Slashdot Mirror
Designing The Ultimate Netbook
Harden writes "TrustedReviews has an interesting take on what the 'Ultimate Netbook' ought to be. From the article: 'How to solve a problem like the netbook? To my mind, despite nearly every manufacturer taking a stab at the thing, none has yet quite distilled my idea of what the Ultimate Netbook would be. This is partly because, until recently, not everyone had a clear understanding of what a netbook was meant to do, but also because manufacturers have all been far too busy jostling for market share to put a lot of thought into the finer details.' What would your Ultimate Netbook include?"
A Macbook nano. $699, 10" screen, dual-core Atom, 2 GB of RAM, 64 GB flash drive, 6-cell removable battery, Airport/Bluetooth, Snow Leopard; no CD/DVD drive. Many manufacturers already have models similar to this; with subnotebook sales at an all-time high it's only a matter of time before Apple jumps onboard.
Take off every sig. For great justice.
I want to be able to walk into Microcenter or whoever, pick my board, pick a case, pick a screen, pick the drive, etc... and then build it. And that way, when something goes wrong, I can go and get the frick'in part(s) a fix it - without having to send it away for $50+.
And WTF is it with Apple of to have to wait 3 or more days to get a hard drive - at their stores?!?
I'd say the ultimate netbook would be a slightly ruggedized version of the Lenovo X61s I already own, plus the built-in 3G that I wish I had ordered. (not that 3G via a USB 'modem' is bad)
For that matter, how about an X200s? Starting weight of 2.5 pounds, but a 'real' computer. The only disadvantage here is that they are expensive, but the article said 'ultimate', not 'ultimate when compromised to make it cheap'.
ERROR: Null
The Psion clamshells seemed pretty popular in their day. I don't understand why that form factor went away and didn't come back! One of these with a color screen, a modern processor, WiFi and running Linux would definitely appeal to me.
Netbooks at the moment seem like the worst of both worlds - too large to be conveniently portable, too underpowered to do serious work, too small to be productive for heavily keyboard oriented stuff. They're light at least - but I don't really follow why that's a big deal. Obviously I'm wrong because Netbooks are popular. I just don't quite understand it.
--- These are not words: wierd, genious, rediculous
Lightweight (under 1.5kg including the power supply), 12h+ REAL battery life, built-in 3G modem, trackpoint or a *properly* calibrated touchpad, a sturdy case - steel hinges (but NOT steel fastened with screws to a plastic frame), titanium alloy or carbon fiber underside and cover - and proper space utilization (if there's space for a full-sized keyboard because the notebook is widescreen, then put this goddamned full-sized keyboard there, not a "normal" laptop keyboard and 10cm of padding on each side). Oh, and a matte screen. Glossy is OK for desktop monitors in a controller environment, laptops are being used where it's often impossible to eliminate direct, bright sources of light that make using a glossy screen almost impossible.
Actually, I think I've just described something similar to my X60, which is a very good design as far as mobility is concerned, but could be improved anyway. Sadly, I couldn't find anything better yet - Eee is nice but underpowered for my needs (no, not gaming) and too small (12.1" is optimal for me), Vaio feels too delicate and too easy to break, while HP subnotebooks are fine at first, but there's something about them that puts me off.
Disclaimer: this has nothing to do with the "desktop replacement" kind of notebook, which definitely has its place (small apartments, dorm rooms etc.), but is, in my opinion, out of scope of this discussion.
This is Slashdot. Common sense is futile. You will be modded down.
I'm not sure how much of a PC you're going to get for $150. I'm in the UK, and that's currently roughly £75. You'll get fuck all for that.
For £200-250 you can get something like what you're after. I went for the Acer Aspire One - £250 ($500) for a 1KG, 1gig ram, 120gig hd Intel Atom based PC running a customized version of Fedora on a 9inch 1024x600 screen. It has Wifi and a webcam, a well usable keyboard and a touchpad, and the OS has been made extremely easy for non-nerds to use (ie single click access to brower, email, open office etc. There's a rapidly growing community working on ports of the major Linux distros to it, although it'll be some time before those versions boot in the 20-odd seconds mine takes, or support the hardware out of the box. You can always plump for a Windows version but for me this was a chance to kill a few birds in one go: portable access to my work pc; gain familiarity with Linux; a cheaper (!) alternative to the black and white ebook readers sold by the likes of Sony and Amazon; handy way of dumping photos from my camera when on the move etc. I can't recommend it enough. The battery life could do with improving (2 hours or so isn't too hot) - they're working on a more powerful battery but you can wait forever with tech stuff, can't you!
The categories are fuzzy, of course, but I see two main ones:
1) What I call a netbook, which is a reduced-functionality, super tiny notebook, with emphasis on wireless connectivity, startup time, and battery life, to give you a minimal terminal to access your online life from anywhere. It's cheap enough that you'd likely buy it in addition to a normal notebook, and between being rugged (SSD) and cheap, you wouldn't worry about banging it around as you take it everywhere. It doesn't apologize for not starting OpenOffice quickly, or other traditional things you'd do with a notebook (let alone gaming)... That's not its purpose, and if you miss those things, look at #2. The original Eee nailed it.
2) Sub-sub-notebooks. These are the "larger" ones, which work as super light notebook for people who travel away from their main PC a lot. More CPU, a little heavier, a much bigger screen, somewhat less battery life, and you get a tiny, convenient notebook. It costs more. It's more about "running applications" than "hop online for a second". See: Dell, or the new Eee.
For me, the perfect netbook starts with #1, and keeps going in the direction of small, light, power efficient, instant-on, connectivity everywhere, and feels no shame about its limitations. To improve, try adding one of those trick transflective flip-around displays from the OLPC, and an ultra-low-power display-only mode to make it a usuable ebook... Or just put an e-ink display on the lid. Some are adding cell data interfaces... Good move, though plan pricing will probably render it useless.
I basically do all I need on my 61
-even writing this.
Read emaiks,RSS and googling combined with navigation: I seldom use my PC nowadays.
Ohh, and of course use it for SMS, VoIP and ordinary telephone.
/ Owen, Denmark
But I would be very happy with the following:
an Atom based machine, with
a USB host port, and an
SD card slot,
GPS,
Wifi,
Bluetooth etc,
5 hour battery life
All in the form factor of an A4 sized(maybe even A5) iphone like device. Ie Glass screen, solid build, slim design.
If i need a keyboard for the thing i can use a bt one. It would be perfect for reading books, maps, basic games, browsing. And fit into a pack or bag nicely
Oh, and finally, it would run Linux of course
(if the price was around the 500AUD mark, it would be fantastic, but twice that would also be tolerable :)
Software
easy access to more software and large repositories already activated.
All for £100-£150 ($200-$300)
Most Damage is done by people who are AWAKE
Ultimate netbook: Second hand IBM ThinkPad X40.
* Full size keyboard vs eeePC's absurdly unsable plastic thing.
* Very good screen quality vs eeePC's wristwatch reject.
* Over 4h battery time running Xubuntu (I timed this with average use, this is *not* with the notebook sitting idle).
* Not much bigger than the eeePC, and still very light at 1.2kg.
* Super durable vs eeePC's plastic trashy case.
* Half the price of an eeePC.
I wish people would cut out this rubbish Netbook phase. Netbooks, at the moment, are overpriced reject hardware.
Until a netbook is at least as powerful as a 3 year old laptop, has usable input/output peripherals and is durable enough to take anywhere (after all, that's the point of the size, right?) then netbooks will be in my mind a total waste of time and money.
I hate printers.
Start with the iPhone/iPod Touch's design, and scale it up to about 10x7, the same size as a typical large format paperback like an O'Reilly book. Aside from built in WiFi and BlueTooth, he device includes an Express Card slot and several USB ports, so that it can accommodate the broadband network cards offered by both the HSDPA and EvDO providers. The underlying specs will be closer to a MacBook or MacBook Air.
In iTouch mode, it will be able to do all the things the iTouch does, as well as connect to the 3G cell phone networks with the appropriate adapter. Email, web browsing, etc. are all there. This mode will operate in a low power mode.
One of the "applications" available in the iTouch interface will be an option to boot a full os, which can be some combination of Mac OS X and Windows via bootcamp. Now it becomes a full laptop. A keyboard and mouse can be connected via USB or BlueTooth. An external monitor can be connected via a mini-DVI adapter.
In my view, this would work very well for digital nomads and road warriors. The small device would fit easily into almost any bag, and wouldn't require a true laptop bag. It could be used on a plane or a park bench. It could be whipped out at a moments notice and immediately be useful. At the same time, it is easy to throw a keyboard and mouse into a bag with clothing for a business trip, and have a nice environment to work on documents and presentations at the hotel. When visiting a client, it could be plugged into a projector and run the presentation just as well as a typical laptop.
The problem with this scheme is that the price point wouldn't be anywhere close to the netbooks. This would be a $1,500 machine that would compete with ultra-portables, potentially remaking that segment. I can imagine that the technology could quickly trickle down, however.
I have an Asus EeePC 901.
It *is* the ultimate netbook.
It has a 1.8Ghz Atom processor, faster than my desktop's AthlonXP 1800+. It has no problem crunching numbers or playing highly compressed high-quality video.
The 1GB of standard RAM is fine. I'd rather 2GB in dual-channel, especially since ram only costs 12$/GB or so, but I also have no troubles running Windows 200 Server, Firefox with 50+ open tabs, thunderbird, Apache2 with 10 concurrent users, Trillian, Winamp, Filezilla, and a dozen other services on a local server with an AthlonXP 1800+ with 640MB RAM, so 1GB is fine.
It's 12GB of space, spanned over two internal solid state drives, plus a 16GB SD-card means I have all the space I want (and with the three USB2.0 ports, unlimited room for expansion) and can also simply leave it on all day while moving from room to room and place to place - just stuff it in my briefcase and go - as there are no moving parts (pick it up and shake it while it's running - no damage, no headcrashes).
Speaking of leaving it on all day, it averages 8h:30mins of actual use per charge. Longer when in self-initiated standby half of the day.
The screen is nice, clear, and not a glare screen. It has a slightly imperfect resolution of 1024x600, but that has not yet caused a problem in any application. The graphics card is fast enough to handle UnrealTournament comfortably, giving ~30fps @ 800x600, 32-bit color, all settings "High", dynamic lighting, etc. Since I've only installed a few LAN-games like GTA2, Starcraft, ete it works perfectly for everything I've thrown at it.
The wireless network card is not only "N"-compatible, but AiroPeek drivers exist for it, and it can put into passive mode and can be used for wardriving/wireless network analysis.
The webcam is fairly good quality, sharp, and clear.
With a 20$/month contract, I have a USB2.0 stick that provides wireless internet (3G/UMTS) flatrate between 2,000 to 7,000 kbps.
The only thing that could be better would be to use an NVIDIA Quadro 280 graphic chip instead of the silly Intel chip (compatibility and quality reasons) and to use a dual-core Atom processor (that will soon be available), and both I would consider a luxury.
Also the thing is so cheap I got it for free with a dirt cheap (15$/month) mobile phone contract.
Heh, I was just going to write this, but you beat me to it. Writing this on my X40 here. I have 7 hours of batterytime if I stretch it (no wifi, just coding and playing simple games).
c++;
Something I am longing for is a cheap 9-10 inch tablet PC. Is it so hard to make a tactile screen and a hinge that will allow the screen to hide the keyboard? How about no keyboard at all? B/W screen is ok and e-paper would extend the battery life.
My ideal notebook would not be Intel architecture.
Let's face it, designing a notebook around an Intel processor is like designing a bicycle around a V8 truck engine. Even recent attempts to make them low-power are laughable; the Intel Atom may draw an unheard-of 4 watts, but the new generation of ARM chips have about the same processing capabilities and draw *0.3* watts (plus you get a DSP and a PowerVR 3D accelerator for free).
The only possible reason for wanting an IA32 processor is if you're going to run Windows; which is fine, if you want to do that, but I don't. So why should I, and all the people like me, be restricted to having to using hardware that's crippled by the need by a ludicrously power-hungry processor and all the heat-dissipation hardware necessary to make it go? I have an Asus eee 701; it has a *fan* in it. That's simply absurd in a machine that size.
Lose the Intel processor, and it'll be cheaper, lighter and you're probably quadruple the battery life...
The majority of the comments are focusing on the "book" part; and mostly ignoring the "net" part. Current wifi, proprietary cellular, or true-high speed wired network are not pervasive or interoperable enough to provide effectively for the "net" part.
The "netbook" is just smoke so far. No real fire.
Every mans' island needs an ocean; choose your ocean carefully.
I hope they enter this field
You mean like the Apple eMate from 1997?
Ok, its hardly a "netbook" - but ubiquitous WiFi and mobile internet weren't really on the menu in 1997. Actually, the failure of this, and also the Psion Series 7 might suggest that mobile web browsing was the missing ingredient needed to get the "small, cheap laptop" market off the ground.
As for the MacBook Air, I think Apple were a bit unlucky with the timing: it was clearly intended to compete with other "premium" ultra-compact laptops from Sony et. al. - instead, everybody seemed to put it head-to-head with the (brilliant, but more Fischer Price than Jonathan Ive) EEE PC 701.
In a survey of 100 programmers, 111111 thought that duck-typing was a good idea.
If components are interchangeable, they can be mass produced, and the price of them would fall.
If you can buy cheap, interchangeable components, and build your own, fat profit margins for laptops for Dell, Lenovo, Apple, etc. would disappear.
Buy building their own, non-modular laptops, they can sell products that differentiate their features from other companies: lighted keyboards, extremely thin, whatever.
Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
An Apple Netbook wouldn't be affordable and it would include the usual Apple restrictions and digital rights violations. No, thanks.
That would depend whether His Steveness envisioned it as a cut-down MacBook (i.e. a general purpose computer) or a souped-up iPod/iPhone (i.e. an appliance). The vast majority of those "restrictions and digital rights violations" bones of contention arise from the latter.
The only such issue I can think of with Macs is the restriction of OSX to Apple hardware - which nobody seemed worried about until the Intel switch and, IMHO, removing that would simply kill OS X.
In a survey of 100 programmers, 111111 thought that duck-typing was a good idea.
Thats a really interesting point. The iPhone has most of the features that people want in a netbook: Wifi, 3G, long battery life, lots of different apps, some simple games, etc.
I think it would be interesting to see the iPhone made into a netbook. Get some USB connectivity so you can have: A real keyboard, a hard drive, a mouse, and what ever else the user wants. Give the user access to the file system, and an office suit. The iPhone already supports video out, so hookup a small screen instead of a TV. Then use the extra space for a huge battery. Package it all into something the size of the EEE pc. I know its not as easy as this but you get the idea.
Bingo. On top of what the parent said, it should also be small (less than 12.1" screen) and lightweight with a battery life of at least 3 hours.
Bingo. On top of what the parent said, it should be small (less than 7.2" screen) and lightweight with a battery life of at least three hours...
Seriously, the best laptop I've ever had was a Toshiba Libretto 100CT. It had a screen resolution of (if I remember correctly) 1024x600, a perfectly usable (though small) keyboard, and mine ran Debian. It did everything I wanted of it, well - it even ran a full Oracle 8 database - and it fit easily into a coat pocket.
If I was designing a netbook now I'd start with the Libretto form factor, use solid state memory for backing store (definitely no hard disk) and finish it with about 2mm of rubber all round, for splash proofing and increased shock protection. It would run Ubuntu (possibly the netbook special build) and weigh not more than the Libretto - which is to say 910 grammes.
If Toshiba could build that machine in 1996, it shouldn't be difficult to do the same now, with solid state storage and better battey life. A Netbook - or a Libretto - is not meant to be your main computer. It's meant to be something you have with you virtually all the time. It needs to be robust because it's going to take knocks. It needs to be small, otherwise it's awkward to carry. It needs to be light for the same reason. If it doesn't have the graphics or the horsepower to run Crysis, well, frankly, I can live without.
I'm old enough to remember when discussions on Slashdot were well informed.
Couldn't disagree more. A full size notebook is not good enough for people who want a netbook. If you've ever flown coach, the reasons are obvious. With a typical laptop, if you place it on your tray table and open the screen to a comfortable viewing angle, the edge of the screen neatly tucks in where the tray table was with very little extra space. This becomes a problem only when the person in front of you leans back and your screen gets compressed between the back of the seat and the tray table. In a panic, you have to yank the computer out of there or risk the screen breaking.
I desperately want a laptop that is about 1.5 inches shorter off the table when fully open so that it isn't at risk when using it on a tray table. A netbook would be perfect for that. Here's what I want in a netbook:
There's my list as a frequent traveler. In other words, a size-reduced (screen-border-reduced) MacBook with ExpressCard, no optical drive, and an Atom CPU instead of a Core 2 Duo CPU.
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
Is a tablet with SSD, touchscreen and a pretty design... Pretty much like the internet tablet techcrunch wanted to design...
But I think the keyword for a successful netbook is to have a pretty design, drop x86, and tightly integration software!
Everybody seems to be forgetting the most important thing software... Make a netbook that will be remotely administered by manufacturer... Screw customers freedom, unless they ask for it, and let the manufacture own the root account... Don't give users a root account!
A pretty design and a system supported, as in remotely administered by manufacture, promoted through capabilities not system specs, is the key to success...
Tell the user that the browser will open in 0.5 sec and the wordprocessor in 0.8 sec... And that the system will boot in 10 sec... And that they don't have to worry about updating software and installing applications, because they can't do that it will be remotely administered by the manufacturer...
Okay, I'm not sure about the "remotely administered" which means not root access for user... But for the average Joe it might be good... One might allow root access but tell users that it breaks software support warranty.
Nevertheless, the key to sucess which I think everybody is forgetting is that lowering system specs requires serious software/hardware integration in order to work good...
Maybe I'm alone here but I see a "netbook" as being ultimate productivity wherever and whenever with a little ability for fun(most people don't want to work during the whole plane or train trip). I was thinking something like:
atom dual core for netbooks
2 gb ram
30-40 gb of some type of solid storage
decent onboard audio and video (playback simple movies and music)
9" screen that is a rotatable touchscreen (I really need this for chinese character writing and I'm sure someone else could us it for on the go designs)
wireless n, bluetooth, 3g, gps
and a 6 cell 5hr battery
This should be doable under the 600-650 usd mark
but maybe I'm crazy
I'd like to make an argument that the ideal combination for most of the young net-using population would be a combination of a docking laptop and a netbook.
Consider it on a "piece of equipment" basis. Having a desktop, a power notebook, a light notebook, and a (light) netbook respectively each gives you specific capabilities and have costs attached to them. Owning one of each would be ideal, but they cost.
I'd firstly discount the power notebook as a viable mass-market proposition. For the purpose of at-home use, power can be had at twice the amount for half the price if getting a desktop instead. For the purpose of distance use, portability and battery life is both horrible. Thus, for the "cost saving" of two in one, you really get a very poor version of both. The only situation this looks viable is someone who moves around a lot and with no fixed address but still wants power, i.e. working from hotel rooms and somesuch. This is not a large portion of the population.
Light notebooks and netbooks simply can't give the power of a desktop, so for a number of very popular and often desired purposes (screen resolution, processor speed, graphics card), desktops have capabilities that can't be duplicated. If you want portability as well, a light netbook is an additional option. Or... is it possible to top that?
I would think it can be topped - if you combine a desktop docking station (containing additional storage space and a high-powered graphics card) with a laptop with a solid-state disk, large screen and a powerful processor with excellent power management ability. That should let you get battery power very high. The total cost of this would be in the range of an expensive desktop. For the best multimedia watching, you could connect it to a TV. You could also get a netbook in addition, although this isn't strictly neccessary.
Thus the initial purchase, although somewhat expensive, would give you power and portability in one, making for some a netbook superfluous, until you can afford one.
the USB dongles look ugly sticking out of the side.
I always wonder at this when people bring it up. When I got my 3G modem from Verizon, I specifically got the USB720 USB dongle for the specific reason that it is what it is. An easy way to get any computer on the internet that has nothing more than a USB port to stick it in. I can't tell you how many times I've run different desktops and laptops with it while troubleshooting to get them on the net for drivers, software, etc. Most modern Linux distro's have drivers for it built right in. I believe OSX does too. Of course, Windows doesn't but, I just boot a live CD to work with those. In fact, my Intrepid CD is zero config. You just load it up on the Live CD, plug in the modem and click connect. You don't have to tell it /dev/usbtty0 or whatever it is, you don't have to type in #777 or anything, it just works. I have no interest in a built in 3G modem that can only be used on the particular hardware it came on. Just added expense in my (net)book.
The soylentnews experiment has been a dismal failure.
Apple netbook would own. I'd like to see something that was almost the resurrection of the Newton eMate, but with a more modern Mac OS X derivative OS, 802.11n, and an option for Mobile Phone Company-provided bandwidth. However...and this is a big HOWEVER...this Apple netbook would be more expensive than any of the other netbooks. It just comes with the territory of machines with better "fit and finish" than the average computer.
I would say such a machine would be sort of like the offspring of an iPhone and a MacBook. Considerably less powerful than the MacBook, but with more versatility -- and no tie-ins to a single mobile phone company -- than an iPhone.
Knowledge is power. Knowledge shared is power multiplied.