and there’s a very good reason for that. I think they make the best example of whatever market they’re in (except phones). They’re desktop computers are simply the best made computers in the world. Their operating system is the best. They make the best selling laptop computers on the planet and their portable media players are second to none. None of them are the cheapest but they are so much better than the competition that you can easily justify the increase in personal spending. Each product solves a problem that a lot of people need solving. A tablet computer doesn’t solve any problem. It just is. It might be very cool and shiny but I haven’t found a reason to want one yet. I am prepared to be completely wrong about that.