Apple ios

Apple: Their Tablet Computer History
ON NOV 08 IN EBOOK PUBLISHING, NEWSPAPER AND MAGAZINE PUBLISHING, SLIDERS, UNCATEGORIZED BY RYAN VETTER

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The Apple Newton MessagePad, Apple’s ‘failed’ PDA, is sitting on my desk. It’s a late model 2100, which was the last iteration Newton MessagePad to ship back in 1998. Every time I use one, I immediately think of a tablet computer, both because of its size and functionality: it’s much more than just a small, simple PDA.
But it’s more nostalgia than anything: the Newton was pretty much before my time. Today’s technology is quite a bit more advanced than when the Newton had its run. From powerful mobile processors and graphics chips, to high-resolution screens and high speed wireless connectivity, mobile devices today well eclipse not only the Newton, but even the most powerful consumer desktop computers of the time.
The Newton is an interesting device though, not the least of which because it spawned an entire industry of handheld PDAs. It’s what the Newton exemplifies that is notable. That is, it was the peak of Apple’s prior research and development on portable, slate-like (tablet) computers.
Now that Apple has released the market-leading iPad, with a barrage of other tablet computers and dedicated eReaders flooding the market, it’s worthwhile to look back and see where all of this came from. The focus will be on Apple, and their history with tablet computers.
Apple’s history with tablet computers dates back to at least 1979. A good stock of the following pictures and associated captions/background information are themselves derived from the book,AppleDesign, The Work of the Apple Industrial Design Group, by Paul Kunkel/Photos by Rick English (1997).
Roll the curtains…
The Apple Graphics Tablet (1979) – pictured at left – was the beginning of