On August 17, a pioneer in the computer industry sadly passed away. John Ellenby died at age 75. He was known as the “godfather” of the laptop because he and his company Grid Systems released the first clamshell portable laptop in 1982: the Compass. Over 30 years later, the idea of opening and closing a laptop still stands as the standard design among laptops.
Today, Apple sells Macs in laptop and desktop formats. The laptops are the MacBook Air and MacBook Pro. The desktop Macs are the all-in-one iMac, the expensive and high-powered Mac Pro, and a. The PowerBook (known as Macintosh PowerBook before 1997) is a family of Macintosh laptop computers designed, manufactured and sold by Apple Computer, Inc. From 1991 to 2006. During its lifetime, the PowerBook went through several major revisions and redesigns, often being the first to incorporate features that would later become standard in competing laptop.
Kendati mahal, laptop Apple ini juga banyak disukai pekerja kreatif seperti web designer, fotografer, pekerja film, karena kecanggihan fitur dan multimedia yang ada di dalamnya. Seri Apple MacBook.MacBook adalah seri laptop Macintosh yang diproduksi Apple Inc. Laptop ini diproduksi dari tahun 2006 hingga akhir 2011. Choose Apple menu System Preferences, then click Accessibility. Click Voice Control in the sidebar. Select Enable Voice Control. When you turn on Voice Control for the first time, your Mac completes a one-time download from Apple. 2 Voice Control preferences. The Macintosh Portable is considered one of Apple’s worst products ever, but it’s a good checkpoint on our evolution list. In 1989, Apple released its first portable laptop complete with a 9.8.
Though the Compass wasn’t the first portable computer, it was the first one with the familiar design we see everywhere now. You might call it the first modern laptop.
The Compass looked quite different than the laptops of 2016 though. It was wildly chunky, heavy and expensive at $8,150. Adjusted for inflation, that’s over $20,000 by today’s standards. It also extended far outward behind the display to help with heating issues and to house the computing components.
So in honor of this revolutionary design, let’s take a look at some of the major evolutionary changes laptops have endured in the years since the Compass. Rest in peace, Ellenby.
1982: Grid Compass
If the Grid Compass was released today, I doubt anyone would even call it a portable computer. Yet that’s what it was during its time at a laughable 5 kg/11 lbs. The Compass featured an Intel 8086 processor with a 320×240 ELD display. It was also ridiculously priced starting at $8,000. Still, this is the design — thick and ugly as it may be — that started it all for the modern laptop.
If the Grid Compass was released today, I doubt anyone would even call it a portable computer.
Macintosh Apple Laptop
1989: Apple Macintosh Portable
The Macintosh Portable is considered one of Apple’s worst products ever, but it’s a good checkpoint on our evolution list. In 1989, Apple released its first portable laptop complete with a 9.8-inch 640×400 black and white display, a 40MB hard drive, trackball and a $7,300 price tag. The storage is especially mind boggling since that’s only enough to hold about a dozen photos, let alone an entire OS. The Portable was an ugly off-white color and weighed even more than the Compass at an insane 7.2 kg/16 lbs.
1992: IBM ThinkPad
The IBM ThinkPad series became wildly popular after its launch in 1992. It ditched the ugly backside earlier laptops had and instead folded completely in half: display on top, keyboard on the bottom. Additionally, ThinkPad was notable for TrackPoint, a tiny pointing device built in to the keyboard to maneuver the mouse on screen. The ThinkPad line still exists today under Lenovo.
ThinkPad was notable for TrackPoint, a tiny pointing device built in to the keyboard to maneuver the mouse on screen.
1996: Toshiba Libretto
The Toshiba Libretto was the first laptop marketed as a subnotebook because of its tiny size. It was just a little baby Windows PC about the size of a novel that weighed 840 g/1.85 lbs. Still sporting a very rugged ’90s look, the Libretto made waves for being portable in a way that no laptop was portable before. It was effortless to carry this thing around. Notebooks of this size later made a brief comeback in the form of netbooks in the late ’00s, but quickly diminished when people decided they prefer tablets.
1999: Apple iBook
The Apple iBook debuted in 1999 as an “iMac to go.” Thus begins the era of the shinier-the-better design philosophy. iBook was so over the top in terms of design, but clearly aimed at average consumers instead of savvy businessmen. Even the color names had to be extravagant, e.g. blueberry instead of blue. It was also a landmark laptop in that it was the first to support Wi-Fi connectivity instead of needing a wired connection. As you can imagine, prices substantially dropped for laptops over the last decade since the iBook was available for $1,599 at launch.
iBook begins the era of the shinier-the-better design philosophy.
2003: Dell… Everything
As the evolution of laptop design started to slow down a bit in the mid-2000s, it became harder to pick a singular laptop with a large impact. Instead, in the early ’00s, Dell began to rule the computer market. Everyone knew the “Dude, you’re getting a Dell.” slogan. There is also a decent chance you probably know someone who at some point who owned a Dell. At this point, laptop designs kept getting thinner and lighter. Displays expanded farther toward the edges of the device. Plus, shiny vibrant colors were out, silver was in.
2008: Apple MacBook Air
The reason why Apple appears so many times on this list is it’s easily the most disruptive computer company. Whether you like iOS or Android, you can’t deny Apple consistently pushed the envelope in Mac products. In 2008, Apple debuted the thinnest laptop in the world: the MacBook Air. But it became even more infamous for its lack of disc drive, Ethernet port and much of any other port. It was still a gorgeously minimalist product that didn’t compromise on battery life, though slow and overpriced at its birth. Many laptops have since followed suit with the trend toward extreme thinness and lack of ports.
2012: Microsoft Surface
The Microsoft Surface got off to a bumpy start with frequent complaints of slowness and bugginess upon initial release in 2012, but it’s been a decent hit for Microsoft since then. After companies experimented for years, the Surface was one of the first to get the tablet and laptop combination right. Often considered a tablet more than a laptop, it still technically functions as a laptop with an adjustable kickstand and keyboard.
Surface was one of the first to get the tablet and laptop combination right.
While Microsoft sees the future of computing as laptop and tablet hybrids, companies like Apple believe the two should remain separate. It’ll be interesting to see what the market decides in the coming years.
ALSO READ:Why Microsoft Should Really Launch the Surface Book in India
The above article may contain affiliate links which help support Guiding Tech. However, it does not affect our editorial integrity. The content remains unbiased and authentic.
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macOS Catalina introduces Voice Control, a new way to fully control your Mac entirely with your voice. Voice Control uses the Siri speech-recognition engine to improve on the Enhanced Dictation feature available in earlier versions of macOS.1
How to turn on Voice Control
After upgrading to macOS Catalina, follow these steps to turn on Voice Control:
- Choose Apple menu > System Preferences, then click Accessibility.
- Click Voice Control in the sidebar.
- Select Enable Voice Control. When you turn on Voice Control for the first time, your Mac completes a one-time download from Apple.2
Voice Control preferences
When Voice Control is enabled, you see an onscreen microphone representing the mic selected in Voice Control preferences.
To pause Voice Control and stop it from from listening, say ”Go to sleep” or click Sleep. To resume Voice Control, say or click ”Wake up.”
How to use Voice Control
Get to know Voice Control by reviewing the list of voice commands available to you: Say “Show commands” or ”Show me what I can say.” The list varies based on context, and you may discover variations not listed. To make it easier to know whether Voice Control heard your phrase as a command, you can select ”Play sound when command is recognized” in Voice Control preferences.
Basic navigation
Voice Control recognizes the names of many apps, labels, controls, and other onscreen items, so you can navigate by combining those names with certain commands. Here are some examples:
- Open Pages: ”Open Pages.” Then create a new document: ”Click New Document.” Then choose one of the letter templates: 'Click Letter. Click Classic Letter.” Then save your document: ”Save document.”
- Start a new message in Mail: ”Click New Message.” Then address it: ”John Appleseed.”
- Turn on Dark Mode: ”Open System Preferences. Click General. Click Dark.” Then quit System Preferences: ”Quit System Preferences” or ”Close window.”
- Restart your Mac: ”Click Apple menu. Click Restart” (or use the number overlay and say ”Click 8”).
You can also create your own voice commands.
Number overlays
Use number overlays to quickly interact with parts of the screen that Voice Control recognizes as clickable, such as menus, checkboxes, and buttons. To turn on number overlays, say ”Show numbers.” Then just say a number to click it.
Number overlays make it easy to interact with complex interfaces, such as web pages. For example, in your web browser you could say ”Search for Apple stores near me.” Then use the number overlay to choose one of the results: ”Show numbers. Click 64.” (If the name of the link is unique, you might also be able to click it without overlays by saying ”Click” and the name of the link.)
Voice Control automatically shows numbers in menus and wherever you need to distinguish between items that have the same name.
Grid overlays
Use grid overlays to interact with parts of the screen that don't have a control, or that Voice Control doesn't recognize as clickable.
Say “Show grid” to show a numbered grid on your screen, or ”Show window grid” to limit the grid to the active window. Say a grid number to subdivide that area of the grid, and repeat as needed to continue refining your selection.
To click the item behind a grid number, say ”Click” and the number. Or say ”Zoom” and the number to zoom in on that area of the grid, then automatically hide the grid. You can also use grid numbers to drag a selected item from one area of the grid to another: ”Drag 3 to 14.”
To hide grid numbers, say ”Hide numbers.” To hide both numbers and grid, say ”Hide grid.”
Dictation
When the cursor is in a document, email message, text message, or other text field, you can dictate continuously. Dictation converts your spoken words into text.
- To enter a punctuation mark, symbol, or emoji, just speak its name, such as ”question mark” or ”percent sign” or ”happy emoji.” These may vary by language or dialect.
- To move around and select text, you can use commands like ”Move up two sentences” or ”Move forward one paragraph” or ”Select previous word” or ”Select next paragraph.”
- To format text, try ”Bold that” or ”Capitalize that,” for example. Say ”numeral” to format your next phrase as a number.
- To delete text, you can choose from many delete commands. For example, say “delete that” and Voice Control knows to delete what you just typed. Or say ”Delete all” to delete everything and start over.
Voice Control understands contextual cues, so you can seamlessly transition between text dictation and commands. For example, to dictate and then send a birthday greeting in Messages, you could say ”Happy Birthday. Click Send.” Or to replace a phrase, say ”Replace I’m almost there with I just arrived.”
You can also create your own vocabulary for use with dictation.
Create your own voice commands and vocabulary
Create your own voice commands
- Open Voice Control preferences, such as by saying ”Open Voice Control preferences.”
- Click Commands or say ”Click Commands.” The complete list of all commands opens.
- To add a new command, click the add button (+) or say ”Click add.” Then configure these options to define the command:
- When I say: Enter the word or phrase that you want to be able to speak to perform the action.
- While using: Choose whether your Mac performs the action only when you're using a particular app.
- Perform: Choose the action to perform. You can open a Finder item, open a URL, paste text, paste data from the clipboard, press a keyboard shortcut, select a menu item, or run an Automator workflow.
- Use the checkboxes to turn commands on or off. You can also select a command to find out whether other phrases work with that command. For example, “Undo that” works with several phrases, including “Undo this” and “Scratch that.”
To quickly add a new command, you can say ”Make this speakable.” Voice Control will help you configure the new command based on the context. For example, if you speak this command while a menu item is selected, Voice Control helps you make a command for choosing that menu item.
Create your own dictation vocabulary
- Open Voice Control preferences, such as by saying ”Open Voice Control preferences.”
- Click Vocabulary, or say ”Click Vocabulary.”
- Click the add button (+) or say ”Click add.”
- Type a new word or phrase as you want it to be entered when spoken.
Old Apple Macintosh Laptop
Learn more
Apple Macintosh Laptop Computer
- For the best performance when using Voice Control with a Mac notebook computer and an external display, keep your notebook lid open or use an external microphone.
- All audio processing for Voice Control happens on your device, so your personal data is always kept private.
- Use Voice Control on your iPhone or iPod touch.
- Learn more about accessibility features in Apple products.
1. Voice Control uses the Siri speech-recognition engine for U.S. English only. Other languages and dialects use the speech-recognition engine previously available with Enhanced Dictation.
Macintosh Apple Laptops
2. If you're on a business or school network that uses a proxy server, Voice Control might not be able to download. Have your network administrator refer to the network ports used by Apple software products.