Microsoft Origami Unfolds

College Student writes "Microsoft has officially unveiled 'Origami', a paperback-book sized portable hybrid (laptop & PDA). From article: 'The new machines will connect wirelessly to the Internet and carry full-sized hard drives, but they are not intended to replace current PCs....The new PCs are expected to sell for between $599 to $999, but Microsoft said it is possible to sell one for $500 if the manufacturer selects components carefully.'" More details at the official Microsoft site, and via Channel 9 a look at the system with the UMPC general manager.

Comments

Not this again

[timeOday]

I feel there's a void of uselessness in sizes between the PDA and the laptop. If I can't put it in my pants pocket, then I have to carry/backpack it, so it might as well be a laptop with a real keyboard.

more pics etc.

[DrSkwid]

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/03/08/origami_um pc_clunker/

another MS hardware failure, to be sure

Origami with

[ikejam]

no particular identity
no particular use
no particular target client
no particular chance of success

origami (ôr'-gä'm) pronunciation
n., pl. -mis.

      2. A decorative object made by folding paper.

a decorative object...ohhh..i get it now..

Re:A few questions:

[Total_Wimp]

-No keyboard at a time with mobile computing is moving to keyboards: check

-It's basically a big PDA at a time when the PDA market is on it's death bead: check

-It's not a phone at a time when the smartphone market is growing rapidly: check

Either Microsoft knows something nobody else does, they're just playing a niche for incrimental revenue, or, well, I don't know. I don't get it.

TW

Re:Sell if for $100 and I'm in

[PFI_Optix]

Unless you live in Sudan or somewhere else fun like that, for you the answer is "never."

This is something I just can't wrap my head around. The more they sell, the cheaper they are to make. There are thousands of rural/poor school districts in the U.S. that would LOVE to get their hands on semi-rugged, simple, cheap laptops and give one to each student. I guess because we don't live in Africa the fact that we don't have the money to provide technology to our students doesn't matter.

They could sell tens of millions of those in the U.S. and make the units even more affordable in places like Sudan (mark them up to $150 here if you want, then it only costs $50 to put on in the hands of an African student).

Watch me be a hypocrite

[hey!]

OK, I'm going engage in something that I usually detest: predictive punditry.

Here goes: This thing is going to flop.

Here are the reasons why:

(1) It fits into the space between laptops and phones, the same place PDAs are struggling in. They will have to to steal market share from a declining market segment.
(2) Portable => form factor is critical && the form factor == Newton && Newton == marketing flop.
(3) The lowest conceivable selling price is equal to the highest conceivable buying price.
(4) Challenge the iPod? With something this big? Are they nuts?

I am a well known non-believer in convergence as a user concept, but as a marketing concept it's a winner. We'll probably end up with converged devices and laptops pincering any product category in between to death.

What this means is that if there are markets for intermediate form factors such as PDAs and small tablets, they will have to be cheap and as non-converged as can be -- they'll have to be built around a "killer app" for a some market segment. That probably means shirt pocket organizers in the sub $50 range, hand held gaming in the sub $100 range. These may accrete certain PDA like functions as a kind of "freebie", the way even rudimentary non-converged phones have calendars and alarms, but they aren't going to be the deal closers for the buyers.

the real problem is battery life

[theStorminMormon]

I was really excited by the possibility until I saw the three hour battery life. This cripples the entire project, in my opinion, because it dictates how you use it. Unless you can reliably use it whenever you feel like it during the day without having to monitor battery life continuously or worry about it pooping out on you it's effectively tied to outlets (car, office, etc). I know that's how I'd feel about it because even though I can get 3-4 hours out of my laptop on battery I rarely use it that way because I'm always worried that when I really need the batteries they won't be there.

Until they can get all-day battery life it's just not interesting to me. By "all day" I mean 8-hours with moderate use as a BARE minimum, and I'd really want something more like 12-16. It should be as portable battery-wise as cell phones were when they took off or portable players are when they took off. Otherwise it's just not genuinely portable.

-stormin