macnews.net.tc
2005-10-11
My one wish...
Tomorrow's the day of the iPod video. If it doesn't happen, it's going to be at least the day when the iPod video didn't appear. ;) - But I want to talk about something else entirely. I've been looking at this review of the Sharp C3100, and I've been thinking about the Palm LifeDrive etc. You know: PDAs with 4 GB of storage. They're achieving this through the mini harddisks also found in the iPod mini. But the nano shows that 4 GB are possible with NAND flash memory, and that this saves a lot of space.
If you look at the review linked above, you'll see a nice little PDA. Sure: Apple won't ever go back there, but I'm thinking of something else entirely. Just a possibility. Let's think about the "iBook mini". Actually, it'd replace the venerable eMate 300 as a rugged little notebook for pupils. (And writers, of course.)
Think 8 to 10 inch widescreen display. Something like 1024*600 would be good. Think a much better keyboard than the C3100's. Think a PowerBook's keyboard, just a little smaller, so people wouldn't even notice much. The TrackPad wouldn't be needed, since it'd have a touchscreen. Or, if you prefer that, it wouldn't have a touchscreen, but a small trackpad instead. I don't care much. ;) Both would work.
Then: 8 GB of NAND storage. The OS would take about 1 GB, the apps would probably take another half GB, the rest's for your documents, for music, for videos. If you intend to use it for documents, really, even 4 GB could be enough (in order to make it cheaper).
Apple could make a really, really good ultraportable notebook slash big-PDA-with-keyboard. The eMate, back then, was pitched at the educational market mainly. Some were sold in stores later, but that only happened when Steve already nixed the Newton altogether, so the window for buying an eMate was rather small. I'd say the free market didn't even have a chance to see whether the device would have been a hit. - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 10:59 [article link]
If you look at the review linked above, you'll see a nice little PDA. Sure: Apple won't ever go back there, but I'm thinking of something else entirely. Just a possibility. Let's think about the "iBook mini". Actually, it'd replace the venerable eMate 300 as a rugged little notebook for pupils. (And writers, of course.)
Think 8 to 10 inch widescreen display. Something like 1024*600 would be good. Think a much better keyboard than the C3100's. Think a PowerBook's keyboard, just a little smaller, so people wouldn't even notice much. The TrackPad wouldn't be needed, since it'd have a touchscreen. Or, if you prefer that, it wouldn't have a touchscreen, but a small trackpad instead. I don't care much. ;) Both would work.
Then: 8 GB of NAND storage. The OS would take about 1 GB, the apps would probably take another half GB, the rest's for your documents, for music, for videos. If you intend to use it for documents, really, even 4 GB could be enough (in order to make it cheaper).
Apple could make a really, really good ultraportable notebook slash big-PDA-with-keyboard. The eMate, back then, was pitched at the educational market mainly. Some were sold in stores later, but that only happened when Steve already nixed the Newton altogether, so the window for buying an eMate was rather small. I'd say the free market didn't even have a chance to see whether the device would have been a hit. - posted by Patrick Armbruster @ 10:59 [article link]
