Items tagged with Smartbook
We've discussed ARM's plans to enter both the netbook and server markets, but a new interview with Tudor Brown, the company's CEO, suggests the CPU designer's plans are more ambitious than some have realized. Speaking to DigiTimes, Brown claims that the company will snatch a huge chunk of the notebook market by 2015, while simultaneously gripping 85 percent of the future tablet industry. Brown's betting on Windows 8 will open the netbook/notebook market to ARM processors in ways the company hasn't previously been able to achieve. There's no denying that the CPU designer's products have matured enormously in recent years--dual-core Cortex-A9 CPUs have established themselves as the workhorse of...
Read more...
You could argue that smartbooks never really had much of a chance once netbooks began to sell for below $299, but Qualcomm and a number of partners definitely put a lot of effort into the category. Initially launched in early 2009, these mid-sized notebook/handheld hybrids were meant to be slotted between the average smartphone and notebook, giving you a third device that would last all day and provide a better browsing experience than what was available on a phone. But two major hiccups happened over the course of the past year to really derail the popularity of smartbooks. One is the proliferation of netbooks. Netbooks ended up being "portable enough" for most people, and Android / iOS phones...
Read more...
It's a Toshiba kind of day, isn't it? In celebration of the company's 25th anniversary in the notebook business, the company is using the AC100 as their grand finale. And what a finale it is. This is the first smartbook we've seen come to light in quite a few months, and the promises held here are just astounding. Described as a "smart companion" machine, the AC100 is one of the smallest, most powerful laptops to date. It uses a clamshell form factor and has an "always-on" capability that makes it perfect for stop-and-go Web browsing and e-mailing. The unit can reportedly remain in standby mode for up to a full week and the 10.1" display is no smaller than the average netbook. The company will...
Read more...
Yesterday Lenovo introduced a bunch of new ThinkPad machines, with the new Edge, X100e and a few other machines headlining the show. Today, the company is making another push as CES gets ready to open its doors to the masses, with its IDEA-branded products getting a significant upgrade. Moreover, an all new product from Lenovo has been announced: its first smartbook ever. Let's get started with the IDEA lineup. The IdeaCentre A300 is the industry's thinnest all-in-one PC, measuring just 18.5mm thick and boasting an expansive 21.5" LED-backlit LCD panel. It runs Windows 7 and features an array of Core 2 Duo CPUs, an Intel X4500MHD integrated graphics set, up to 4GB of DDR3 RAM, stereo speakers,...
Read more...
We won't be the ones to say we told you so, but hey, we kind of told you so! The Smartbook revolution looks to be upon us, with Freescale serving up its version of the product just as CES gets unofficially underway. At first glance, you may confused this device with something akin to an Apple tablet, but when you consider that most every tablet looks generally the same (rectangular, thin, a large panel, few buttons and maybe a camera at the top), you'll probably realize that one is just about as good as the other. This device won't actually be wholly produced by Freescale. Instead, this is more of a rendition/mockup of what Freescale hopes to see the smartbook tablet sector look like, and for...
Read more...
Smartbooks aren't entirely new; we've heard of them before, and we've seen prototypes before. Basically, they're the machine that is supposed to be cheaper than a netbook, yet more capable than a smartphone. They way we see it, they only have a few short years to thrive, as the converged smartphone is becoming all the more powerful by the minute. These so-called smartbooks won't typically run on a conventional OS (like Windows 7), but instead on various kinds of Linux builds that are designed for easy access to the most commonly used applications: Firefox, Office tools, etc. A new report from the Wall Street Journal suggests that CES 2010 will be the smartbook's coming out party, where a bunch...
Read more...
If you haven't generated a UMPC/MID/Tablet PC of your own by now, you've probably missed the boat. In an effort to catch the last vessel out, Sharp has this week introduced a new portable PC that isn't likely to sell well based on figures from prior attempts, but it's certainly a compelling device. The so-called mini mobile PC is designed to boot up quickly, support touch inputs and recognize key presses via a QWERTY keyboard. One could say that this unit slides into the confusing new "smartbook" category, which is designed to please those who feel that a smartphone is too small and a netbook too large. This "NetWalker" device ships with a 5" high-resolution touch panel (1024x600), 800MHz Freescale...
Read more...
NVIDIA has built its brand and reputation as a GPU designer since the company was founded in 1993, but recent comments by the company have implied that it believes platforms like Tegra and ION will be key revenue generators in the future. We've previously discussed NVIDIA's ongoing emphasis on the GPU as a massively parallel processor capable of handling workloads and programs far outside the realm of video games, but to date, reviewers and analysts alike have treated Tegra as more of a side project than a future core competency. The two core components of NVIDIA's mobile strategy: ION and Tegra Given how difficult the last twelve months have been for NVIDIA, it's easy to wonder...
Read more...
Quick question—what's smaller than a netbook, bigger than a smartphone, and doesn't conform to Intel's definition of a MID (Mobile Internet Device?) If you guessed "smartbooks," give yourself a pat on the back for being prescient. If you've never heard of a smartbook before, don't feel bad; the term refers to a series of ARM-based sub-netbooks companies like Acer, Foxconn, and Pegatron all intend to back. The name is a portmaneau between "smart phone" and "netbook;" the devices themselves are meant to echo the various feature sets common on today's cell phones. Smartbooks were unveiled for the first time at Computex last June, but we'll reportedly see an array of these devices on the market by...
Read more...
Intel has been floundering a bit around in the pocket mobile and handset space for some time now. After grabbing a solid foothold in the netbook market (seriously, what netbook doesn't have an Atom under the hood these days?), the company is now looking to take the mobile space ever more seriously. In order to do so, the Intel has formally announced a long term partnership with one of the world leaders in mobile phone and communications technology: Nokia. Anand Chandrasekher, Intel Senior VP and GM, Ultra Mobility GroupDuring a press call today, executives from both companies reiterated on numerous occasions that the announcement was simply a technological partnership. In other words, those hoping...
Read more...
Things are about to get a lot more cluttered in the netbook/smartphone/MID/UMPC space. As if that area wasn't jam-packed enough, right? This past week, both Qualcomm and Freescale announced news that they would be supporting a new breed of devices entitled "smartbooks," which would be positioned as smartphone complements and priced between the average handset and a netbook. So, why should you consider one of these "smartbooks" over a netbook?For starters, we're told that these units -- which will be shaped a lot like Sony's VAIO P and will be thinner and lighter than the typical netbook -- will have the battery life we always hoped a netbook would have. On average, 8 to 10 hours. Of course, we...
Read more...
