Apple has been awarded a patent for a purely tablet device – has Apple got an Apple Tablet cooked up as well as a MacBook nano?

The patent, one of several awarded to Apple in January, is titled “Display Housing for Computing Device”, and describes a tablet device with radio communication built in.

To quote: “As a computer system, one embodiment of the invention includes: an antenna, said antenna being configured to transmit or receive RF signals; and a computer housing, said computer housing being configured to enclose said antenna”.

So yeah. Sounds like a tablet ultra portable to us. Could Apple be building a tablet as well as the MacBook 3G or nano AT&T is pressuring it for?

It’s worth stressing that just because Apple has patented this design, doesn’t mean that it’ll ever get round to building it – it could just be covering all its bases to ward off competitors, but we’ve got our fingers crossed for this one.

Out TBC | £TBC | Apple (Via Gizmodo)

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  • Aubrey

    Surely the iPod Touch is essentially a tablet computing device though? I’d be interested to see a tablet similar to the Nokia N700, but I’m not sure how much of a market there is for one. It would be nice to see a bigger screen on the Touch/iPhone though.

  • Ben Sillis

    It’s a good point Aubrey. I think there’s too many tablet/netbooks coming out soon for there to be an audience for a tablet only model, even from the likes of Apple. But Apple won’t make any sort of ultra portable without it being completely revolutionary either, the market’s too crowded to do otherwise, and it knows it. Maybe the Onion’s right and it’ll throw out the keyboard and replace it with a wheel!

  • Aubrey

    That was a genius thought whoever made the video with the ‘Wheel’ laptop, made me laugh. I think Apple are more likely to develop the 3rd Gen iPhone into a more accomplished computing device. I love my 3G, but in terms of functions it’s way behind the competition. I could spend ages going through the list of functions lacking, but I’m sure you know most of them already!

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