Curious Blend of VPN, PDA and USB Drive

An anonymous reader writes "Realm Systems has developed a cellphone-sized mobile device that takes advantage of the hardware of a another PC by attaching via USB. It requires an Internet connection to connect to a backend system, but acts as a fully functional PC with dual PowerPC processors, a 20 GB drive and all your applications - if you can find someone who lets you connect to their PC. An interesting option especially for a price of $195 for the mobile device." So, for a $10,000 central server, a $1000 PC, and a $195 device, you can have the computing power of: a $1000 PC. It seems like there might be cheaper ways.

Comments

WiFi

[Daxx_61]

Why not use Wi-Fi? Why bother with USB at all?

Too damn proprietory

[Kris_J]

And it looks like it wants to more or less shut down the host PC. It's be more interesting if it was accessible via a terminal services, VNC or X window itself.

Come to think of it, a couple of friends have a Sharp Zaurus and it's SSH-able when it's sitting in its cradle...

This is the first

[ZSpade]

and last time we'll ever see this piece of technology. Guy 1: Yeah, let me give you my business address. Guy 2: Hold on I'll put it on my MPS... Guy 2: Uhh, You wouldn't happen to have a computer on you, would you?

Re:This is the first

[Anonymous Coward]

until they put a screen and mini keyboard on it and you can use it in 'PDA' mode ...

For a $10,000 server...

[djsmiley]

"MPS devices will be available from $195. While we could imagine Realms technology to also be attractive for home users, the necessary SOBA router may be out of reach for most households: Pricing ranges from $10,000 to $40,000, depending on the amount of users."

its not even a server, its an over the top router!

Re:Overkill

[isometrick]

I'm still trying to figure out HOW it "takes over the machine", but it says that it maintains state on the host machine as well as itself. Hmmm...

I think

[nahdude812]

I think that this is probably targeted at roaming corporate users. I split my time up between three corporate offices, a day here, a day there. Since I only have a cubicle in one of the three, I'm always having to use someone else's computer who's out for the day (it's a big company, there's always someone out). Each of the other guys in my group are in the same scenario.

Our roaming profiles give us access to our documents when signed on to someone else's computer, but they don't give us access to our developer tools. We've thought about external USB / Firewire drives, but not all of the tools we use can work running right off a detachible device.

This sounds like it might offer a better solution.

Still doesn't beat Zaurus

[zoum]

I don't think such device is decent enough compared to Sharp Zaurus Cxx model.

Zaurus can be also connected to any PC via USB or WiFi connection...and you can control Zaurus via ssh or vnc, etc...Moreover, Zaurus itself functions as a mobile computing device with superb display in terms of size and resolution, and many other great features...

Similar to the Intel Personal Server

[Jacco de Leeuw]

I see some resemblance with the Intel Personal Server.

Don't know about the security. There is no keyboard on the thing so a (hardware) keylogger on the host PC would be disastrous.