Outbound Laptop

The Outbound Laptop is a great computer. Other portable clone manufacturers settled for repackaging Mac Pluses. Outbound made their own. And they made it better. The Outbound Laptop weighs in at 9.3 lbs, heavy for a laptop today, but light as a feather compared to the Mac Portable.

The computer's design is very innovative. The keyboard detaches and communicates with the computer via an infra-red port. The pointing device, built into the keyboard, is an Isopoint Trackbar, which is a cross between the eraser stubs on IBM Thinkpads and a trackball.

The motherboard and floppy drive (mine doesn't have an HD, though some did) are stored behind the LCD. The battery is in the computer's stand. The computer can be propped up at the edge of the desk, taking up only about 6 inches, and the keyboard, with its infra-red port, can be placed anywhere - under papers, on top of books. When the keyboard isn't needed, it can simply snap onto the front of the unit. The Outbound Laptop possesses a near perfect desktop design.

And it also makes a pretty decent portable. There's a little bar that pops out of the back of the keyboard that iphysically attaches the keyboard to the computer, giving the user a perfectly functional, if a bit top-heavy, laptop. When it's time to actually move the computer, the base folds up, the keyboard snaps into place, and the handle pops out, making transportation effortless.

I am very interested in acquiring a power adapter for the Outbound Laptop. I burnt mine up by inadvertantly connecting it to an Outbound Notebook.