While its been rumored for the better part of a year and all but confirmed for the past few months, the buzz continues to grow for Apple’s sub-notebook, aka Slim MacBook, aka MacBook Nano. Likely less than two weeks away now here is the latest:

Today CrunchGear has published a supposed picture of the device (above) – almost for sure a fake for if nothing else that the picture is actually still up on the Internet (and I know first-hand how quick the lawyers come out when a picture is real). Also in their picture the lighting seems to be off and what on Earth is with that HUGE trackpad button? Seriously, would Apple do something like that? It’s the size of a ruler. Will you need two palms to press it down?

That said, the touchpad is expected to be larger if Apple implements my dream of having Multi-touch built into it, but if that’s the case I wouldn’t be surprised if they get rid of the button and simply stick with the Multi-touch service. Other rumors suggest the Multi-touch trackpad may only be making its way to a new, “Penryn” (Intel’s 45 nanometer dual-core ship) powered version of the MacBook Pro.

Also gaining steam is the rumor that the new slim MacBook will completely get rid of on onboard optical drive in lieu of an optional external one. While my immediate thought on this back in September when the rumor first appeared was that this was crazy, I quickly realized what a good idea this was. After all, how often do you really need to install something on the go (for trips you’d take your external drive with you), and for movies as Webomatica points out, what better way to push iTunes upcoming digital rentals than not having the option of watching DVDs on the machine?

I’d be pretty shocked at this point if the MacBook Nano doesn’t appear at MacWorld in a couple weeks, there is simply too much smoke. The question for me now is if it will live up to all the rumors and if a new MacBook Pro emerges with Multi-touch would I choose that over a MacBook Nano?