Does an upgrade of the Macbook Air justify the current secret activity we see at the Apple stores? Employees not allowed to take vacation? Gigabytes of training materials distributed? Black curtains and mandatory meeting on next Sunday?
No, I think it must be something bigger. For example, the iConsole. Apple is going to compete with the XBox and the PS3.
I'd put my money on an entirely new Mac model. It's already known that the Mac Pro is being updated with a smaller form-factor, but there's still a space between it and the iMac that could stand to be filled. Something screen-less, more expandable than the Mini, but less powerful than the Mac Pro.
PCI slots are the new floppy drive: lot of people think they can't live without, they will scream bloody murder when Apple releases a new Mac Peo without PCI slots, but in reality Thunderbolt has just made internal PCI obsolete.
There will not be 3 models. A Mac Pro with PCI slots is just a temporary stop-gap like iPod Classic until all the PCI card vendors have transformed their products into external Thunderbolt devices.
The future will have a small Mac Mini and a big Mac Mini, the latter with the required cpu/ram for server purposes.
> But in reality Thunderbolt has just made internal PCI obsolete.
The current Thunderbolt implementation transfers up to 10 gigabits/second bi-directional. [1]
The current PCI-E X16 slots in the Mac Pro transfer up to 64 gigabits/second bi-directional. The future PCI-E X16 standard (3.0) has 128 gigabits/second bi-directional. [2]
Over the next decade, Thunderbolt transfer rates will reach 100 gigabits/second bi-directional. [3]
Thunderbolt is nowhere close to replacing PCI-E slots within computers.
Sadly, I don't think we'll ever see a matte screen iMac ever. The iMac is geared towards the consumer market, and the general consumer market prefers glossy screens.
While the Apple TV could certainly offer game features, its appearance doesn't appeal to the target audience (the Xbox and PS3 definately look much more exciting).
Therefore, Apple will probably have designed the iConsole in a somewhat more exciting look than the usual Apple products, which are all quite minimaistic (which I like, BTW).
No, I think it must be something bigger. For example, the iConsole. Apple is going to compete with the XBox and the PS3.