In usual Tuesday manner, Apple has unceremoniously taken its web store down, telling customers to sit tight as the company updates the online venue with goodies. It is generally believed that Apple’s Macintosh computers are on track for a number of hardware upgrades. Nothing else new is expected from Apple, this time around.

With the iPad hype reaching critical levels around the January 27 announcement, few rumors focused on the remainder of Apple’s product lineup, including the company’s desktop and portable computers, the iPods, accessories, etc. Recently, however, as tablet talks cooled down a bit, speculation began to center around Macintosh upgrades, particularly for the professional-grade Mac Pro towers and MacBook Pro notebooks.

During the past couple of weeks, several sources have been keen to post reports citing reliable sources as leaking information pertaining to Macintosh upgrades. The most recent such rumor arrived yesterday, when Softpedia informed that a report showing benchmarks for a new-generation MacBook Pro had been spotted online.

The report, signed Geekbench, talks of an unreleased Apple MacBook Pro employing Intel's upcoming dual-core 2.66GHz Core i7 mobile processor. It lists the supposedly new MacBook Pro model as “MacBook Pro 6,1,” “a previously unused MacBook Pro identifier -- running an unreleased build of Mac OS X 10.6.2 labeled 10C3067,” AppleInsider added in a report.

Earlier, in January, Intel caused a stir when it sent out an email announcing chances to win a MacBook Pro equipped with an Intel Core i5 processor, via its Retail Edge Program. At the time, Apple’s MacBook Pros were equipped with Core 2 Duo processors. They still are, as far as we’re concerned, since the Apple online store is still down. Intel later reiterated its claims, citing an internal error.

Finally, HardMac later cited a few rumors as suggesting that Apple was on the verge of equipping its ultra-thin MacBook Air with better parts as well. The site claimed in January it was fairly possible that Intel would send new chips in the form of first samples over to Apple, at a premium price, but in small quantities.

Until Apple’s store is put back online, tell us what you think Apple is cooking up for us. We’ll be sure to update this piece the minute everything is back to normal. Once the store is back up, drop us a line if you spot changes that others missed.

Update #1: Apple's store is still down, but the company's press room is featuring a new announcement - Aperture 3.

Update #2: Apple's store is now back online. Sadly, Aperture 3 seems to be the only new addition to the company's product line. No Mac upgrades for now.