Rumors have begun to swirl that Apple is gearing up for the launch of a new Mac Mini to be dubbed the ‘Mac Nano’ (of course following the iPod naming convention) as well as a new AppleTV (though I’m still not sure that these two shouldn’t be the same device).

Not too much seems to be “known” about the Mac Nano other than it will be significantly trimmer (by 25%). The AppleTV 2.0 rumor has quite a few more details such as a cheaper ($249) version with a 60 or 80 gig hard drive, a $299 version with a 120-160 gig hard drive, and a $399 version with a 200-250 gig hard drive. There is also word that at least one of the new models will finally sport an optical drive, which I find a bit odd given that another Mac rumor has a super-small MacBook (or MacBook Nano if you will) that will be the first step for Apple to move away from optical drives. Both of these rumors are said to be on track for an end of October – December timeframe.

I think it’s a pretty safe bet that Apple is indeed working on a second iteration of the AppleTV, a device seen by some as a failure, but one in which I continue to believe would be a huge success if Apple simply a) offered significant HD content via iTunes and b) offered movie rentals. Of course both of those things are rumored to be happening soon as well, and those combined with a new larger hard drive AppleTV would be huge – especially if it does have an optical drive and people could replace their DVD players with it.

Here’s to hoping Apple doesn’t stop at a 250 gig AppleTV though. If they offered a 500 GB or better yet, 1 TB AppleTV it seriously might be the fastest purchase I’ve ever made. Regular platter-based hard drive prices are so cheap right now (you can easily find 500 GB external drives for around $100-150). If I could store my entire DVD collection on my AppleTV (which I believe would still technically be illegal – and is one of the most idiotic rules still in place by the way) I would be a very happy man.