MWTY Wrap-Up - Follow Up On iMac Docking Station (With iPod Bay)

by , 12:00 PM EST, March 26th, 2002

Last week, we ran a report from the show floor of MACWORLD Tokyo about the Zabuton iMac G4 docking station. We followed up with the company for more details, and offer this follow up article on the device (for images and more information on the Zabuton, please reference the original story, "Japanese Company Offers Docking Station For iMac G4 With iPod Bay").

First of all, Zabuton properly translates as "cushion," or "pillow." In our original report, we translated Zabuton to be "The Button." Thanks to Observers T. Holbrook Walker and "dang" for helping us with the proper translation.

The company showing the Zabuton at the Expo is called IMTB. It turns out that IMTB is actually an R&D arm of Sanyo, the electronics giant. All of the devices that were being showed were prototypes and proof-of-concept models. IMTB was showing these devices in order to gauge consumer interest, and asking visitors to the booth to fill out questionnaires about how much they might pay for the products being shown, and what they thought about them. It is possible, but not specifically planned, that Zabuton might be brought to market, but its too early to tell.

At this point, there is no contact information for IMTB for the public. If this should change, we will let you know.

Thanks to Observer Brett Rumble for his assistance with translations on the show floor.

The Mac Observer Spin:

We would like for Zabuton to come to market, though perhaps under a different name. It's a very cool concept for an iMac docking station, and we absolutely love the iPod bay. The visitors at the IMTB booth that we saw seemed to really like the product, but the company officials to whom we spoke were not at all sure it would ever see the light of day.