Yes, that’s right, a new MacBook. Why you ask? Well, there are several reasons that Apple will launch an actual product and not some a wireless way to pay for products, using technology which won’t likely be included in the next iPhone and all signs point to a new MacBook.

5 Reasons Apple’s Surprise is a New MacBook

The MacBook is a year old on May 18th – The current MacBook was announced a year ago, and based on upgrade cycles it is one of the oldest MacBooks in recent history. Only the original MacBook Air held a longer time between upgrades, clocking in at 499 days according to the MacRumors Buying Guide.
The MacBook is 5 years old this Month - The first MacBook, which replaced the iBook, was announced 5 years ago in May. At the time, the White and Black MacBooks where a diversion from the standard notebooks with an island style keyboard, glossy display and the famous Apple magnetic latching system. Many of these features have jumped from the MacBook to the rest of the notebook market, leaving the Macbook of a year ago behind the PC competition.
The MacBook is Normally Updated in May – Take a look back at MacBook upgrades and you’ll see that May is a popular month for bringing changes to the MacBook. While we have seen some of the biggest changes come in October, it would be very surprising for the MacBook to go another 150 days until an upgrade.
The MacBook Looks Dated – The MacBook doesn’t stand out nearly as much as it used to. The white polycarbonate look looks like something from 2006 and at over an inch thick it isn’t as sexy looking as the rest of the Apple Notebooks or even the PC competition. Set the MacBook next to the $100 cheaper Toshiba Satellite E305 and pick a winner based on looks. Odds are you’re wondering if you can put a Hackintosh version of OS X on the Satellite E305.
The MacBook Needs New Tech – It’s not just looks, Even the low-end PC competition is running circles around the MacBook which is due for a bump up to Intel Sandy Bridge processors by now. We could also see Apple including a Thunderbolt port on the MacBook.

What to Expect from a New MacBook

While we haven’t had any recent leaks, we would expect the MacBook would get a new thinner and lighter look, possibly even with a new aluminum exterior to match the current MacBook Pro and MacBook Air lines. The move to aluminum is less likely, but not out of reach.

Additionally, we expect to see Sandy Bridge processor options from Intel. It is likely that the new MacBook would include a Core i3 2nd Generation processor with integrated graphics, rather than the faster Core i5 options available in the MacBook Pro lines. We expect the base RAM size to stay at 2GB and there’s only a small chance we’ll see the starting hard drive size will jump up to 320GB.

Is a New MacBook Apple Store’s 10th Anniversary Surprise? [5 Reasons] is a post by Josh Smith from Notebooks.com.

If you are thinking of purchasing a used or second hand MacBook, you should take precautions to make sure you don’t end up with a stolen notebook that won’t be valid for warranty service and will likely be taken from you if it is discovered to be stolen property.

How to Check if a MacBook or MacBook Pro is Stolen

There are a few ways you can attempt to figure out if a MacBook is stolen or just a really good deal. Unfortunately, Apple doesn’t keep a list of lost and stolen MacBooks as some people may tell you, but you can use the serial number to check eligibility for AppleCare and to check with your local police.

1. Ask for a Serial Number – This is one of the easiest ways to find out if you are dealing with a rotten Apple. If the seller refuses to provide the serial number than you should walk away right away.
2. Check Apple Care Eligibility – Once you have the serial number you can check to see if the MacBook Pro or MacBook Air is eligible for warranty coverage. This can help you determine if the Macbook was purchased when the seller says it was.
3. Check with the Local Police – You can also call up the local police and tell them you want to make sure a laptop isn’t stolen. If you are buying online, you would be well served to call the local police from wherever the seller says he or she lives.

If everything looks good, make sure you go to the meeting with someone and meet in a very public place. These transactions typically involve cash, so there is always the possibility that your seller could be looking to take your money and run without handing off a new MacBook.

Our advice. If you want to save big on a MacBook, MacBook Pro or MacBook Air. Look for refurbished deals direct from Apple which offer hundreds off the regular price without the need to buy in a McDonald’s parking lot and worry about the provenance of your Mac.

How to Avoid Buying a Stolen Mac: Apple Store Robbed of 24 MacBooks in 30 seconds (video) is a post by Josh Smith from Notebooks.com.

Over at our sister site, Gottabemobile.com, the team put together some great coverage of the day as well as what to do when you get yours home.

Our editor Josh Smith posted some video of interviews he took of would-be iPad buyers in line at an Ohio Apple Store.

We were also on hand at the Best Buy in Hickory, NC where the buying experience was pretty smooth except for one poor customer who despite being first in line was didn’t get an iPad because they ran out. Check out that sad story.

Lines were pretty long at most Apple stores. Including the New York store where a woman who got their early cashed in by selling her place in line for $900. Our publisher Xavier Lanier went buy one in San Francisco and found 200 people already waiting at 2:00 PM.

200 in Line at San Francisco Mall Apple Store

With iPads in hand the team went to work checking out Apple’s new tablet. Warner Crocker watched as a friend unboxed his first ever iPad and got some first impressions.

They also have some good advice coming on what to do with your new iPad 2. Josh posted the Top 5 Things to make sure you do before downloading some of the new apps and games that take advantage of the great iPad 2 hardware.

Apple iPad 2 Has Arrived at Gottabemobile is a post by Kevin Purcell from Notebooks.com.

Yesterday, the Apple Store featured the infamous yellow sticky note saying, “We’ll be back soon.” Normally, this means a new or refreshed product. However, once the store was available again, there didn’t seem to be any changes. Then, people started noticing the new feature at the top of a Mac product page in the Apple Store. When you click it, it pulls up Apple’s in-depth comparison of multiple Macs.

Included in the comparison chart is included software, included accessories, technical specifications, and a configuration summary at the bottom. Unlike most comparison features on other websites, Compare Macs allows you to customize each of the compared Macs, updating the price and configuration summary on the fly. You can even save the comparisons for later reference.

One interesting feature is the detailed explanation of each Mac’s effect on the environment. With more and more people “going green”, this is an important feature that many companies neglect to consider.

So if you are having trouble deciding which Mac has the best features or value, check out the Compare Macs feature today.

Apple Adds Compare Macs Option to the Apple Store is a post by Carter Sprunger from Notebooks.com.

Today I was driving to Greensboro to pick up my son and I heard that some Apple Stores still had the iPhone 4 available. On a lark I went to the Apple Store in Greensboro, NC to see if I could get lucky and get one on launch day. I found two lines; one for those who had preordered which still had about 50 people in it 4 hours after the store opened and another for people who didn’t reserve an iPhone 4 which was a little bit longer.

I got in the line and they had some yellow crowd control barriers up to keep us in line.” The Apple staff passed out water which many drank down and left there on the side. If they hadn’t regularly been cleaning up I am sure it would have been a real mess. The also gave some umbrellas to ward off the hot sun. It was well over 90 degrees. Not sure what the temperature was on that hot pavement.

After about thirty minutes, the staff had come out to count the people three times. Since we were not told they didn’t have enough iPhone 4′s n stock, we believed they did. How could they let us wait like this in the heat knowing they didn’t have enough for us?

Sadly, our faith in their humanity was dashed. About thirty minutes later, we were told specifically that there were no more phones to be sold today. The only reason we got that information was a belligerent customer who had been waiting since 5:00 am got quite loud and angry. To appease him the store manager came out and finally gave us the bad new. He said all he could do was put our name on a list.” Thinking a person with a legal pad, or at least some person with an iPod Touch, would be coming in the next few minutes to get our names, we waited. We waited another 15 minutes when another employee came out to pick up empty water bottles. She told the lady three people in front of me that there was still a chance to get a 32 GB iPhone 4, so I kept waiting.

It was a total of 90 minutes from arrival before I finally got in the door. Handing off my umbrella, I was taken to an iMac where I simply was told to log into my Apple iTunes account and click a reserve button. The nice clerk said it would hopefully be tomorrow.” After all the misinformation we were given, I’m not going to hold my breath. But they belief is that some of the phones reserved will be made available after people don’t pick them up on the 24th. They will make them available some time on the 25th to those of us who got on the list” at that store. Of course to get it I will have to drive back to Greensboro, a two hour trip.

Mine was not the only bad experience. I know of at least one person who wanted to get an iPhone at a WalMart and found they had only one in stock. I called the local WalMart and they didn’t even get that many. Same for Radio Shack and even AT&T. After not getting rewarded by my reservation” at a Best Buy, I got an email today from them asking me to buy one online. Of course they are sold out. Someone shouldn’t have hit send with that one. I guess Apple decided to keep a larger supply of the products this time around.

All of this taught me a few things:

1. Apple loves the publicity two news crews were here recording the happenings four hours after the store opened.
2. My dislike for the company was only confirmed, yet I love their hardware. My son and I hung out looking at the display models and they look pretty cool.
3. By my best estimate about fifty people were put on the waiting list at that store. My son didn’t understand why they wouldn’t sell us a display model.
4. Apple fans are a dedicated bunch and Jobs and company have a loyal customer base. Not sure that is very well deserved.
5. People can be really mean. These poor employees are not making the decisions that caused the troubles like poor pre-order experience, cancelled orders, and long wait in the hot sun. But people sure can treat them poorly. If you yelled at some poor Apple employee who was not rude to you, shame on you!

iPhone 4 Line at Apple Store is a post by Kevin Purcell from Notebooks.com.

In a post to the MacRumors forum, Justin said he was the first camper in line each of the past two years for both the 3G and 3GS releases. He normally only camps out the night before, but this time he chose to have some “fun” since he hasn’t gone on any kind of “trip or vacation” for a decade.

Here is a video interview of Justin who is arguably the most loyal Apple customer ever. Or at least in Yosemite, TX.

Apple fans who were bitten by this year’s ordering snafus and incredible demand may be laughing now, but will be crying next Thursday as Justin laughs.

iPhone 4 Waiting Line Begins in Texas is a post by Kevin Purcell from Notebooks.com.

The Apple Store App has five separate tabs at the bottom of the screen, which are Featured, Products, Stores, Search, and Cart.

In the Featured tab, it lists the featured Apple products, with the newest products showing up first.

The Stores tab enables you to see featured items or promotions, see a schedule of events at that specific store, and reserve an appointment to have an Apple employee assist you in various ways.

The Products tab lists all of the products that can be found on the Apple Store in your computer’s browser. From here, you can select different products and options and add them to your cart.

Alternatively, if you know exactly what product you are looking for, you may search for it using the Search tab.

Once you have select a product and added it to your cart, it appears in the Cart tab, showing you the final price and allowing you to Checkout.

The Apple Store App truly makes researching/purchasing an Apple product a breeze. It may even be a simpler to use than the Apple Store on your computer.

Apple Store App for iPhone and iPod Touch is a post by Carter Sprunger from Notebooks.com.

On Monday, Apple launched the “Gift this App” in the Apple App Store. While you are shopping in the App Store on iTunes, users can click a drop-down menu next to “Buy App” that will give an option to “Gift This App.” By choosing this option, users are taken to the “Give a Gift” page, which allows users to type in the recipient’s name and e-mail address. It also gives the opportunity to add a personal message. Gifts can be printed, delivered snail mail, or emailed to the gift receiver. Gifts can only be redeemed in the store country from which the gift originated.

It was nice of Apple to “sneak” this into the new Terms and Conditions of the iTunes Store, just in time for the iPad launch on April 3rd.

“Gift this App” for Apple App Store is a post by Amy from Notebooks.com.

What we do know is that the Apple store is currently offline this morning.  What does this mean?  Well, if the rumors are anywhere near true, there will be announcements today about a refresh of the Apple hardware line, including the use of the new Intel Core i5 and i7 processors.  There may also be news about a 4th gen iPhone, a video iPad and possibly news on an updated iLife 2010.

We’ll keep you posted as we receive news from Macworld!

UPDATE: 10:13EST- Looks like the only update so far was the release of Apeture 3, the photo editing program from Apple.  We will still wait on more announcements later this week.

Apple store offline in wait for Macworld announcements is a post by Amy from Notebooks.com.

Opening at 10am on November 14 (tomorrow morning as I write this), the Upper West Side store boasts an all-glass arched roof and a 45-foot genius bar. It also houses Apple’s largest training and support area, and more Apple products than any other store in the world.

The first 2,500 visitors to the newest iMecca will receive a free, commemorative t-shirt. But you better show up early – Apple store openings are known for the long-lines of Mac fanboys and gawkers.

Whoa.

The grandeur and scope of Manhattan’s fourth Apple store may seem strange to some. Likewise for Apple’s new significant stores” strategy, with it’s emphasis on flashy stores in major markets. In a time where many consumers are turning away from brick-and-mortar stores, and many companies are cutting costs, Apple appears to be moving in the opposite direction.

But it’s working for them, particularly in New York. Apple recently posted it most profitable quarter ever, thanks in large part to it’s retail locations, and Apple’s 5th Avenue location is among that shopping areas highest grossing retailers ever.

Is anyone in the New York area going to check this place out? I’d love to know what you think, so share your comments below or on twitter. And feel free to send me a t-shirt. Size: medium.

Apple opens biggest, baddest retail store ever in NYC’s Upper West Side is a post by Jeremy from Notebooks.com.