This is the reason why I love the modding community: they have no limits. Whether it’s about hardware or jailbreak / graphical modifications, modders always push themselves beyond the limitations and come up with exceptionals, custom creations.
Bart Reardon of The MacBook Air Project decided to try to fit a MacBook Air right under an Apple keyboard and make everything a single piece. Yes, a 1.6Ghz Core 2 Duo, 2GB RAM and 80GB hard drive computer inside a standard keyboard. He later thought of putting a Magic Trackpad next to the keyboard, too. He thinks that the device “will be used much beyond internet/email….maybe as an AppleTV replacement.”
Seriously, it’s awesome.
As for why he chose a MacBook Air, and not other models:
“As a component they are more expensive to get at but more importantly it’s about space. The nice thing about the macbook Air’s motherboard is how narrow it is. The other MacBooks have small motherboards too but they spread out at the connector end. This still makes them narrow enough to fit under a standard keyboard but that loses favour as it means you can’t get the keyboard (a desktop keyboard that is) low enough to be ergonomically comfortable.”
The latest pictures Bart posted on his blog:
The “iKeyboard” (what would be a good name for this?) still needs some adjustements and tweaks - the Trackpad antenna interferes with the Bluetooth antenna, for instance - but it’s getting closer to completion every day. We can’t wait to see the final result.
If you think about it, it’s very likely that we’ll see something like this in the future. I mean, why do we need to keep the computer separate from the input unit? We have the technologies to incorporate everything in one single piece. Maybe it’s just that we’re not ready to see a computing keyboard yet. [Update: or maybe yes?]
Follow the updates on the official The MacBook Air Project, or find Bart on Twitter as @bartreardon.
