A prototype of an older MacBook Pro with built-in 3G cellular data functionality has appeared for sale on eBay. It indicates that at least Apple tried to look into adding wireless data functionality on it’s notebooks back in 2007. the seller placed this 15″ MacBook Pro on eBay & it’s bidding time would be end on August 18th.
Quite interestingly the circuit boards inside were bright red as opposed to the normal blue. the seller has also confirmed the availability of fully integrated cellular modem and SIM slot. there is an extendable cellular antenna located at the top right side of the display & it was also marked with “Tyco Proto / #006″. Standard size SIM card slot is located underneath the memory cover on the bottom of the machine.
The seller claims that the SIM card board is connected to the logic board via a connector not found on production machines. the solder footprint for it is still present on the production boards and not populated, which is interesting. The optical drive is marked as a “Sample for Evaluation”, rather than a normal EMC Number. However, seller also added the condition of this laptop as “surprisingly good”. but the question remains with the cellular network data functionality as the seller couldn’t make it working. Hardware specifications for the prototype, which identifies itself as MacBook Pro model 3, included an Intel Core 2 Duo 2.4GHz dual-core processor, 2GB DDR2 RAM and nVidia GeForce 8600m video. the device also sports AirPort Extreme 802.11n Wireless and Bluetooth 2.1 alongside the test 3G functionality.
For more information you can visit the the eBay page of the seller from here & if you want to bid for this MacBook Prof, good luck with that.