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Dell is Reportedly Working on a Dual-Screen Windows ARM Device (theverge.com)
Dell is working on a foldable dual-screen device, according to a report. According to news blog WinFuture, Dell's supposedly forthcoming device would run Windows 10 and an unreleased Qualcomm Snapdragon 850 ARM processor. From a report: Dell's device is reportedly codenamed "Januss," and has been under development since last summer, but it's not clear whether the device will ever come to market. Dell was working on mobile Windows devices before, and those devices were canceled. Microsoft also canceled its own Surface Mini device, just weeks before it was due to be revealed. The Verge understands that the documents WinFuture has obtained are old, and that Dell could have altered its product plans by now.
That's nothing! I dropped my iPhone and now it has roughly 17 screens*!
* shapes vary from one screen to another.
#DeleteFacebook
The device full name is Hugh Januss.
Must be.
This sounds a bit like the old Microsoft Courier. I really wanted one of those at the time but it never came to life
You knew the job was dangerous when you took it. -- Super Chicken
I can't think of any commercially successful attempt to put Windows on something that isn't an x86 PC. And I don't see why that thing would be any different.
You get Windows for the huge software library accumulated over decades and because you get the best support for just about anything you can plug into your computer, graphic cards in particular.
ARM devices like that lack the binary compatibility with everything that's written for x86 and lack the extensiblility of PCs that make good drivers so crucial. So why bother with Windows? There is that killer app called MS-Office but you need a proper keyboard to be productive, and even that didn't save the original ARM Surface.
Intel is screwed. ARM is the processor of the future. Intel is the processor of the past. Intel will still make billions over the coming years selling laptop and desktop class processors but the future is mobile processors utilizing ARM.
Because instead of costing the same or less than an x86 PC, it will be something like $1200.
Oh sure, you can buy more expensive laptops than that, but you can also head down to Walmart or Best Buy and pick one up for about $350.
If they actually wanted to sell snapdragon Windows PCs, then they would price them at about $500.
Finally!
From a two faced manufacturer?
But "I wish I could run the same software on my tiny smartphone as I run on my giant over powered multi-screen workstation" isn't something you hear that often.
Yes, Windows has a giant collection of legacy applications.
But not much of them could actually be useful in a "smartphone with a soft-keyboard clamshell" form factor.
In other word, very few users in of portable device are actually interested in running MS Windows software on their devices.
(I think the above mentioned support for Office might be the only case getting any significant amount of vague user interest)
Android apps are what seems to be the most enviable thing to run in that form factor.
Seems that if you can't run apps from any of the too main ecosystem of the current duopoly (Android or iOS apps), your device will flop.
Main reason why Windows 10 Mobile never of on anything small than "transformable tablet" (i.e.: a glorified laptop with a weird keyboard) and even there, they're having they lunch eaten by ChromeOS.
Yup, Dell has probably noticed the popularity of crowd funding campaing like Gemini's revival of the Psion form factor.
But Dell hasn't been paying attention to the fine details (Psion was popular back in its era because of an OS and software suite geared to the form factor. Gemini is currently targetting also OSes that are either geared to the form factor (Android currently supported, Sailfish OS collaboration with Jolla upcoming) or are customizable enough for us nerds to adapt it to the formfactor (GNU/Linux distributions are supported).
I predict this device won't be as popular as Dell expects them, even with gimmicks like the clamshell keyboard being software on a a secondary screen. (And thus doubling as a digitizer tablet)
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
and somebody will port Linux to it. Win!
That is going to be highly hampered by the fact that it's a Windows machine (thus relying on a SecureBoot UEFI bootloader).
Unlike on the x86_64 world, where UEFI is *required* to allow end users to boot a 3rd party payload (either by disabling the SecoreBoot, or by adding their own signing key), there's no similar mandatory bootloader unlocking in ARM land.
There's a risk that these devices come with a UEFI bootloader that will only exclusively boot kernels that have been signed by a secret key that only Microsoft has access to.
(And no way to persuade Microsoft so sign some boot shim like on some GNU/Linux x86_64 distros - with the excuse that "it's an appliance, not a computer").
Of course Dell could preclude the flop by offering it with Linux (I'd really like such a device) or Android, or at least supporting Linux development.
That would really save the day if Dell gets involved to make sure that 3rd party firmware are going to be bootable.
Then you're bound to see some LineageOS port of Androdi, right after the device gets released.
And various full blown GNU/Linux following shortly after that, by leveraging libhybris and co (AFAIK Qualcomm only releases Android/Linux drivers for their SoCs, no GNU/Linux ones).
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
The days of "Intel inside" are numbered. The cloud, and mobile have rendered the underlying chip brand a non issue. What remains an issue is battery life and heat/size.
How about an ARM pizza box with PCIe slots, plenty of ECC DIMM slots, and a standard ATX power supply? No? Then I am not interested.