885g Pentium Sub-Notebook

Alicia (ad454) writes "A new sub-notebook was released in Japan today, the JVC InterLink Victor MP-XP7210, which is one of the smallest notebooks around in recent years that does not have a Transmeta emulation processor. It has a true Pentium-III 800MHz processor, weighs only 885 grams, and is only 225x152x28mm in size. It also comes with 256MB ram (384 max), 30 GB harddrive, 1024x600 TFT display, SoundBlaster Pro compatable audio, V90 56kbps fax/modem, 10/100 ethernet, USBx2, IEEE1394 (ilink/firewire), cardbus type 2 PCMCIA, and SD memory slot. You can get the specifications, which are in Japanese; you can use Alta Vista to translate it. A number of stores in Tokyo are selling it for (JPY)209,800. It would be interesting to hear what type of opensource Unix (NetBSD, Linux, etc.) and X-windows driver support exists for it. Although some may find the keyboard and screen too small, many of us find it quite useable, especially when compared to a PDA."

Comments

With only 1.5h battery time

[mocm]

I'd rather get a Sony Vaio U with Transmeta CPU.
Have a look at these specs.

Oh come on

[indole]

Well that page was spectacularly useless.

For an English-language press release try: here instead.
(and dont forget to notice the big bold capped FOR THE JAPANESE MARKET ONLY)

Re:Oh come on

[jsse]

FOR THE JAPANESE MARKET ONLY

They couldn't help, in view of high tariff on Japanese-made electronics. Like Sony, they've to find markets where they could get a quick sales for new products. Yes US is a huge market, but it's not a desirable market for new product initial lanuch.

Re:Oh come on

[Cryptnotic]

There are no tarrifs on foreign-made electronics in the U.S.

Re:this hting doesn't look so hot.

[TellarHK]

You should see some of the small firewire drives that're available out there now. I've seen a few different models specifically designed to match the look and feel of Apple hardware like the Powerbook Titanium that're so small they'll easily fit in your shirt pocket.

Plus, there's a chance you could even use an iPod with one of these things. iPods are simply another tiny firewire drive that happens to play music. In fact, you can even -boot- a Mac from one of them.

885g, wow!

[cheebie]

When I read the subject, the first thought that popped into my head was "885 GHz! Holy cow, how did they do that?"

Then I noticed the rest of the writeup and the small "g". Darn.

Other machines

[smoondog]

885 grams == 1.95 pounds

This article is a bit of a ridiculous pitch, here are Other machines come close:

The Dell X200 = 2.8 pounds (800 MHz processor, 12.1)

Fujitsu Laptops (Various w/Transmeta) - P1000 is 2.2 pounds, $1299 starting

The Toshiba Portege - 2.6 pounds PIII750, bit expensive, $2199

-Sean

Re:Other machines

[juuri]

Sharp has an awesome series called the UM stateside that were called the "Murasame" in Japan. I bought one of the Japanese models because they weren't supposed to come stateside but they did...

Anyoo here is the list of the models which start at $1299 for a 2.9lb 2/3 of an inch thick laptop.

Sounblaster Pro = 8bit sound

[zealot]

I wonder if it really means Sound Blaster PRO compatible... I used to have one of these cards, and it's 8 bit, rather than 16 bit like most generic, non-dsp sound cards now. This means that, for example, mp3s will sound absolutely horrible (kind of like listening to music on AM radio), if they'll play at all.

When I first heard about mp3's in early '97, I ripped a song and tried playing it on my 486 with a Pentium 83MHz overdrive chip, and a sound blaster pro. Sounded just awful. I knew then that for my next computer I'd need a 16 bit sound card...

1kg...is sold in the US for under $1500

[ndege]

Lifebook P-1032 (700MHz Crusoe, 128 MB, 20 GB, Windows XP, 8.9" TFT)

The coolest part of this one is the fact it has a touch screen just like we have come to expect for pda's. And, I have a friend that is running debian on one without any trouble.

And, it weighs in under 1kg.

Pricegrabber has it for $1393 shipped to my home.

Re:JVC Laptop?

[QuaZar666]

What makes you believe that JVC makes it? Most Laptops are made by 3rd partys such as Quanta, Toshiba, and a few others and then people put there names on it.

The new Imac is even made by Quanta. The name on the machine does not mean they made it.

-Qua

crippled little things

[aminorex]

Why are all the little notebooks using dinky 20g
harddrives and topping out at 256/384MB? It peeves
me that the first thing i have to do when i spend
a couple grand on a lap is replace the hard drive
and expand the memory. It peeves me even more that
the memory doesn't expand to something reasonable
for a modern application load, like 1G/2G
reasonable. Finally, what's up with the display
sizes? I know they can put a decent resolution
into a 10" screen -- but you can't find one on the
market. The newer picturebooks and librettos are
almost reasonable, at 1280x768.
And this crappy proprietary hardware stuff has
got to stop. I'm not going to buy a piece of
hardware I can't control.