Slashdot Mirror
Handtop PC Announced Using Transmeta Processor
Cyberllama writes "Like many people on Slashdot, I've been wondering when all those transmeta-based products we were promised were finally coming out -- then I saw this. It claims to a be a fully functional laptop-like device with a 5.6 inch screen that can fit into the palm of your hand -- smaller than many laptop batteries. The specs are a bit last year (256 megs of ram, 1 gigahertz processor, 30 gig hard drive) -- but the size of the device is still pretty impressive. Unfortunately it looks like they won't be shipping until the end of the year."
Write some drivers and it would be able to. I'll be your tester, you just have to send me the hardware....
It won't be out till next year and it is already pretty unimpressive. Time to market in the PC world is king.
Stay tuned for new sig...
what do i possibly need 256MB/1GHz with a 5.6" screen for? not a troll, im honestly curious. thats what i have at home in my desktop and it does all i need, sure. however, most of what i do coudl not be done on a 5.6" screen. maybe its just a little to early for this kind of tiny power or are there really pda-style apps that need this?
use your turn signal! you people act like it's divulging information to the enemy
" device with a 5.6 inch screen that can fit into the palm of your hand "
I don't think something with a 5.6 inch screen would fit vary comfortably in most anyones hand.
TruePunk | Games
I want to get such a system for $450-$600 brand new tops. Doesn't have to be the fastest, but with the price of such small laptop like computers, it is never going to happen. Even used Toshiba liberttos are expensive.
------ Curiosity killed the cat. {satisfaction brought it back | it didn't die ignorant | lack of it is killing mankind
if you had the money.
www.antelopetech.com/
I recently purchased a Fujitsu P Series Lifebook that uses a TM processor (see their site for details). It's pretty slick. Don't have a CD/DVD drive, but I'm using my unit for remote admin work so I love being able to go wireless, grab a wired connection, or even use GPRS via a PC Card. The touch screen is great as well.
The article simply says "pricing is not yet available."
Argh, what does it matter. Whatever it is, it won't be worth it because laptops are getting more and more prevelent. This will simply be more geek eye candy, something geeks will show off to other geeks.
It's a good thing I have a big hand :p
Anyway, my main grip with this (it's not the only product I see doing the same) is still keyboard design. You are supposed to write with your thumbs while grabbing the thing, why not arrange the keys around the thumbs then? It's not like anyone will be able to touch-type there anyway with that size.
Also start using some fucking trackballs again, I'm sick of these useless annoying touchpads. It'd be specially annoying in something that size.
---- Take the Space Quiz!
That seems a bit short. Considering you can buy a 15" scrren laptop that gets 4 hours life. I guess they have a tiny battery powering that thing. Too bad, it looks like a nice halfway between PDA and laptop.
Moderation: Put your hand inside the puppet head!
The Compaq T-1000 TabletPC has. And I can tell you from experience that WindowsXP on that thing is A DOG. Pack a lunch if you plan on using this thing for anything more than IE and Freecell.
Haven't we all seen this before? I remember back in 2002 when OQO claimed they would ship something very similar (an "Ultra Personal Computer" or uPC) by the end of 02. Haha. What a laugh. Here we are 1 1/2 years later and nothing yet.
I'll believe it when I have one in my hand.
What will matter is the price they can bring these units down to. The big deterrent to a lot of companies that could use PDA's (construction companies, stores, etc) is their high cost. If this machine can help lower the prices of other machines, it is good, even if it is not the fastest or most impressve device in the world.
stuff |
I got all excited by this gizmo, but then I searched and searched and couldnt find any indication that this thing has any firewire or usb 2.0 ports.
What a bummer.
The porn on it would be so small I would have eye sore from squinting all the time. I'll pass.
Evolution or ID?
In the world where laptops are getting smaller and smaller.... I like this handtop. It is a good bridge between my ultraportable Averatec Laptop and my Palm PDA. This would be great also in the business environment. It won't fit you all and it is nice that you have your opinions, but we don't need to hear about it not running something you want or being too slow. This is a product just like any other and suited to work for a group of people being nonspecific as possible and yet covering their needs. This would work perfect in hospitals.
Does anyone smell another Vapoware???
"2-3 hours running Windows(R) XP operating system and Microsoft(R) Office applications"
Really, we'd need more than that. A spare battery or two, perhaps, especially if you plan to do anything hardware-intensive on it (Office, Windows, anything involving Half-Life... sweet, Counter-Strike on a palmtop PC).
Striking fear in the authors of godawful fanfiction, I am here, appearing in darkness, Tuxedo Jack!
The specs are a bit last year (256 megs of ram, 1 gigahertz processor, 30 gig hard drive)
Hey! Those are the specs of MY box.
Technoli
Sorry guys, but this simply looks very much like a geek toy to me. Not really useful for anything than show-off.
sick of sigs... *sigh*
I could play solitare in meetings and the people around me would think I was actually working but wouldn't be able to get a look at the screen to see what I was really doing.
Evolution or ID?
I think this little device has great potential. Specifically, it has a hard drive and runs Windows XP. I bought an HP 680 Handheld PC, which I thought was great, but ran Windows CE. Finding software for it when a new version of Windows CE/Pocket PC came out that was incompatible with the previous version.
Now I just hope they have the budget to do some advertising. No one wants to waste time on a product that will be discontinued in a few months, as was the case with my HPC.
I think the more important question is can it run StarCraft? :-) This looks like just another over-sized PDA to me. Right now, it is faster than current PDAs, but, right now, it is also vaporware. By the time it comes out, 1 Ghz will be the minimum.
From a driver perspective nothing looks horribly exotic, except the display driver and/or the builtin mouse/touchpad
"The United States has no right, no desire, and no intention to impose our form of government on anyone else." - Bush 05
Guess what? this isn't a new company. Look at the top of the page, and you will see that this is just Vulcan putting a name to their product.
Plus, I just love the realistic 'Users'. Personally, I don't think any mother would want/need to be "always connected, so she can keep an eye on her business while catching the Little League playoffs."
[/sarcasm]
When you can tap on something, throw it across the room, or pee on it, that's when it exists. When there are a bunch of pictures and promises on a web site, it doesn't. It means it's in "prototype", which means the actual machine is larger than my current laptop, but with a 5.6" screen and they're HOPING to get it down to size.
:wq
Look at this guys posting history, he should be banned.
My Casio (made by Panasonic) has 2 - 6 hours battery life, 800x600 screen, 80GB aftermarket HD (up from the original 20GB), 512MB RAM, only a 600MHz Transmeta so it's SLOW, PC slot with a 54Mbps wifi card, CF slot with a 384kbps cellular card, firewire, USB, external video, modem, fast ethernet, a hardware switch to boot it into XP or Midori Linux, and weighs next to nothing. It's also two years old, obsolete, and sells for $400 on the used market. Better than vaporware any day of the week.
typing looks like it's going to be a huge problem. "the fingers you have used to dial are too fat. To obtain a special dialing wand, please mash the keypad with your palm now."
No, but Sharp Zaurus runs linux, as well as being much smaller/cheaper/better supported. Even has a full keyboad.
/waiting for his 5600 in the mail :)
It's great for porn on the go, but a 5.6" screen? Come on people, what are you thinking!?! Or are they going to release one of those magnifying lens addons like they did with the old Gameboys? :-)
Looks pretty cool, quite compact... oh, crap, Windows? I'll stick with my Series 5 then.
This is nothing new... this kind of stuff exists since 1989!
People ask, "why so I need this?" I say you don't.
Not until Microvision MVIS retina scanning displays are cheep and full color. When your screen is the back of your eye the ultra portable doesn't need a screen and becomes your only computer.
Basically a video iPod that you can watch porn at work with a shit eating grin on your face and have no one know what your doing.
Good buy economy hello hedonism.
When I worked at Fujitsu we had some of the crusoe powered notebooks. The size was nice, but the performance on winXP was disappointingly weak. Any time I opened anything under winXP it took longer to come up than it did on my ancient 400MHz desktop from home.
How on earth did he plagarize you 6 minutes before you posted the original? Could it be that he posesses a time machine, or just that you're an idiot?
That seems a bit short. Considering you can buy a 15" scrren laptop that gets 4 hours life. I guess they have a tiny battery powering that thing. Too bad! It looks like a nice halfway between PDA and laptop.
if it connects to the Phantom? Besides, if you want small-but-cool, you're better off with an MP3-playing wristwatch. Their english ain't so hot, but their products are.
REM Old programmers don't die. They just GOSUB without RETURN.
i hope not too see those useless annoying fucking trackballs _ever_ again. what a relief to have those nice useful touchpads!
The main reason is that it runs XP, and not one of the light weight "Windows Powered" hand held operating systems. It's not a PDA, but a full blown PC.
"Full Windows XP Home/Professional operating system"
This is not a Pocket PC, but a full blown PC at the SIZE of the larger clamshell Pocket PCs. You're getting close to the low end of XP's recommended hardware specs with this device. It'll probably be a bit sluggish with that hardware.
"Live Free or Die." Don't like it? Then keep out of the USA
You mean like on the Pepper Pad?
When you want something bad enough your mind can play tricks on you....
and
The specs are a bit last year
turns into
The battery lasts about a year
...I guess I'll just have to keep dreaming
Where's the immersive VR? Where's the sex robots? Where are they already? Where's the ability to replace my crappy, suckass life on a giant rock infested with morons and religion and boy bands with one that's custom tailored to my every whim?
What I get is underpowered little plastic boxes running another goddamned f****** dysfunctional Microsoft product. I get MSN watches that lull me into a coma with such cutting edge data as stock quotes, sports scores and the temperature. I get the 55,147th first person shooter or the 24,106th driving sim or Madden NFL 40K. I get friggin' Mel Gibson's friggin' fairy tale movie working it's friggin' controversy into every place I turn. There is no escape!
It's those goddamned Victorian era assholes! This is all their fault! Sex used to be PART of religious ceremonies before they came along. Prostitutes used to work in TEMPLES, for Cliff's sake!
All I know is this supersymmetrical string theory better deliver on something, because that will be the last straw, kupo.
--- Ban humanity.
I own a Toshiba Libretto C110. I still use the heck outta it - I never bothered with buying a PDA, I use my Libretto instead. It's small enough to drop into the pocket of my trench coat when I head out on a startup, or go to gaming on the weekends.
PDA's have a very confining feature set - very little storage, low processing power, etc. For instance, I hate carrying my books to gaming - so, I have scanned versions of my books (and some that I bought from TSR in .pdf format) When I need to look up something, just pull up the document, hit find, and I've found what I need - more convenient than a dead trees version (for searching - there's still something I prefer about dead trees for normal reading). Plus, it beats the heck outta carrying 5 books. Sure, I could convert to plain text for a PDA, but then I loose most of the table formatting. Plus I also keep my characters on there in Excel (I'd run OpenOffice, but, the Libretto is too underpowered for OO - it works fine with the fairly old version of Office that was included.)
It's also great on a startup for similar reasons - just throw all my manuals on it, and when I need to look up something, pull that sucker out. Also great for times when I need to upload a program to a PanelView, connect to a PLC, etc. It's small, and I can hold it in one hand while connecting to the PLC - no need to have to set up a table or rest it on a rack.
For any serious long term use, it requires an external keyboard and monitor hooked up - I've used it that way a few times, but more often than not I just suffer through 15 minutes of typing on the itty-bitty keyboard it has.
This thing sounds like a perfect successor to my Libretto. The Libretto has 32Mb RAM, 166MHz processor (I overclocked mine to 233Mhz - there's some nice sites out there about hackin' the Libretto), and a 6Gb HD in it at the moment. 1 Ghz, 256MB, 30GB HD, and 802.11g? Sounds like a great upgrade to me :-)
Now if I could only get: Same thing with a G4 in it (what ever happened to the idea that Transmeta was going to be able to emulate any processor?!) running MacOS X, a touch screen that can be rotated around like some of the (way too large!) TabletPC's, and a decent 3D card in it (for when I'm bored at the airport, car trips, meetings :-) I'd REALLY happy :-) (And my wife would too - while I don't have a PDA, she does. She also has a Mac, and if she had her choice everything would run OS X / work like a Mac :-)
Davis Ray Sickmon, Jr - looking for something to read? Check out my three free novels at MidnightRyder.org
Only Hitler would ban someone for opinions he didn't like
Look folks, don't think of this as a very small PC.
Think of this as a PDA that can run standard applications.
For example, one of the main uses I have for portable computing is running trip planning software like Delorme's MapNGo products. Currently, such products are pretty much Windows-ia32 only. I really don't NEED a full-size laptop for this, and the software was designed to run acceptably well on a 25MHz 486 with 32M of memory fercrissakes! Running this on a 1GHz Crusoe with a quarter-gig of RAM will be child's play.
Yes, it would be nice if you could run this software on an XScale or MIPs based PDA. It would be nice if I didn't have a mortgage payment, too. But I do and it doesn't.
So having a PDA that can run ia32 code is not a bad thing.
www.eFax.com are spammers
Mars? Solitary confinement? Where?
"I've been wondering when all those transmeta-based products we were promised were finally coming out"
So you missed the tablet PCs then? That had Compaq and MS behind it. If anyone was going to help TM make a dent in the market, I think it would've been them. Sony have done TM palmtops too. In fact, it's been around a bit now in buyable products...
As it is, my TC1000 runs on a TM 5800 and it's awfully slow, even with 768MB ram. As the Fliptop has pretty much the same hardware/software combo - except the Geforce 2 Go, which was vital for good video performance - I'll give it a miss thanks.
So, is one palmtop going to help Transmeta out big time? I don't think so...
I found that 'Dope Wars' for my Palm worked rather well, as I'd have to write numbers for how much I was buying/selling, which looks much different than just clicking and dragging things around.
And when people saw me writing, they just assumed I was taking notes.
There are probably other games out there that would accomplish the same effect.
Build it, and they will come^Hplain.
I covered this last week for Forbes.com, and got to play around with a Flipstart for about 60 seconds.7 flipstart.html
http://forbes.com/technology/2004/02/17/cx_ah_021
There are dozens if not hundredss of Transmeta powered devices around, if you bother to look.
As others have mentioned, this is most likely vaporware (like the OQO). Any "first generation" of a form-factor typically makes compromises in functionality to get the product out into the market. This device has everything but the kitchen sink, so it makes me highly suspicious of it ever becoming a real product.
There is definitely a need for a mobile/transportable computer, but taking a desktop/notebook PC and shrinking it down, is not the answer IMO. I would like to see a PPC-on-steroids.
A viable mobile/transportable device would be approximately the size of today's PPCs but have the ability to connect to external peripherals like keyboards, monitors, mice, etc. Include a "mini-dock" for large harddrives, etc. and we'd have something that wouldn't replace a desktop PC, but provide some very useful capabilities.
Imagine, if you will, one of those DVD players with the brain of a Zire-class device; color screen (5" LCD - TV resolution, but that didn't stop us in the olden days), internal data storage (5GB?), a usb port or two, CF or CardBus, and maybe a bottom-of-the-barrel Realtek or ADMTek 802.11X chip.
Email, address book, DVD, MP3, and computer functionality in your (large) pocket, or backpack. Plug in whatever USB mouse/keyboard you want, or use the integrated joystick-thingy on the bus/subway/plane/go.
Hell, you could even play Commodore 64, Atari, and GameBoy games on the thing..
Hellllo Amiga..Only Hitler would mod someone down for opinions he didn't like
I really don't care if the company supports Linux, but so often these devices use such obscure proprietary hardware that there are none, or at best buggy drivers available for Linux. This really bothers me. I hope that the device will at least use some common components which will work well with Linux!
(Of course not having to pay for a Windows license is always nice, but no doubt a pipe dream.)
I find that (vaporwareproduct) lets me (e-action) and (e-action2) while (e-action3). The (hardwarespec) allows me to store (information) while the (hardwarespec2) makes for fast (e-action4).
My (vaporwareproduct) helps me keep it all together, thanks to its (hardwarespec3) and (hardwarespec4). My productivity has increased, since I don't have to carry around (competingproduct), (competingproduct2) and (competingproduct3).
Thanks (companyname)! (vaporwareproduct) is tailored just for me!
I guess it does. From the FAQ, it seems easy to install your favorite software. Since this is an announced feature I think that if there should be any problems, FlipStart support will happily help you ;-)
How do I install my favorite software?
You can install software one of four ways:
1. Download the software from the Internet
2. Install the software from your home or office network
3. Attach FlipStart to the mini dock and install the software from the CD-ROM drive, and
4. Attach a USB drive.
)9TSS
if i'm not mistaken its already the third such device to be 'released within six months'. There were this qlc (or smth) thingie coming out, there were promises for solution based on VIA platform and now this... Get real, it will NOT be on sale EVER. Just like everything else of this class. It's just plain doomed already and they made it even worse by opening waporware site that automatically throws it's credibility below the sever lines. But otherwise it's ok, I guess. At least I will be able to masturbate looking at it's specs for a while.
Megapixels has nothing to do with how well the camera will work in a low light environment. It all comes down to the aperature of the lense, as well as the signal/noise ratio of the sensor at low light levels. CCD chips aren't the best in low light situations. CMOS sensors are a bit better..
As for the usefulness of this. Well, people accept highly compressed audio files that sound like crap. They accept poor service & audio drop outs on cellphones, and they also accept incredibly poor & blurry pictures taken from an incredbily cheap cellphone camera. Why wouldn't they accept this as well?
People don't like to pay for quality. It's all about low price. This has been proven time and time again..
First it's ordering beer at Mariners games with your WAP phone, now this...I want Paul Allens time/money.
.-=Wit is educated insolence=-. -Aristotle
Will it run Duke Nukem Forever?
I'm waiting for my 5500 in the mail too. I can't wait to see what it can do with some console emulators.
The days of the digital watch are numbered.
Which does go some way to explain the heavy use of the word Microsoft and their associated (tm)(r)(c) lettering in almost every page.
Information here.
Avantslash - View Slashdot cleanly on your mobile phone.
Just get a Libretto off eBay for 200 bucks
-off topic, but ...-
I just got mine. I waited for Amazon to lower the price to US$289. Also have a wireless CF card.
I would like to use Firefox vs. Opera, but the machine is stable and fast-enough as is.
Browsing web pages is mostly a pain. I hope more sites become like mapquest and offer PDA friendly page layout.
Only Hitler would repeat himself until someone believed him.....
The "testimonials" seem to be so fake (ala Microsoft "switch from MAC to Windows". A google of "Park Valley Realty" returns no such company name. Could it be someone who depends on her mini-laptop so heavily really not have a company web site?
" 5.6" HDTV-quality display (1024 x 600)"
Coming out in time for the next Superbowl! No longer do you need to go around to your friend's house to watch the Superbowl on his home theatre set-up, you can bring your own 5.6" HDTV-quality system!
(Hmmm...720p...1080i...600 what?)
This econmic article is much much more important to every /. reader than a Transmeta article.
For what this gives you (at some point in the future) you can get a Sharp SL-C860 for $750 to $850 (depending on reseller) now! True, you don't have a hard drive or built-in WiFI/Bluetooth, but I've got a CF card for the WiFi and don't miss the lack of a hard drive (my 512 MB CF cards take care of things nicely, thank you). Plus its running Linux!
Anyone remember that series of childrens' paperback books that were popular in the eighties, which were written in the third person and had the reader being a kid secret agent who carried around a disguised micro-micro computer and saved the day by writing a few well-placed BASIC programs?
:)
That was the first thing I thought of when I saw this paperback-book-sized computer...finally technology has caught up to fiction.
Editor Emeritus and Senior Writer, TeleRead.org
only Hitler supporters would support censorship
It's hardly an oversized PDA. Did you read the description of the machine? It has USB2 and an array of other expansion ports, a 1024x600 screen, for God's sake it even has a 3D accelerator with 8MB of dedicated VRAM. What else do you want in something that small? Heat-seeking missiles?
Yes, it can run StarCraft. It can also run X-Wing Alliance, for that matter. Pay attention.
+++ATH0
Remote Desktop. I could see using this thing to access my home PC running a remote desktop through Wifi. Who cares how fast it is as long as it has the ability to push my commands through and display the graphics on the (small) screen. Right now I've got a 12" Sony VAIO that I can contect to running as my main desktop PC that is connected to my wireless router. I simply fire up remote desktop from the laptop and now I'm effectivly running at P4 2.8GHz speed with a Gig of RAM and plenty of hard drive space, not to mention access to the programs on that computer. This applies to any "under powered" pc networked to a nice box.
"When you can tap on something, throw it across the room, or pee on it, that's when it exists."
Thats exactly how I proved your mom exists.
Pocket pc's look like the most useless toys you could possibly buy. Arcade games are different because you only need to control them with a few buttons. But no one in their right mind would try and get work done on a pc with a "thumb keyboard".
Meanwhile, my Palm is chigging away happily with it's 30 some odd Mhz Dragonball processor, and it does everything I could want it to do, and more.
And I don't have to charge it for 3 weeks.
Feh...
--- Ban humanity.
No thanks, I already have a Sharp Zaurus SL-C750, why do I need a vapor product that's a bit faster (and with a HDD), but doesn't fit in my pocket? It's still going to be too small to do any serious typing, and this thing looks like it's going to be too big and overpowered (heavy, crummy battery life) to be a good PDA (actually, the Zaurus isn't a great PDA either, but that's a software issue).
I read the internet for the articles.
where's the pen?
Pen input is a natural for devices this size.
One more reason not to go to California. I hope you, your jobs, and your stereoid-enhanced govenor break off of the US and sink into the ocean...then the fish can listen to you hippie freaks babble nonsense, and the rest of us can get back to work and never have to stay late to attend your conference calls again.
Sincerely,
Someone on the East Coast
"[Q:]How do I back up my data on my FlipStart if it's my only computer?
[A:]As they do today, computer users should back up their data when they are connected to their home or office network. That said, we have constructed the hard drive to withstand rugged conditions to prevent data loss." -- From the Faq on the site.
Does anyone else see this as not answering the question? WHO posts a faq, and doesn't vene answer the questions correctly? This just CAN'T be good marketing.
...storing and reviewing digital photos on the road. In my opinion the current hard-drive based portable storage devices are a one-trick pony, which limits their usefulness. On the other hand, notebooks are currently too big for a device whose primary purpose is to store photos and maybe review some on a screen. Sony and IBM have some ~3 lb. wonders that come close, but at around 1 lb. this thing is exactly the right size.
What remains to be seen is how much this thing will cost. If it's priced like a 3 lb. notebook, forget it.
Cheers,
Jeremy
not trolling, but it kinda looks like holding that thing would be a real bitch. You can't really get it to sit in your palms (imagine an old gameboy) and I imagine that'd cause some nasty cramps after any significant use. I like the idea, but all i can think is ouch...
[Fuck Beta]
o0t!
Specs are here:
Celery 600, $2,000.00 price tag.
Didin't say it was cheap, but then I don't expect this thing to be less than $1000.00
Jon Acheson
All opinions expressed herein are my own, and not those of my employers, who are appalled.
How many stereotypes can you fit in one post? We're not all hippie freaks (you have to be at least 55 to qualify as a hippie). I can tell you this; the hippie freaks didn't vote for Arnold, it was probably the recent East Coast immigrants.
I'll bet pretty much anything it's either complete vapor or we'll never see anything like it. The fact that not even Toshiba has released such a device doesn't look promising for this company. I know that major PC manufacturers aren't always right about everything, but they do essentially determine what we are allowed to want and what the market is allowed to carry. Sony's Picturebook (I think) series is the closest to this I have ever seen, and with those machines' low usability and fairly lame specs for a price well over US$2000, why bother? Frankly, this is the direction we should be going with computing. John Dvorak predicted something like it years back, where we have a palm-sized device that is the core computer and offers some functionality on a portable level, but then we dock it into it's docking station and we have a fully functional, powerful desktop machine. The problem is this is years from becoming reality, but it is what will happen. Right now, the best you can do is a combination of devices. Grab a Sidekick from T-Mobile (or something like it), a laptop from Apple, and a Shuttle box, and you will have achieved bliss. (Wait, shit, no.... but you get the idea)
I am feeling fat and sassy
Last year? Wouldn't its closest competition be high-end PDAs? Last I checked those had 400 MHz XScales at best, maybe 128 MB of memory, not all available to the user, and only external access to mass storage. So how is this device that's clearly more powerful "last year"?
I think it looks good. The only question is, does it run Linux?
From here:
...
"The Rugged Handheld is the first Windows XP..."
"Buttons: CTRL-ALT-DEL..."
Would anybody buy this? We're increasingly reading about the lack and declining interest in PDAs and more of a move to cellphones. So the question is what woudl one do with this? I find it hard to thing anybody would be doing any serious work on it and the cellphone is replacing much of the core functionality provided by PDAs. The only place I see there being a demand for this is in some niche market.
"Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere." - Martin Luther King, Jr.
suddenly, my hiptop seems almost inadequate.
It has USB2 - so it has the option of backing up on an external USB2 hard disk, or CD/DVD burner, etc., etc. They mention using USB2 for backup on the very same page that you quote. But they think backing up over the network is the best solution, if it is possible. And I think most of the people who are likely to be using such a device as their 'only computer' will be using this for work purposes, with access to a network.
How do you back up an ultralight laptop which doesn't have an CD/DVD-R? How did we back up laptops before laptop CD/DVD-Rs were inexpensive and generally available (*not that long ago*, and don't say 'use a floppy' - 1.44mb has been too small for a long time). Personally, I back my laptop over the network, and would recommend this as a first option to anyone who asked.
My mouth it has begun to water ugghhhhhhh.
This is not a PDA and any computer-savvy person would know this.
I see a lot of questions why we need this. To me, this is what a PC should be. The boxes we use as PC (Personal Computers, remember?) are way over powered for that. For Gaming, you need power. For workstations you need power. What average PC needs 4GHz and 512RAM with 120GB storage? To me, we could have stopped at the 400MHz PC's and called it good. Personally I would not JUST have one of those myself being a power user. But, the reason I think these are coming out more and more is we had a PC right a while back on the specs. We can now just shrink them more than they first came out. If these can kill the collection of overpowered beige boxes sitting on millions of desks, then good! And, don't even get me started on the term "Desktop"...
AB HOC POSSUM VIDERE DOMUM TUUM
Where are you getting these awful performance specifications from? Transmeta 1GHz processors can generally be expected to perform around anywhere from a 500MHz to 900MHz P-III, depending on how the processor optimizes itself for the task at hand (that is, it gets better at the task the more it does it).
+++ATH0
The flash presentation is very slick - except that none of the photos show the device in use. I get kind of suspicious when you see the same 10 views of a device, even if its a prototype, and they're all still photos.
are very easy to have if you have USB. You can use a dongle of extremely minimal size. Think of it as a cable length extender :)
+++ATH0
HTH HAND
What surprises me is not that a product, which is not due to ship for months, has announced that they are using the Transmeta processor, but that Transmeta is still around (see Transmeta: hype and processor performance).
Other than support for the underdog, the fascination in the Linux community with Transmeta has been the Linux (or Linus) connection. This connection is now tenuous at best. It's time to look at Transmeta with a less romantic eye.
Originally Transmeta was founded to provide a high performance processor for laptops (I interviewed with them during this phase). They claimed that they were going to be the next Intel (truely, a quote). Unfortunately, the Transmeta processor could not beat Intel and AMD processors. So then they refocused on producing a low power chip for portable devices. But then Intel and others came out with low power processors. So there is no real edge that I can detect for Transmeta. I am only surprised that they are still around.
this post is absolutely right. remember waiting and waiting for YOPY the linux PDA? sure, after two plus years of waiting, it was released. then, it got trounced by sharp zaurus.
Why did I lurk so long before registering for a Slashdot account? I could have had a Slashdot ID of less than 100000.
A friend who works for them had a prototype of the OQO. Neat device. Certainly these devices will only get more powerful as time goes on, and components continue to shrink.
My impression / comparison:
Speed : Tie
Memory: Tie
Networking: 802.11b only on the OQO, but g should be coming
Bluetooth: Built-in on the OQO
Size : The OQO seems a little smaller and leaner physically
Screen: The screen was very high-quality on the OQO. One major drawback to it is that it doesn't flip down, meaning you'll have to protect it a lot. The FlipStart works more like a laptop, self-protecting the screen. Also, the resolution is smaller on the OQO. But the wacom-style touch-pen is very nice, and a lot more flexible and powerful than modern PDA styluses.
Expansion: The OQO has ports all over the outside edge. It's really kind of impressive. However, only USB 1.1. It does have firewire, which I think is great for external drives and fast peripherals. And the OQO docking station looks really useful on the website.
Sexiness: The OQO wins hands-down. The look and construction of it is much more in line with very sexy Apple-industrial design standards, than cheap Toshiba-notebook plastic-molded awkwardness. That'd be a main selling point for me.
I don't want to say anything about price, because I don't know what's public knowledge yet, but I will say that the price I heard for the unit was well below what I thought it'd be. So you might find these units being aggressively priced and marketed to gain traction early on.
Anyway, it was neat to see one of these things in person finally, because I agree: they've been a long time in coming!
So, hows the graphics on these things?
A handtop Quake III Arena would make a cool gameboy !
Apparently this is sponsored by Paul Allen.
I recommend going here and suggesting politely that
they support Linux on the device:
http://www.flipstartpc.com/contactus.asp
It boils down to a simple equation:
profit = (selling price) - (production cost)
Businesses try to make a profit, it's not illegal to do so.
Production cost are too high, thanks to taxes like:
1. worker's compensation
2. property taxes
3. business income tax
4. business inventory tax
5. land use restrictions
6. water/sewer taxes
7. electricty taxes
8. fuel taxes
9. government permit fees and difficulty or delays in obtaining a permit to do anything
Simply stated, the total spending by the government must remain below a certain percentage of the GNP/Business Income of California for businesses and thus jobs to be located in California.
All of those feel-good handout programs are essentially forcing businesses and jobs to leave California.
Also, the Federal 9th circuit court's anti-business anti-capitalism rulings drive businesses away.
5600? They still make that? I think by now you should be waiting for a C-860 at least.
i think the better question on slashdot is "how much of that is supported by linux and XFree and the like, as well as how does one install to it?"
and who really needs a 1ghz prosseser... i would settle for a ten fold performance boost in disk access and my 867mhz transmeta chip
All of the above was encrypted with a Quad ROT-13 method. Unauthorized decryption is in violation of the DMCA.
Mod parent as funny, not informative, please.
I got my wife a palmtop PC compatible over a decade ago and it had 512 of memory:
http://www.reto.com/
Oh, wait. Did you say MEG?
Maybe /. readers will realize that going to court to saving a tree located on private property economically damages the owner of the private property. In other words, it reduces the value of the property and prevents the owner from using the property how he pleases.
This affects the economy since it takes land out of use for housing, farming, etc. This makes the remaining land more valuable for housing, farming, etc...
If you want to turn California into a nature preserve, then you elliminate our food supply since 25% of all food consumed in the US is grown in California. This will drive food prices up and hurt those less able to buy the more expensive food.
You must have an enormous laptop.
A wise man once said:
"Can you feel it, nothing can save ya
For this is the season of catching the vapors"
I don't believe any hardware with a flash demo and no
pricing information. Sorry. Anyone want to bet me a beer
that this thing will be on the vaporware awards next year?
Quick Googling--and a glance at the faces--strongly indicates that the "real people" sharing their "solutions" on the site are nothing more than FAKE poseurs. (Anyone ever seen a "regional sales manager" who looks like "Jason"?)
They're models...probably because there are no REAL users yet for this vaporware. Fake testimonials for a fake product.
Actually, the photos are probably from a stock photography house. An image match search could confirm this...
Wake up Paul and get better marketing (and a better/real product!)
None of the Zaurus models available in the US have a "full keyboard"... it's something like 37 keys. You have to use the "Fn" key to even type numbers. Don't get me wrong, it still works great, but it's a far cry from "full".
It'll be nice if they start selling the C-860 here (which is a laptop form factor like this vaporware thing, only it's real) but if someone actually comes out with an x86-compatible one at a competitive price, I think all the high-end PDA's are dead meat.
OQO.com has had something similar in development for a while also. Also vaporware, but with a video and a sexier for factor
I have two sony picturebooks, and you're right it's not great to pull out even a sub-laptop to take pictures. However, they're both great video.
I have 20G and 40G drives in mine, and for both machines the battery usually runs out before the drive fills up (ie at least 90 minutes of recording). This machine has 30G, again enough.
As for other uses of sub-laptops, mine is my main mp3 player, a handy place to backup my digital pics while travelling, and also a work machine (although I usually take along a USB keyboard 3x the size of the machine and use an on-site monitor). I also have astronomy software in case I get curious about what star I'm looking at, backups of many personal docs and videos to watch whilst on the train, as well as a few (slightly dated) games.
I agree with an earlier poster that this sounds like a good replacement, except that it's not available now. By the end of the year I doubt I'll be interested in buying a 1Ghz machine with only 256M RAM.
I've been posting on the net since 1994 and I still haven't come up with a good sig!
I already wear glasses. A 212 DPI screen in practically useless.
Unless they include a free 8" x 10" fresnel lens and clip-on armature like in the movie Brazil.
- it's got a small keyboard (but probably big enough to type reasonably on, if it's well designed);
- it's in a clamshell design;
- it's grey.
It's a Psion 5mx.
Oh, just a moment:
Sorry, it's got about 1/15th of the battery life of a Psion. And it won't run my last 5 years worth of applications for the Psion. Oh well, back to Ebay to look for a replacement Psion, before I start tring to solder up the breaks in my screen cable.
Isn't it amazing how Windows machines can catch up with devices that have been out of production for 3 years.
Birds are not dinosaur descendants;birds are dinosaurs, for all useful meanings of "birds", "are" and "dinosaurs"
That IS misleading. There are no (and haven't been for a year and a half, I'd say) full-size laptops with 1GHz CPUs. Maybe they include thin-and-lights in a very general "full size" category.
The Efficeon is just better at having its clock speed ramped up than the Crusoe, I think. Other than that, per clock their performances are supposed to be comparable.
+++ATH0
FUCK YOU
Unfortunatly, the thing runs winXP. i decided to ask vulcan ( the makers of the device ) if its okay to get linux on one of these, they said:
" Thank you for your interest in FlipStart. FlipStart is a generic x86 PC using off-the-shelf components from leading manufacturers. As with other x86 PCs, a Linux port should be possible with tweaks to some device drivers (such as the 1024x600 screen resolution, WiFi Chip etc). However, Vulcan currently has no plans to provide support to Linux porting efforts. If interested in future developments, please check back often at www.flipstartpc.com. "