Random mobile tech thoughts while running
I just got back from a seven mile run to break up the day and had some random thoughts come to mind. Don’t worry, I’ve already showered, so the post is sanitary.
- The Asus Eee PC looks like a nice little lappy and many folks seem excited about it. Is it really that different from the Palm "please don’t remember my name" Foleo? Are they miles apart or actually relatively similar in terms of use cases?
- Some versions of Vista include all of the Tablet PC bits, so there was much talk last year of Vista helping the Tablet PC market. Is it me or have we seen no more or no less new Tablet PCs introduced than in the last few years prior to Vista?
- Speaking of Tablet PCs, why does inking get such a bad rap? All of the folks in the keyboard camp: have you truly given inking a several week trial or did you give up in under a week? (Note: if you tried and it doesn’t work for you, I respect your choice.)
- Related: as nice as it is to have an indicator of textual input speed percentages across multiple input types, i.e.: keyboards of various sizes, speech, ink, etc… when did it become vogue to benchmark humans?
- Did UMPCs fail the concept of a "companion device" or did we fail to grasp the concept when we (myself included) attempted to use them as full time mobile devices?
- Will the fact that Apple is releasing an SDK for third party iPhone apps add further momentum for consumers to buy the device or did Steve have you at "Hello"?
- Related: what are the odds that Apple finds a way to sell the iPhone apps solely through iTunes so they can make a cut off every title?
- Why is it in my Commonwealth that we buy our liquor in a State Store and still try to state our case for Liquor Stores? OK, that’s not mobile tech related, but those archaic laws have been in place since Prohibition and I want to know why.
While I sit back, drink a protein shake and read RSS feeds, talk amongst yourselves in the comments.
Interesting thoughts, James. I don’ think the Eee PC really is that different, aside from battery life and being Intel-based… I was under the impression it used a version of Linux that had an X-windows server (basically can run normal Linux GUI programs, like Firefox and so on) but I don’t know why. I hope it does.
Sorry, I’m in the keyboard camp… I really have tried to ink, on Pocket PC and XP and briefly Vista. My handwriting is awful, though; I don’t blame the poor software.
I think UMPCs would work better as companion devices if syncing were easier. It’s possible, but it’s hardly easy or built in. Then again… I think we’d miss the point anyway.
Wow how do you manage to remember all that when running?
I’ll chime in though.
* The Asus Eee PC: From the specs, seems more of a UMPC with less parts to lower costs and a form factor people are used to. I put this device in the OLPC-clone/cheapass subnotebook category.
* Tablet PC’s bad rep: Haven’t they always had a bad rep? Isn’t that why the most popular Tablet PC’s are convertibles?
* Benchmarking typing: I think it’s great. I think Jenn of pocketables made it cool.
* UMPC’s as a companion device: I think software was a big problem. Which apps were built for UMPC’s? Origami Experience and iGuidance? Onenote works well but not necessarily built for the small screen and touch interface..
Kevin,
I think the EEpc and the Foleo are/were to different animals. I don’t believe the EEPC is supposed to be a companion device. But it sure has the potential to be a great companion device. The Foleo was to be an interface to a smartphone. If the foleo had been priced at $150.00 I would have leaped on it.
I use a pure slate everyday. I ink with it all day long. I have really bad hand writing so I seldom convert to text. My M1400 works great as a note taker, movie player, ereader, rss reader etc. My only problem is battery life. 2.3 hours with wireless connectivity turned off. About 1.7 hours with wireless turned on. Then again, I am using the original battery which is about 4 years old. Tablets PC’s work great for me.
I’m just starting to play with a UMPC. so far, so good. I think I’ll be using it for multimedia and PowerPoint presentations. Maybe GPS Navigation when I get around to buying a bluetooth gps unit.
I still consider my Q1 and my M1400 companion devices. My 2.8 GHZ Dual Core HP does the heavy duty, processor intensive computing needs. (Video and Photo Editing)
I just need a reliable way to sync files between all of my devices. My Treo has spoiled me. Foldershare is not working so well for me.
TateJ: Give MS Office Groove a try! I think Groov is the most underappreciated application which is perfectly suited for keeping multiple devices in sync.
>Will the fact that Apple is releasing an SDK for third party iPhone apps add further momentum for consumers to buy the device or did Steve have you at “Hello”?
Yes and yes; though with an sdk for iTouch …
>Related: what are the odds that Apple finds a way to sell the iPhone apps solely through iTunes so they can make a cut off every title?
1:1
Do you complain about Nokia selling MP3s and getting a cut? Or their games for the new NGage service? But somehow Apple selling apps via iTunes is a Bad Thing? Pleeze. Turn in your iPhone! (To me! Steve said so!)
Inking is worse than typing, unless you are on the go or talking with someone and then it is better not to use a keyboard.
UMPCs are a bit too small. The ideal would be the size of a Motion LS800, but thinner, and a device that is not dockable is suitable only for inking.
I also fall in the bad handwriting camp. Inking would have been useful in my calculus classes, but for every other class using Word and it’s outline formatting was infinitely more convenient than inking would have been. My job now involves lots of odd part and order numbers so it’s doubtful the OCR would do me much good now, either.
To me inking and handwriting recognition in general has always been an interesting novelty, but nothing I could see as actually better than typing for anything outside of no-desk-needed or something-in-other-hand convenience.
Oh Kevin. Its so tempting to answer! I must resist…ahhh. No….here goes.
[Flame suit on]
I still stand by my prediction that inking will become less important to pc manufacturers as time goes on and the T9 kids come through, the most natural input mechanism will be qwerty or T9. Its still more difficult to balance the device in one hand, pull out the pen, ink, check, correct, accept and stow the pen than many other methods. In addition to that, for me, inking hurts my wrist. Its not natural for my muscles any more.
The niches will remain of course so tablets will always be around but I don’t think they will become more widespread.
Ref keyboard typing tests. Its best to keep these results relative and not based on any actual CPM speeds. That gives a more general result that other people can relate to. Maybe you can give us some inking test results? The quick brown fox… 5 times. Both on keyboard and ink and then work out percentage speed. It will be interesting to see what sort of speeds one can expect after a few years inking.
Cheers.
Steve.
P.S. Any way to subscribe to a comment thread? I keep forgetting to check back for responses.
Steve, no flame suit needed here. Just promoting discussion so we can share thoughts that might be beneficial to all.
Kevin,
Specifically about UMPC’s as companion devices: I think it’s a good idea, but with the current available software it’s doomed to fall. I tried with my “work” notebook and a Samsung Q1, but there were so much pain related with sync’g that I gave up to try. It’s not only about sync’g files. There are the bookmarks (I used foxmarks and myboomarks), events and contacts (Plaxo), email messages (?), the applications installed… And, additionally I’m using TrueCrypt on most of the important files. With limited memory and processing power, doesn’t sound like a good idea to install a lot of widgets, like FolderShare, Copernic Desktop Search etc., so I had to sync files with a less-intrusive tool (SyncBackSE). And, from time to time, something was missing
. Now, my “new approach” to a companion device is going to be “use what I’ve made available trough Web”, that includes online bookmarks, plaxo, mp3tunes etc. No sync´g at all. Still not sure it will work well 
Regards,
clayton
“Related: what are the odds that Apple finds a way to sell the iPhone apps solely through iTunes so they can make a cut off every title?”
100%. All of this nonsense about protecting peoples privacy and preventing viruses, etc. is a smokescreen. His Jobsness wants a cut. Web apps don’t make Apple money, iTunes downloads will.
And until manufacturers can get to instant on with UMPC’s, they will always be considered mini laptops and not true companion mobile devices. I do fully believe in the market, and I’d be more than willing to buy an OQO or the Fujitsu U810, but I can’t justify buying a desktop, laptop, and another mobile device all in one year (since I already bought a desktop and laptop this year). I think we also need to see high speed cellular data plans decrease in price. Some may say the iPhone, but with only EDGE at this point, not going to happen.
I don’t think the Eee[k] is a workable alternative to a Foleo because it doesn’t have a full-sized keyboard. I’ve seen James talk about “almost” touch-typing on the Fujitsu but to my mind there’s no such thing as almost touch-typing: either the keys are where your fingers expect them to be or they’re not. If they’re not, it’s no help to say that they’re only a few millimeters out.
I haven’t tried inking but (as you might have guessed) I’m very happy using a keyboard, so long as it’s a good quality keyboard.
What Clayton said, although I remain sceptical about relying on the internet. I don’t travel much anymore but when I went away on holiday for two weeks our hotel didn’t have any internet connectivity at all! Good job my OQO had everything on it I needed.
As to the inking thing. I love writing and find it far more thought provoking. However, with my OQO I find now that I very rarely use the stylus. It is just so much more convenient to slide the keyboard down and use that. And in reality thumb typing is just as fast as writing.
Slightly OT. I installed Vista on my new desktop and I have all the Tablet functionality available (Journal, Sticky Notes, Tablet Input Panel). Is that usual? It doesn’t haven’t a touch screen or any way to ink.
The Eee is a full PC, not a companion running some tiny embedded OS like the Foleo was. It’s running either full blown linux (Xandros), or windows XP.
My guess is Asus hasn’t been doing a good job of making that clear, since people are now assuming it’s some linux internet device instead of a fully functional laptop.
- The Eee PC: It’s a Wintel-capable unit. No porting, no workalikes, you can install an x86 OS and go to town on it. Even in the Linux world, you don’t see a lot of packages running on handhelds, just because no one wants to recompile it to ARM, or rebuild it to maintain compatability with some new device hooks/kernel modules/etc.
- Vista: I’ve never heard anyone with 2GB of RAM and up complain much about Vista. However, since a lot of us don’t *have* 2 gigs available, Vista-based Tablets just haven’t caught up to the hype.
- Inking tends to work, I’ll happily agree with you there, but I still type faster than I can ink. (I’ve also been typing since I was five, so let’s keep that in mind.)
- Text input speed matters when determining if you can tolerate the device that you’re eyeing. I expect at least 30wpm on a thumbboard, 20+ on SureType, 75+ on a full sized QWERTY, and somewhere around 40 (with one hand!) on the 8″ wide keyboards on things like the SH6 and the Eee PC. If I can’t reach those numbers, then your input methods can’t keep up with my workflow, and I’m just not interested.
- UMPC Hype: Both. There’s little reason that a UMPC can’t do everything, even if it only does one part of everything at a time. However, as a companion device, they suck due to synchronization. Groove, XP File Sync, etc., can’t get around the tiny hard drives, and often unusable doc layouts on the low-res screens available on most UMPCs. To be honest, 1024×600 is a bare minimum for me. 1280×768 is really where I’d be comfortable.
- iPhone SDK: I’m not going to ever ignore the *potential* of the iPhone as a mobile companion. Once they hit around 16GB of space, I think I’ll have to get one, especially if I can truly turn it into a proper pocket computer.
- iPhone Application Store: I wouldn’t bet against it. They probably want to sign the apps anyway, and should make that money back, but like the iTMS, they’ll probably have a free app every week or so.
- Liquor laws: Not enough constituents care about the blue laws, so no one changes them.
@Aaron: I haven’t had the opportunity to see an Eee in the flesh, so I could be wrong, but I have the impression that it’s rather less than “a full PC”. For that reason, I question whether it’s wise of Asus to take up so much of its limited memory by installing a full PC’s operating system.
@Art: Here are some pics from previews showing both XP and Xandros:
XP: http://chinese.engadget.com/gallery/eee-pc-hands-on/441985/
Xandros (bottom row of pics shows the regular Xandros KDE desktop. The first 2 rows show the “simple” tabed UI you can use also, for less computer savvy people):
http://www.hothardware.com/articles/Hands_on_with_the_ASUS_Eee/?page=2
The only thing that is low on this machine is disk space. But other than that, Xandros would run quite fine on it. I don’t know how great XP would run though.
But that’s the great thing about linux. It’ll run fine on much lesser specs, which is most likely why Asus chose it as the default OS.