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Hand-Sized Antelope Windows PC To Debut
securitas writes "CNet's Michael Kanellos reports on start-up Antelope Technologies' plans to launch its Modular Computing Core (MCC) next week. The 'full-fledged Windows [XP] computer that measures 3 inches by 5 inches' is based on the IBM Meta Pad, which Antelope Technologies licensed from IBM. Priced at $3,970, it's expected that the MCC will be primarily for corporate fleets, where mobility is a requirement. Antelope's MCC was previously mentioned on Slashdot, and it seems that the company has beat competitor OQO to real product status. Will the Nimbel V5 be next?"
The 'full-fledged Windows [XP] computer that measures 3 inches by 5 inches
That'd be the world's smallest space heater.
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
Yeah, but can it run Windows 2000?
full-fledged Windows [XP] computer that measures 3 inches by 5 inches
Nice and small. What's the point in having a laptop unless it's plenty mobile?
I have over 70 freaks, do you?
How big is an Antelope's Hand? Just a little bigger than a jackalope's buttock?
CTRL-ALT-DEL
Antelopes don't have hands.
And just how big is an antelope's hand?
Oh wait, I found it: 1 Antelope Hand ~= 0.067 VW Beetles
Now thats exactly what I want!
Not these trickle down upgrade Plam type devices.
overpriced dayplanners
I had to read that title a few times - the first couple readthroughs had me thinking this PC was the size of an antelope hand (which they don't have anyway), and that didn't help me very much when trying to picture how big it was.
yet another windows handheld pc... sounds fun, but there's no way you're getting me on windows - especially for 4G's... couldn't you buy around 8 Zauri for that much loot? imagine a beowulf clust... sorry.
Are there any pictures of this thing, not the metapad?
I thought we were going metric. First they start measuring storage in Libraries of Congress (LoC), now they're measuring PC sizes in antelope hands. And here I thought they had hooves. Anyway, what would an antelope need a PC for?
But does it run Linux?
And just buy a nice compaq IPAQ. These things are pretty robust, can run linux for those inclined, and have a decent amount of memory.
Best buy description
I mean hell worst case scenario, you go out and buy that flat panel tv you always wanted with the extra loot you saved.
I have a Cig, but do you have a light?
oh god not this troll again
litigious bastards
suck it sco!
That is pretty damn funny - for how long (and in what wierd ways) will this archaic, accidental key stroke combination manifest itself? I started wondering about the implementation - does the unit have a 'CTRL-ALT-DEL' button, or three separate ones? Kinda reminds me of the reset button on the back of my Jornada paper wieght.
In case you didn't follow the above link, from the Antelope site:
Buttons: CTRL-ALT-DEL, Left/Right mouse, On/Off
I thought they said "Antelope Sized Handhelds with Windows to Debut". "Way to innovate" is what I thought... But oh well, I was wrong. ;P
Un-news
Probably not. Small, custom devices like this usually dont have a lot of options as far as driver support goes.
I was a huge fan of the Toshiba Libretto, way back in the day, so its nice to see somebody else pick up the mini-PC torch. Those things were an admin's dream; imagine having all your software installed on an easily portable system which can fit in your pocket; and this was in 1996!
That one was really hard to get drivers for as well, as I recall; its hard to remember, but it may not have supported Windows 98 too well.
Manipulate the moderator system! Mod someone as "overrated" today.
How is this thing powered?
--"The perfect example of the man of action is the suicide." - William Carlos Williams
I just don't think this "hands-free" thing, in its current incarnation, is going to take off.
Locutus
You have this small box thing which you put in a cradle to connect to a monitor -> This is your desktop. To become mobile you insert the small box into a PDA shaped thingie -> This is your notebook/palmtop. Why the hell did they not just integrate the small box into their PDA receptacle, making it probably overall smaller and then run the PDA in a cradle as your Desktop PC???
...or are you just... oh nevermind.
666-607: 6th floor apartment of the beast
After just 1 hour of use, the Mini-PC can also be used as a lightsaber. Just play your favorite star wars movie, burned of course.
--"The perfect example of the man of action is the suicide." - William Carlos Williams
I thought antelopes had hooves?
At last sow3 compexion for Apple N33wton. I'we b33n using mx Newton for Xears now, and rea77y enj0y the handwritting recogmitiqn. Bux I d0 wonder ir there is something bettef.
Silly editors edited the confusing yet funny subject line! And here I was thinking how many posts would get shot off about the funny subjhect and I come back 10 mins later to find it 'fixed' :(
Although pricy, the sony viaos really do do as good a job / if not better than what the libretto did. And they look damn cool!
Another start-up, OQO, is expected to release a similar handheld computer soon,...
This coming from an October 24 (2003) C|Net article? Do these guys know what "soon" means?
Call me a troll; I'm just disappointed because I really wanted one of those things, and by the time one's finally released, we'll have Intel Septium Freon eXtreme processors which will be barely fast enough to run Micro$oft LookOut Express.
I will buy an Apple PowerBook G4 17" w/ Superdrive instead.
Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government.
I think you are confusing this with the canteloupe-based version of the Tungsten Palm Pilot ("Tung Pilot").
This handheld, with its unique lingual input system, comes in 4 flavour varieties: canteloupe, Bertie Bott Random Flavour Generator, lesbian, and Tootsie-Pop.
It's available for $499 ($549 if you want seedless).
You've gotta run like an antelope... out of control!
Hey, this is mommy, I want to take you up on your offer. We'll take turns on your one computer and do it like true nerds.
> Priced at $3,970
At that price point you can almost have a one-off custom made just for you. Anybody can make fancy hardware for a price. Call me when they're $299 at Newegg, that's when it gets interesting.
And at the risk of bringing forth the obligitory fat jokes, if I can sit on it and break it, I don't want it. (Although I'm not a big guy, I don't like shelling out nearly 4 grand for something I could break as easily as my 10 dollar shades.)
-Doc
We should take care not to make the intellect our god; it has, of course, powerful muscles, but no personality.
What is up with all this need for mobility in the corporate world? It seems like seventy percent of IT sales is counting on these guys.
Are they coming to visit me?
Are they going on a big corporate fantasy Barbie date and need to keep in touch to fill in everybody back at the office on all the juicy details?
Are they gearing up for a hostile takeover of another company? Hoist the mainsail!
If the corporate world is so gung ho on mobility then why do they spend all that money on those big offices? Why not let the workers hang out at McDonalds and get their work done on those spiffy portable devices.
It's all sort of surreal. You tend to think McMicrosoft is maybe just making it all up like they did with tablets and Pocket Pool(TM) PCs.
Apparently they don't count operating system when they use the term "modular."
Sorta reminiscent of the playable memory modules for the Dreamcast. Also, give me a keyboard, mouse, and virtual image display goggles (instead of a monitor) so I can do work on an airplane without people looking over my shoulder.
A goal is a dream with a deadline
Hand-Sized Antelope
Cool! I can keep a whole stable of those in my cramped dorm room.
I have been following this off and on for a few months now. It is still a little immature for it to truely make big gains in the market (at least in my opinion). The system throttles performance of the processor down to pda speeds when on battery (i.e. about 400mHz). When on battery, it still only has an expected battery life of 3-4 hours. Laptops get easily as much battery power and they have a huge display as well as run at usually around 800 mHz or faster while on battery. Now grant it mHz doesn't mean everything in terms of performance, but a laptop's CPU is easily on par performance wise to the CPU in the Antelope, and the laptop's are running easily 2-4 times the clock speed.
So on the high end, if you are looking for performance, a laptop blows this away. If you are looking for portability, a PDA easily wins. PDA's will give you easily 4-5 hours on battery as well as WiFi and/or Bluetooth wireless access. As well as cost 1/8 the price.
I just don't see the market for this device at this time. It isn't very small, or very powerfull. And it is very expensive especially considering you can get a high end laptop AND a high end PDA for the same price (or less!) then an Antelope.
We were all warned a long time ago that MS products sucked, remember the Magic 8 Ball said, "Outlook not so good"
The vaio's are nice and small as far as a sub-laptop goes, but the libretto was about as big as my hand. If you needed to use a floppy or cd-rom, you needed to connect it externally via a PCMCIA card. Inconvenient if its your regular computer, but as a utility computer it was phenomenal.
The only bad thing was you needed to use the PCMCIA slot for a network connection (it wasnt integrated in the first models), but it was ok for us as we had a mixed token ring/ethernet environment. Also, it only had one PCMCIA slot, making the additional port replicator, which added another one, a must-have.
Manipulate the moderator system! Mod someone as "overrated" today.
next? And at a massive 7.5 X 7.5, a damn-sight cheaper, apparently.
illegitimii non ingravare
Hi Theo! How's OpenBSD coming along?
Joking aside, in XP I don't think I've used ctrl-alt-delete since I found out Windows Key + L locks the computer. Every once in a while, I'll do ctrl-shift-esc to bring up task manager and check CPU/Memory usage, but even that's rare. In fact, I don't even think you CAN restart the computer with ctrl-alt-delete anymore, unless you use it to get to the shutdown menu...
OK you need to visit Dynamism.com.
The Sony U101. 1.9 lbs, 7.1" TFT, 7.04 x 1.34 x 5.49 inches. Integrated WiFi. Celeron 600A processor, firewire, USB 2.0, tons of battery life...
MORTAR COMBAT!
Seriously though, it's a good idea if it catches on. People are starting to accumulate data they want or need to carry around and use in different places in different machines. I'd much rather have people plug their own machine into a docking station at my house than constantly bug me "Can I use your computer to check my mail?" and have to worry about them screwing up my machine.
The main obstacle is getting enough power and storage without losing portability and compatability. PDAs seem to have a problem with the latter, most are very limited in what they can run. Laptops seem to have problems with the former. To get a decent battery life and features you often wind up having to haul around 5lbs more hardware.
The big problem I can see with it is there's no standard for the docking bay design. Which means proprietary systems that are no good. There needs to be a standard design for this kind of thing so they all work in each other's docks and you can just plug your base unit into anyone's keyboard, monitor, cd drive, sound system etc.
Introducing the new Occam Fusion! Now with sqrt(-1) fewer blades!
Breakfast served all day!
An external keyboard for the device
At first i thought it just said Hand Sized Antelope, and was wondering why there wasn't the bio-tech icon, thinking they'd engineered/bred a housepet sized antelope. 1000TH POST!!! W00T!!!
"Sic Semper Tyrannosaurus Rex."
What would you do with something like this? I can think of some contrived examples, but honestly I do not see a use. Do you have any ideas?
Xybernaut already has the wearable PC angle covered.
Holy crap, I expected a link to that windows keyboard photo. Amazing that you linked to an informative page. That is sad.
Jesus was all right but his disciples were thick and ordinary. -John Lennon
For 3K I can buy a laptop that'll smoke whatever this thing can put up for numbers, and it'll have a DVD writer and a builtin wireless card and all kinds of other fun shit.
This is merely a stupid toy for a rich VP's.
Yes Francis, the world has gone crazy.
After learning terms "palm pc", "palm sized pc", "pocket pc", "hand sized pc" etc..., I have come to know what they mean by "window pc". It means "window sized pc".
I fail to see how this pricey device is *THAT* much different from the failed Tablet PC. Why would I want to lay down nearly $4k for such a contraption?
TT
This product concept reminds me a great deal of Apple's Duo product line
info here that was sold in the early 90s. The idea was to make a tiny computer for use in a portable role, that could be easily stuck into a device that would make it perform like a desktop. The sales were abyssmal since it could do neither role particuliarly well. My bet is that this concept, as nifty and geek pornish as it is, will go the way of the Duo.
My Karma is so good, I'm the Dalai Lama...or something.
It wants its FUD back!
Seriously, blue screens are a thing of the past. Everyone else moved on four years ago, while Slashdotters are still stuck in the 90s. Why do Slashdotters continue to harp on blue screens? Is that all they have?
I don't even want to recall all the freezes I experienced when I tried Slackware 9 on my laptop.
"Sufferin' succotash."
So how the heck do you login once the computer has been locked?
CTRL + ALT + DEL is the ONLY key combination that will bring up the login screen.
Life is too short to proofread.
It wants you to read the linked website!
Only if you enable that feature.
I've been reading in the news that PDA sales are plummetting. Most people attribute this to the consumer need shifting from the old style PDA to a smartphone.
However, that's just ONE aspect of what I see as the convergence in the portable space.
There are several portable devices, all of which can be duplicated by a conventional laptop:
1) portable MP3 player (ala IPOD)
2) portable DVD player
3) PDA apps
4) cell phone (well, I'm assuming it's possible)
The big problem with PDAs are:
1) No optical storage options, and microdrives are still too small to be able to serve a healthy dose of media.
2) CPUs still too weak for truly decent digital video playback.
3) Screen orientation sucks for the web.
4) have to use an external keyboard, or if you use a thumbpad you are still stuck with portrait mode.
The problem with the IPODs and portable DVD players are that they are single-purpose devices.
The problem with laptops is they are still too expensive and too bulky to be an everything-in-one solution. But it's still the best out there right now.
There is also a lot of corporate shortsightedness going on. PDA manufacturers are still thinking in terms of the "vertial marketplace" even though we're in a recession and corporations are not on any sort of buying sprees.
Computer manufacturers still look at laptops the way the big car makers look at SUVs. They can get more of a profit margin because of a perception in the consumers that the product costs a lot to manufacture.
So that explains why you have $400 desktops with decent specs and low end laptops are still close to a grand with sucky embedded graphics chips.
You've got Dell that is pushing the envelope in pricepoint on their PDAs, but they still aren't really marketing them to the average joe. They come out with yet another dead-end device, an IPOD clone, for that.
Now think what if...
What if PDAs could hook up to 1.8" hard drives or walkman-like CD/DVD drives to PDAs or sub-notebooks?
What I'm thinking is component-like devices all with their own power supplies that can interface with eachother. It's like if you chopped up a laptop into pieces you could decide how much you needed and when to deplete each component's individual batteries.
And the cool thing is that the individual components would still have a function separate from the core. A bluetooth-enabled IPOD is still an IPOD. But if you stored video files on an IPOD you'd only be able to play them back on a video-enabled device. An MP3 CD player can still play CDs on its own, but if you put a DVD disc in it you will only get audio out through the headphone jack. A cell phone is still a cell phone on its own but can also be used as a cellular modem. The PDA core boots off nonvolatile storage and doesn't require a hard drive.
Jeez dude, do you have a cron job posting your messages now? Or do you just copy/paste from a list of your old messages?
(i.e. about 400mHz)
Completing an operation every 2.5 seconds is sloooow.
I agree on your points. I want something in the 10cm x 15cm screen size range without paying a fourth this much.
...in VIA bringing their Nano-ITX motherboards (12cm x 12cm) affordably to market than the likes of Oqo, Nimble and this other group.
Combine that with their new, smaller Eden-N processor that runs at 1 GHz with 7 W of heat dissipation, and built-in AES 256-bit acceleration...
Considering their Mini-ITX boards run under $200, I don't think they'll have a tough time beating $3,700.
Learning HOW to think is more important than learning WHAT to think.
(insert simpson scientist sounds here)
seriously i didn't rtfa either but really... isn't it obvious?
Yes, but will the Antelope run Longhorn?
-3Suns
~~~~
The Revolution will be Slashdotted
Those machines should run Linux just fine.
Note that there is a whole crop of vaporware hand-size PC's now: Antelope, OQO, Tiquit, Nimble, etc.
However, it is less and less clear why anybody should care about them. A PDA with a 400MHz ARM has sufficient computing power and you can plug in a CF or USB disk drive if you need more storage.
Of course, there is the fact that Windows XP applications aren't sold for ARM, but for Linux, you get a full desktop computing environment out of one of those machines (well, if you blow away the pre-installed PPC or Zaurus PDA software).
don't need to say anything else
Oh yeah, it's exactly the same concept as an Intel Personal Server.
IBM has decided that a slot-based hardware adaptation is best, whereas Intel is angling for wireless connectivity. Both are basically computers and storage with battery in a tiny box.
Man is the animal that laughs.
And occasionally whores for Karma.
Japanese keyboard, japanese drivers, poor support for external CD-ROM drives (only three Sony models (starting at $400) for FireWire, hit and miss for PCMCIA, and NO USB models supported), shorter battery life than the faster Interlink 7310...
I think I'll pass. (Granted, I've heard something about the Celery 600A really being a Pentium M ULV 600MHz, but I'm gonna call BS on that... it's probably a severely underclocked tualie)
I told Sharp about this kind of thing about a year ago. It told them that they should build a display system that'll allow the Zaurus to plug into it and act as the computing center for the desktop display. Wireless mouse and keyboard would enable familiar data Input and networking could be built into the display or via a wireless link.
Good to see somebody coming up with a product( kinda ) using this idea. These handhelds have enough CPU these days for lightweight desktop use.
IBM's implementation of a computing core is even better because it has the added benefit of enabling wearable computing. Though I do think that's a much smaller market compared to handhelds and desktop combo's potential market. IMHO.
LoB
"Anyone who stands out in the middle of a road looks like roadkill to me." --Linus
the MSRP really spells DOA. any questions?
It's one button. Tablet PCs have the same thing. Joking aside, it's quite useful for killing runaway processes, often faster than the corresponding ps aux, kill -HUP (and if that doesn't work, kill -9) combo under linux.
"The question of whether a computer can think is no more interesting than that of whether a submarine can swim" -EWD
This always struck me as a good way to build a PC, if you don't need a high-powered system with lots of peripherals. Is anybody doing much with it these days, or has it pretty much died out?
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
Your mom called, she wants to give your jism back!
Oh give me a home
where the buffalo roam
and the deer and the antelope play...
Hmmm...maybe I can play "Deer Hunter" on my Antelope PC.
makes it much easier to fling across the room when Windoze crashes, or even to crush the damned thing with your hands (take THAT, Bill G!).
So on the high end, if you are looking for performance, a laptop blows this away. If you are looking for portability, a PDA easily wins. PDA's will give you easily 4-5 hours on battery as well as WiFi and/or Bluetooth wireless access. As well as cost 1/8 the price.
Only 4-5 hours? Thanks but no thanks... my PDA gets 3 days before I have to put it back on the charge cradle. Which is about the minimum amount of battery life that I find acceptable from a PDA (my Palm III went for 2-4 weeks on a single set of batteries).
Wolde you bothe eate your cake, and have your cake?
Okay, so apparently the "Antelope Hand-Sized" jokes were wearing on the editors, so they chang it to "Hand-Sized Antelope"? Or were they just weary of hearing about Antelope Hands, and wanted to hear about tiny, tiny Antelopes?
Personally, I would have gone with, "Antelope, the Hand-Sized Windows PC, To Debut." Then again, I like to avoid dangling modifiers.
=Brian
There is nothing so good that someone, somewhere, will not hate it.
I'd guess that the people still whining about the BSODs can't convince their parents to buy them a system that will run their haxx0r3d copy of Windows XP, or they're not swift enough to try runnig ad-aware to get rid of all the spyware they've installed.
As an aside, any linux user can tell you, those freezes you claim to have experienced never really happened. It was hardware, or software, or solar flares, or crappy drivers, but not Linux. As you are no doubt aware, only 'M$' can put out software with bugs, security holes, or design errors of any kind. Every other OS, whether it's by an international group of programmers, or some 12 year old in his basement coding pure spagetti code, is infallable and indestructable. Even OS/2 1.0.
It's been a long time.
Only 4-5 hours? Thanks but no thanks... my PDA gets 3 days before I have to put it back on the charge cradle. Which is about the minimum amount of battery life that I find acceptable from a PDA (my Palm III went for 2-4 weeks on a single set of batteries).
.Net device and the Pocket PC 2003 .Net have similar capabilities...well, not quite, but it is a better comparison then Palm OS or a micro linux build) is in the 4-5 hours range with WiFi enabled. Networking in general is a big battery drain.
If you had read my statement more carefully, you whould have noticed that I said "as well as WiFi and/or Bluetooth wireless access." Meaning that the 4-5 hours time frame was with wireless connection. Some systems do better, but the average (at least in terms of Pocket PC based PDA's which I used as the Antelope is a MS Windows CE
We were all warned a long time ago that MS products sucked, remember the Magic 8 Ball said, "Outlook not so good"
Haha, that's pretty funny... CTRL-ALT-DEL...
For NT logins I would assume!
there goes another kitty
I've been running Windows 3.0 on my 3.5" x 6" x 1" HP 200LX for over five years. I like to think I'm prescient, not lame.
Nice strawman argument you've concocted there, guy. Now please, please, shut the fuck up.
Just a friendly reminder!
A strawman arguement would require me to make one. I'm agreeing with the parent post, while adding my own experience.
It's been a long time.
when they first started talking about these, the idea was to have a laptop docking staion: it would have the keyboard, batter, and screen of a laptop that the core would plu into
AB HOC POSSUM VIDERE DOMUM TUUM
Any novice in the study of logic can see the strawman you've constructed. Apparently you can't.
In the meantime, keep hopping on OCG's wood. I'm sure he appreciates it!
HAND