Wearable PCs

z0mbie writes sent us a link to an interesting article regarding Wearable Computers. Full powered machines the size of a Pilot with wireless networking, voice recognition, and an eyepiece. Thats the dream. Currently that dream is still wet though. Maybe Someday.

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Notes

[apilosov]

Few items of note:

1. ViA had some (battery?) problems with their units and weren't shipping the old version since December. New version had just been shipped to their beta customers. Unfortunately, to get on beta list, you have to promise to use it daily and talk to them daily regarding your experience. I passed up :)

2. Prices aren't that much more expensive than a PC, at least for someone with few grand of spare cash. ViA 2 is 3200$, including batteries, chargers and liquidimage's M1 HMD.

3. HMD are getting better. The coolest thing I saw was www.microopticalcorp.com selling their HMD for 5000$. While it can be too much for a college geek, its not that much for a company or a geek with a good job. The HMD is almost undetectable, it just looks like a pair of eyeglasses (albeit with a fairly thick frame). I'm getting one when I can get my hands on production VIA 2.

4. It does run linux already. It has a cyrix mediaGX processor, which is supported by latest Xfree. I had a conversation with Steve Case (VP of Engineering at ViA) in which he stated that its already running in the lab, and it is possible to get a beta unit with Linux preloaded. Since you can buy a "bare" ViA, you don't pay MS tax on it...

-alex