Two years ago, I bought my first Intel-based Mac, a 17-inch MacBook Pro, to replace a similarly-outfitted PowerBook G4. Yes, I have an affinity for larger screens. In fact, I’d spring for a 20-inch model if I could afford it and it wasn’t too heavy — and that may be why Apple isn’t producing any.

As part of my company’s two-year plan, that MacBook Pro was replaced a few weeks ago with the newest model sporting Intel’s Penryn processor.

Now I won’t go into the raw performance benchmarks of the current systems versus the originals, since a Google search of the Web will reveal lots and lots of tests of that sort, and you’ll soon know all you want about how the latest model performs and then some.

So I’m going to give you my subjective conclusions about a few of the diffferences, and I’m not relying much on objective information, except as background as a point of reference.

We’ll start with the similarities. As most of you realize, all generations of the MacBook Pro look mostly the same, and the differences won’t be apparent unless you look real close, particularly at the keyboard. But I’ll go into that in a moment.

When the original MacBook Pros came out, many of the early adopters, and perhaps some of you, complained about the fact that it put out an awful lot of heat, particularly on the bottom and just below the screen bezel. Yes, you know it was powerful, that battery life was decent, but how can you call it a laptop computer when your lap fees like it’s burning up?

Well, I have to tell you that I also regarded that PowerBook G4 as rather a hot-running note-book, and I didn’t observe a vast difference with the MacBook Pro. I didn’t mind the warmth, even though I live in Arizona, where it gets 120 in the shade in August. But I can see where the heat might have been a little objectionable to some of you. In fairness to Apple, they released several updates that were meant to make the twin cooling fans run more efficiently — probably longer in most cases.

Now the 17-inch model came out a few months after the original, so perhaps it benefitted from further development, so maybe I missed the worst of the problem. It also performed reliably, except that the original battery wouldn’t take a charge after a few months, but Apple replaced it quickly under warranty.

Over the next two years, moving from Tiger to Leopard actually sped up this computer. The biggest shortcoming was, at least in my particular setup, lack of sufficient hard drive storage space. My MacBook Pro came with 120GB installed, and within months, I got an upgrade to 160GB, which, after adding a Windows virtualization data file, left me with a tad over 40GB of free space.

Later, I added an 802.11n card to replace the built-in AirPort component. No, it wasn’t Apple’s product, but a third-party equivalent from our friends at FastMac that performed extremely well. So that MacBook Pro’s new owner is doubtfully extremely pleased by these extra added attractions.

The new MacBook Pro has some notable differences, other than having a faster 64-bit Intel processor, compared to the previous model’s 32-bit chips. The first is the glossy screen. I had debated the benefits, which include a brighter, richer-looking picture, versus the negatives, such as the greater vulnerability to screen reflections.

I realize glossy screens, which first appeared on Windows note-books, are controversial. I realize some of you do not like the fact that the iMac doesn’t offer a matte option. However, after looking at one over the other, I prefer glossy. For one thing, the black levels are deeper, closer to that of a plasma TV, which also has a shiny screen and a known vulnerability to reflections.

The other difference went almost unnoticed, simply because some of the media coverage didn’t mention the fact that the keyboard layouts of the latest MacBooks and MacBook Pros have changed. The top layer places media controls at the right, and groups screen, keyboard, Expose and Dashboard keys at the left.

The Enter key is now shared with the Return key, which seems more logical. There is no Num Lock key and no way to emulate a numeric keypad, which I consider a small shortcoming, although others might disagree.

The MultiTouch trackpad and its iPhone-like features are neat, but take a little time to get used to. Really, the trackpad needs to be larger.

The revised keyboard also seems more solidly built than previous models, and my typing abilities are also enhanced, with fewer mistakes and somewhat greater speed.

All in all, the MacBook Pro’s subtle improvements by themselves are as important as the performance improvements. And they are clear in every way, from application launch times to the ability to move through your documents in a snappier fashion. It’s also nice to see battery life increase from roughly two hours and forty-five minutes under normal use to approximately three-and-a-half hours, at least with my particular workflow. That’s the welcome consequence of having a speedier processor that is more stingy with electrical power.

Yes, I realize the changes are evolutionary, and that some of you wonder why Apple hasn’t made a significant alteration in the case design of its professional note-books since the Titanium PowerBooks were retired a number of years ago. Frankly, my friends, that doesn’t make any difference to me.

Whenever an analyst wants to write something without thinking, it’s easy to pontificate on such silliness as the alleged resemblance of the iPod to the Sony Walkman. Both gained iconic status, but the latter was eventually largely supplanted by me-too products that were cheaper and offered identical or additional features.

And let’s not forget the famous IBM PC, where the clone makers took the market from under them.

So wouldn’t it seem logical that Apple’s days in the sun will ultimately come to a close in the same fashion? Well, at least that has been the theory every time a potential iPod killer is discovered. The only thing is that the imitator usually self-destructs, or simply fades into near-irrelevance.

One example was the Microsoft Zune, a music player that was almost as good, but merely imitated an older iPod rather than a recent model. Microsoft simply followed the pattern. So what went wrong?

Well, when it came to the Walkman, Sony didn’t have a lock on cassette player technology, an industry standard, nor on tiny radio receivers. They didn’t offer anything that you couldn’t get elsewhere, and merely succeeded in coming up with a repackaging scheme that was easily imitated and excelled by other electronics companies.

When it came to the IBM PC, again, it offered nothing unique that you couldn’t put together yourself from spare parts. All you needed was a copy of Microsoft’s MS-DOS operating system, itself a clone of the older C/PM command-line system ubiquitous in the 1970s. So all the clone makers had to do was to buy their operating systems from Microsoft — well you know what happened then.

With the iPod, you can perhaps duplicate the raw components, since they are also mostly available from a number of suppliers. Within certain limits, you can duplicate the case design, but you can’t imitate such patented features as the unique scroll wheel design or the user interface, and that’s where the pedal meets the metal, as the race drivers say.

By vertically integrating its products and supplying the entire widget, Apple gains a huge advantage over its competition, which mostly attempts to trump the iPod by adding bullet points to a PowerPoint presentation and pronouncing their products superior.

Sure, Microsoft tried to do something similar to Apple with the Zune, after its PlaysForSure initiative failed in the marketplace big time. They also double-crossed a number of their partners, but that’s nothing new for Microsoft.

However, Microsoft’s design-by-committee approach was unable to match the seamless integration of the iPod. Worse, the market for regular digital music players appears to be saturated now. Apple still retains a huge lead in market share, but sales are flattening, even though the average sale price increased somewhat from last year. I suppose you can attribute that to the popularity of the iPod touch.

So it does appear that many of Apple’s new sales may indeed be to people who already have iPods. Maybe they just lust after the new model, or the older one has seen better days. Regardless, Apple has realized it’s time to move on to the next great thing, which may be the Wi-Fi mobile platform they’re touting, of which the iPod touch is just the first entry.

But just what does this vision mean, other than market-speak?

Well, you can look at the iPhone as a prime example, even if Apple puts this hot-selling gadget into a separate category than the iPod touch. In fact, the only significant difference between the two is, of course, the phone. As you know, both use a version of Mac OS X customized to allow you to respond to a touch-based user interface.

Although full integration between a cell phone, a handheld computer and a music player has been tried by others, Apple’s first entry into this space has been almost universally regarded as a home run.

In late June, if all goes according to plan, the iPhone 2.0 software update will include enterprise-level features and the ability to run authorized third-party apps downloaded from Apple’s own unique App Store sales environment.

Yes, there is third-party software available for other so-called smartphones, but just how successful have those products been? Are there any killer apps for, say, the BlackBerry? I’m just asking.

So on the one hand, the media player of yesterday has morphed into a full-fledged handheld computer with or without an integrated wireless phone. On the other hand, if you only want music, a cheap iPod shuffle or a nano will provide all the features you really need. The iPod classic is nearing the end of the hard drive-based music player era, and only awaits the arrival of larger capacity Flash memory at comparable prices before it disappears.

However, the rest of the industry is probably still trying to figure out how to match what Apple’s doing now, without understanding what to do for encore. As for the iPhone’s biggest competitor, the BlackBerry, the manufacturer, RIM, is now, according to one published report, considering whether to port its email software to the iPhone. Well, if you can’t beat them…

How well I remember the claim, years ago, that Macs weren’t really business computers. The interface was simply too cute, and you had to use a genuine PC to get real business chores done. Of course, they forgot that Microsoft Excel actually premiered on the Mac platform before it was ported to Windows. The same holds true for Word.

At the same time, the Mac has always been the preferred platform for content creation. Whether creating pages for a newspaper, or building fantastic special effects for movies, you’ll find that Macs have historically done the job better.

Now I don’t know about you, but I’ve always regarded publishing and the entertainment industry as businesses. You develop a product or service for which you are paid for your labors. So how does that differ from the person who enters data in spreadsheets and gets a paycheck as a result?

Well, forgetting that distinction without a difference, Apple also made moves over the years that favored consumers, educational institutions and small businesses far more than the enterprise. It’s even fair to say that they didn’t have much of a sales force regularly calling on large companies in an effort to get some big deals or any deals. In fact, I gather a large portion of enterprise sales are made through third-party resellers.

Regardless, with Apple’s sales soaring, again you wonder if Apple really cares about the enterprise, and I think they do. However, they aren’t necessarily doing it directly, but through the backdoor.

Consider, for example, the company CEO who buys a new Mac or iPhone. Now maybe the IT department has standardized on, say, Windows PCs and the BlackBerry. But the company’s leader won’t care. He or she will admonish the system administrators to make it happen, period. Once they do, they usually discoved that Macs aren’t so difficult to integrate into a multiplatform environment. In fact, there are a growing number of suggestions now that IT people need to begin to learn how to manage Macs too.

When it comes to the iPhone, Apple is being far more proactive. They licensed AppleSync from Microsoft for seamless integration with Exchange email servers. What’s more, there’s an Enterprise-level developer program for iPhone software, which would allow a company to build their own custom apps for use with this hot-selling gadget.

Those two initiatives alone can result in a significant uptake of iPhones, but just as important, it would encourage businesses to look more carefully at the rest of Apple’s product line.

Believe it or not, Microsoft is evidently doing their level best to help Apple here, at least as far as the iPhone goes. They earn far more money from Exchange licenses than Windows Mobile. And, when a company buys Macs, you can bet many will probably get seats for Office for the Mac and perhaps Windows licenses to use along with Parallels Desktop and VMWare Fusion. All in all, it’s a big win for Microsoft.

This is not to say that Apple’s strategy, which isn’t always obvious and probably hasn’t fully played out, is the best approach to take. Apple appears to be embracing the enterprise from the bottom-up, using growing consumer acceptance of their products as a wedge to get more businesses to adopt them too.

At the same time, you wonder just how far Apple will go to appeal to businesses. Right now, most Macs have consumer-grade features, such as the built-in Web cam on the note-books and the iMac and the bundled copy of the latest version of iLife. However, the remote control is now an extra-cost option, so you have one less device to lose.

Businesses are not necessarily going to embrace such toys. Sure, I can see some uses for iLife at the office, but the camera may only encourage employees to goof off. Or at least that’s a fair assessment a business owner might make in deciding whether Apple’s product line is suitable.

Other than my ongoing campaign for a mid-priced Mac minitower, the so-called headless iMac, perhaps they ought to offer a special order business version of some of their products sans Web cam and Wi-Fi, perhaps, for a few dollars cheaper. Well, I can see where note-books need it, but the iMac?

Certainly, when a company orders new personal computers by the thousands, that can ring up a significant savings.

Now I know some of you think Apple ought to also play in the bottom-end of the PC arena, with basic boxes that eschew most of the frills of a mainstream computer. But PC companies don’t make much in the way of profits from those products. They are often used for bait and switch, to entice you to buy the more expensive model that has the features you really need to get actual chores done.

In the end, I think Apple’s stealth marketing to business is going to pay off, even if a more overt upfront approach might yield greater gains in the short term.

At one time, whenever Apple released a new or upgraded product, it would get major coverage at a Macworld Expo and WWDC. Today, two annual events are simply not sufficient to cover the range of Apple’s development process. Indeed, every few weeks, something new arrives with the Apple logo on it, from a new, cutting-edge product, to a simple refresh for an existing product line.

With few exceptions, most of those introductions seem to happen on Tuesdays, perhaps to give you and me time to recover from the weekend and get caught up with our daily routine. Sometimes, Apple breaks the mold, as they did Monday morning with the quiet news that the iMac line received its anticipated speed bump with the new Intel Penryn processors.

At first brush, it’s just the processor speed ratings that are higher. The lower power requirements of the new chips, though, might result in a minor decrease in your monthly electric bill, and everything helps. But there’s rather more than meets the eye here, and for once Apple is actually moving its iMac line ahead of its portable sibling, the MacBook Pro.

According to Apple’s almost ignored press release on the subject, the updates include “a 1066 MHz frontside bus; up to 4GB of 800MHz DDR2 SDRAM memory.” Both signify a potentially measurable if not significant performance boost. Compare that to the latest MacBook Pros, which retains the 800MHz frontside bus and 667MHz RAM.

In addition, the new iMac’s “Extreme” model tops at at 3.06GHz, compared to 2.6GHz on the MacBook Pro, along with the promise of a more powerful graphics chip. Combined with the faster front-side bus and memory, the iMac will indeed provide a pretty decent improvement over what Apple’s most powerful note-book can offer when the performance benchmarks appear.

Since iMac pricing is unchanged, this makes the iMac a more compelling mid-priced desktop option. In fact, I wonder if some folks who might have otherwise considered a Mac Pro will now be willing to compromise on expansion options and select the cheaper option.

Notably missing from Apple’s announcements is the still-forgotten Mac mini, which remains saddled with last year’s chips. Oh well, maybe Apple still has a large stock of spare parts around and they’re not planning on refreshing the mini until they need to reorder, and perhaps select faster chips from Intel’s 2008 inventory.

That’s unfortunate, as the Mac mini remains an excellent product that will suit the needs of millions of Mac users who already have displays and input devices and for whom the added performance of the iMac is just overkill for the kind of work they do.

Meantime, it’s fair to say that the iMac has been the shining star of Apple’s desktop line, and its good looks and superior performance have resulted in great sales at a time where it was believed that only note-books were important in this day and age.

On the other hand, I still think there’s a huge audience out there, and some of you appear to agree with me, for the mid-range Mac minitower, the 21st century IIci. You see, I still don’t believe that everyone who wants a desktop computer of this sort is willing to pay extra for the integrated display, even if the glossy picture is just glorious — and I think it is! No, I’m not going to get into the matte versus glossy argument here, though I see the point of favoring the former in some cases.

So here goes the argument all over again!

What if Apple provided a compact, fancy-looking expandable desktop with the fundamental options of today’s iMac? To that you add the ability to easily add a second internal drive, swap the existing graphics card and add a second PCI card for additional displays or specialty use.

Indeed, like the souped-up iMac, such a model might cannibalize some Mac Pro sales. But I still think there are lots of people who’d embrace such a computer, particularly Windows switchers, and the end result would be far more units sold in the quarterly financials.

Now that Apple has reinvigorated the iMac with the latest Intel parts, I can’t imagine that it would take a whole lot of development money to deliver a headless version with modest internal expansion capabilities. It’s also clear, in light of the apparent successful launch of the MacBook Air and the many choices in the iPod line, that Apple isn’t averse to fleshing out its product lines.

So, Apple, when are you going to take the next logical step?