I'm thinking the Dell Mini 10 will be a nice sweetspot for Netbooks. Small enough to be very portable, large enough not to feel too constrained and a 1,355x768 display that also isn't too short for web browsing.
As long as the price isn't silly I'm getting one.
What os will you run on it? A flavor of windows, linux or hack osx?
The G3 is old hardware not new low-end hardware though. Plus the G3 is a very old processor now. Cutting off 10 year old hardware is not really a sign that manufacturers will be able to keep people buying at the same rates.
My point is how long into the future will the current Atom processor be supported vs how long into the future the current Core 2 Duo processor be supported.
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But in the last 10 years, those laptops weren't good enough vs the higher priced machines. There is a threshold beyond which no matter how much better manufacturers make the high end, a significant majority will deem it too much and opt for the cheaper models. The Mac Pro is a good example - a Mac Pro may be a very powerful machine but a Core 2 Quad is good enough that people who don't want to pay £1400 can pay just £500 and get 90% of the performance and satisfy their performance needs adequately.
10 years ago the difference between the high end and low end wasn't any different that what it is now. Notebooks won't have the capabilities of the Mac Pro anytime soon. Notebooks are tempered by the need to be thin and light enough to be portable, while not generating too much heat and maintaining decent battery life. I cannot see them ever have the problem of being "too powerful" anytime soon.
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There is the possibility that developers can move more and more towards interpreted code similar to how the Palm Pre will use Javascript to improve development time but they need to protect intellectual property so I don't see a big shift. They may find ways to tax the hardware further but Windows 7 and Snow Leopard are evidence they are trying to do the opposite. Small footprint, fast code, fast hardware. I'm sure people can imagine all sorts of high end software that could require the highest end machines in a similar way to how consoles develop but consoles highlight this point very well.
I think there will be a growing number of services that work in the cloud. But this is not as necessary for a full computer as it is for a mobile phone.
Looking at their feature lists, Snow Leopard and Windows 7 will continue to use advanced functions in newer CPU's and GPU's, while attempting to downgrade gracefully for older hardware.
Software developers are in competition with each other to continue to build faster - more responsive applications. This pushes them to use advanced instruction sets and frameworks that Intel, Nvidia, Microsoft, Apple builds into their platforms.
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The PS3 is arguably the fastest console hardware and yet sells the least. Coming from the back of one of the best selling console in the world - the PS2 - this seems surprising. But contrary to what you have said, developers just can't push the software to a point where the hardware is worth it because the development time takes way too long. Because computers have to have every single behavior accounted for, this level of complexity has to be recreated by solid man hours and that's what will hold back computer growth.
This is an entirely different argument. The gaming platform that sells the best is the one with the best games. That doesn't have anything necessarily to do with hardware.
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I looked at the device and wondered if that could be the next iphone. Full 1080p output, playing Quake 3 at 720p, 10 hour battery life.
This type of performance in a device the size of the iPhone, I'll believe in when I see it.
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I could see a fragmentation happen in the Mac developer community though. A lot of devs may shift to targeting the lower power, high volume, low cost platforms and innovative desktop Mac software starts to diminish. We're already seeing this happen with Apple's Pro software and Adobe's software. The monolithic apps stagnate and it's the quirky new small apps like Aperture, Lightroom etc that get the attention.
I see no evidence of this type of fragmentation. Which large apps are stagnating? Aperture and Lightroom are gaining attention because they perform a function that no software previously accomplished as well as they do. Aperture and Lightroom don't directly compete with anything but themselves.
10 years ago the difference between the high end and low end wasn't any different that what it is now.
I would agree but it doesn't need to be. If the low end right now is faster than the high end back then, this means that people who got their work done just fine on high end machines back then will likely be able to do it now on low end machines. It doesn't apply to all cases but it does in a lot of cases. A netbook for example will do what a powerbook was needed to do a few years ago.
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Originally Posted by TenoBell
This is an entirely different argument. The gaming platform that sells the best is the one with the best games. That doesn't have anything necessarily to do with hardware.
Not if the hardware of one manufacturer is double the price of another and yet does the same job, albeit less elegantly.
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Originally Posted by TenoBell
This type of performance in a device the size of the iPhone, I'll believe in when I see it.
There's a video of it in action.
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Originally Posted by TenoBell
Which large apps are stagnating?
Maya, Final Cut Pro, Photoshop, Illustrator, Indesign. They add very minor things and then give them a new revision number but you can do pretty the same stuff with PS CS1 as you can with CS4. The additions are largely gimmicks. Final Cut Pro has hardly changed for ages. Any major changes they make the the suite are in the quirky apps like Motion or additions to the suite like Color. Final Cut itself will get a new codec like ProRes and not much else.
I will probably never use a netbook. 13" for more than 2 hours is too much of a strain on my eyes and health. And I'm only 30. And have good eyesight, no glasses. I guess I'm just too demanding on what I intend to achieve when I sit down with a laptop. I guess that's why I have an iPhone3G for everything non-computer ... A 10" foldable Mac Touch would be a nice "the next iPhone". Don't call it a netbook... Heh. And then I would use that. But not as my primary work/home/play computer.
Maya, Final Cut Pro, Photoshop, Illustrator, Indesign. They add very minor things and then give them a new revision number but you can do pretty the same stuff with PS CS1 as you can with CS4...
Maybe I'm just software upgrade whore but with Adobe CS4 they finally got "it". Smooth and humming well on Intel Macs. Nice interface tweaks. Surprisingly non-bloated while improving workflow.
I would agree but it doesn't need to be. If the low end right now is faster than the high end back then, this means that people who got their work done just fine on high end machines back then will likely be able to do it now on low end machines. It doesn't apply to all cases but it does in a lot of cases. A netbook for example will do what a powerbook was needed to do a few years ago.
Yes this is always the case that the low end has the same capability of the high end from years ago. You want to cast netbooks as though they've hit some point of usability where nothing else has changed. The reality is that everything has changed equally.
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Maya, Final Cut Pro, Photoshop, Illustrator, Indesign. They add very minor things and then give them a new revision number but you can do pretty the same stuff with PS CS1 as you can with CS4. The additions are largely gimmicks. Final Cut Pro has hardly changed for ages. Any major changes they make the the suite are in the quirky apps like Motion or additions to the suite like Color. Final Cut itself will get a new codec like ProRes and not much else.
The apps you've listed all dominate their perspective markets. They have little to no viable competition that threatens their positions. I don't make common use of Adobe's creative apps, but they continue to dominate their market.
Final Cut Pro I do use fairly regularly and Apple made a lot of changes in the last update. The media management interface was completely changed, support for different codecs on the timeline, makes better use of intel acceleration instructions for real time rendering, more efficient use of HD codecs, integration with Final Cut Server. These are all big changes.
How you brush off Color shows you don't understand what Color is. Color was a $20,000 color correction suite before Apple bought and integrated it into the $1,300 Final Cut Studio.
You want to cast netbooks as though they've hit some point of usability where nothing else has changed.
Yes, I think it's evidenced by those who use them and post here saying they run just fine. If they didn't, you'd have flat netbook sales and people complaining they were too slow.
Maybe Intel will take steps to stop netbooks stealing away too much marketshare (it looks like they want to) but now that they have Via competing, it could be too late.
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Originally Posted by TenoBell
How you brush off Color shows you don't understand what Color is. Color was a $20,000 color correction suite before Apple bought and integrated it into the $1,300 Final Cut Studio.
I was saying that those are where the big changes are, i.e not in the monolithic apps themselves but in new apps added to the suite.
This is a lot of development work for a market that isn't very profitable.
Would there actually be a lot of development work. I thought when the Intel switch happened a good number of developers who had 100% Cocoa apps had them compiled for Intel within a few days?
With Snow Leopard dropping support for PPC who's to say they won't add in ARM support for the full OSX?
About a billion years ago, this pic made the rounds:
I don't think it was an attempted fake; just what someone wanted. Of course, we're now seeing this form factor from Sony. There's a good ongoing review of it at pocketables. It's pretty much an ideal size for me and I wish Apple would make one. That said, I'm still not convinced that the netbook is as big a success as some think. And low price is a critical part of it, which immediately lowers Apple's interest. They have said (and continue to prove through their prices) that they are not interested in the low-margin, high volume market. Hardly a surprise given their success in selling expensive consmer products.
About a billion years ago, this pic made the rounds:
I don't think it was an attempted fake; just what someone wanted. Of course, we're now seeing this form factor from Sony. There's a good ongoing review of it at pocketables. It's pretty much an ideal size for me and I wish Apple would make one. That said, I'm still not convinced that the netbook is as big a success as some think. And low price is a critical part of it, which immediately lowers Apple's interest. They have said (and continue to prove through their prices) that they are not interested in the low-margin, high volume market. Hardly a surprise given their success in selling expensive consmer products.
A market that cannibalizes your margins is not a win for your company. Sony and others are testing this market and seeing their more profitable markets being cannibalized because of it.
The reason people want Apple to do it is they expect their UI to be specifically modified to address the obvious Screen limitations and thus do the heavy design work for the rest of the Industry to copy.
Let Microsoft redesign Vista/Windows 7 to recognize this small visual form factor and put forth a UI designed for it.
Don't forget that until recently the Smartphone wasn't smart and it really started with the UI.
A market that cannibalizes your margins is not a win for your company.
Right; hence my point that Apple avoids that by charging premium prices for everything they make, just as they would/will for any device even remotely resembling the Sony one.
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Originally Posted by mdriftmeyer
Sony and others are testing this market and seeing their more profitable markets being cannibalized because of it.
Can you back that up? If the Sony is successful, it will sell in enough volume to generate acceptable margins.
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Originally Posted by mdriftmeyer
The reason people want Apple to do it is they expect their UI to be specifically modified to address the obvious Screen limitations and thus do the heavy design work for the rest of the Industry to copy.
Well, the reason I *hope* Apple will do it is so I have something I can carry in a jacket pocket as opposed to a briefcase. But I realize the pointlessness of hoping for a certain form-factor just because I want it. That said, if the Sony is a hit, ya never know...
With regard to your second point, Apple is a trend-setter no doubt, and will always be copied.
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Originally Posted by mdriftmeyer
Let Microsoft redesign Vista/Windows 7 to recognize this small visual form factor and put forth a UI designed for it.
Oh, they will. And who knows - this time they may get it right.
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Originally Posted by mdriftmeyer
Don't forget that until recently the Smartphone wasn't smart and it really started with the UI.
Yeah, as someone who fought a Motorola Q on a daily basis for a couple of years, I can attest to its lack of smartness. It was like wrestling with a giant octopus in a tankful of jello.
The numbers, compiled by ChangeWave Research. Of those who plan to buy new notebooks, 30% said they will buy from Apple, compared to 22% for HP and 26% for Dell. 18% percent said they would buy a netbook, up from 14% last month, while two thirds said they wouldn't be considering a netbook and another 16% weren't sure.
I just saw this review on Neowin, regarding a review on the Lenovo S10 (all the netbooks basically use the same Atom N270/GMA 950 configuration, so it applies to other netbooks too).
I've C&Ped a couple paragraphs from the review, as I feel that they are relevant, and match most of the experiences I've had with my AAO.
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Everything configured and worked fine I'm used to a 2.5GHz C2D laptop, so I was concerned that the slower Atom N270 1.6GHz single-core processor would be too slow, but I found that it has enough power for what I was doing and then some. I could connect to my mail without any issues and get to my VPN connections from pretty much anywhere as well.
...
The machine is quite capable of running almost everything I threw at it (my Office apps, Sage software, Big Fish & Popcap-type games, etc). You wouldn't want to try something like World of Warcraft on it (although I suspect it'd run on the lowest settings), and I did have a few issues trying to play some HD 1080 videos on it, but I never expected it to be able to handle a 1080p source file either. If Intel would let the manufacturers put the Atom 330 dual-core 1.6 in their netbooks, I believe this would change. I installed several of my wife's favorite games on the S10 and let her play with it for a bit. When I told her I'll have to send it back, she asked me when we could order her one of her own.
Really, until most people have actually used a netbook, it's hard to judge how neat they are for many tasks, although I can also see where people could be turned off by the small trackpads and non-standard resolution (Windows XP/7 adjusts fine, but Linux has issues from my experience on certain apps and windows).
An awful lot of people are "spec whores" and can't conceive of the possibility that a non dual-core machine running at 1.6GHz could be useful. The same kind of people are found asking if Photoshop will run well on a Mac mini or a MacBook.
I've been running graphics programs for 20 years and got quite a lot of work done with 16Mhz processors. Netbooks are at least 100 times faster; more than adequate for most everything. Of course, not more than adequate for everyone.
About a billion years ago, this pic made the rounds:
>>> deleted pic
That isn't what I'm looking for as right now I believe a handheld tablet is a better choice. In anyevent if the machine where to have a lid I'd rather it would open up to solar cells for green recharging.
When it comes down to it I'd love to see two devices from Apple. One would be an iPhone update with a wider screen. This might make iPhone just a bit longer but they could easily loose some of the bezel and add an inch. I could easily tolerate a marginally larger iPhone for a bigger screen.
The second item for them to deliver would be a paperback sized tablet. Like the book this would be to big to slip into the pocket everyday but yet possible when you really need it. The selling point here would be the much larger screen makin it suitable for Internet cruising, eBook reading and other portable chores.
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I don't think it was an attempted fake; just what someone wanted. Of course, we're now seeing this form factor from Sony. There's a good ongoing review of it at pocketables. It's pretty much an ideal size for me and I wish Apple would make one.
Well a tablet based device yes. The key here is pocketable. Personally I'm not all that excited about a keyboard as I'd rather have more screen real estate. That would mean a foldable screen though.
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That said, I'm still not convinced that the netbook is as big a success as some think. And low price is a critical part of it, which immediately lowers Apple's interest.
I'm not convinced of the utility of netbooks either as they simply don't work well fully portable. That is for many people a properly designed tablet would be more useful. IPhone and Touch provide solid evidence here as to what is useful stuffed in your pocket.
Your arguement about price makes no sense though. The problem is this Apple already sells computers that are low cost. They are the iPhone and Touch. For many people they are a good alternative to laptops for mobile use. Especially for accessing web and E-Mail. Plus they cut easily into the pocket.
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They have said (and continue to prove through their prices) that they are not interested in the low-margin, high volume market. Hardly a surprise given their success in selling expensive consmer products.
When have they said such as that flies in the face of what they do with one entire division. IPods are certainly high volume and their margins actually improved with the drop in Flash memory prices. Yes this is a hint that Apple ought to follow the business model used with the current Touch devices when it comes to new ultra portable devices. Yeah it takes a slight shift in user thinking but I'm finding that App store and the iPhone work really well together. Especially when for the most part you are always connected.
In a nut shell the problem with netbooks is that they try to hard to be very small notebooks and in doing so create problems for the user. That is why I like it when I hear that Apple is exploring interesting ideas related to small devices. It would be nice to see a merged netbook/tablet device that works well as a fully portable device, I just can't imagine anything right now that would work well.
An awful lot of people are "spec whores" and can't conceive of the possibility that a non dual-core machine running at 1.6GHz could be useful. The same kind of people are found asking if Photoshop will run well on a Mac mini or a MacBook.
This is certainly the case, that is people imagining what others would need of find acceptable performance wise. The problem with this market niche is that multiple cores bring to these small devices advantages outside of raw clock speed. There are other performance metrics to be concerned with.
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I've been running graphics programs for 20 years and got quite a lot of work done with 16Mhz processors. Netbooks are at least 100 times faster; more than adequate for most everything. Of course, not more than adequate for everyone.
Now you make the same mistake as the spec whores in that you make a blanket statement that covers all user needs. Adequate really depends on what you are doing at the moment. For example; my iPhone does OK when Safari is running on simple web pages. However you might as well stop what you are doing if an E-Mail comes in.
So iPhone has some performance issues which brings up the question of how do you solve those issues in the next product release. You basically have two choices, one is a CPU running at a higher clock rate and the other is to implement multiple cores. It appears that at this time multiple cores are the way to go to up performance while managing power usage.
Now this is certainly a learned response as I've come to expect no noticeable performance hit on a desktop when an E-Mail comes in. It is a valid one though as huge lag on a virtual input device for a fireground app is distracting and unacceptable. From Apples standpoint there are a number of ways to meet customer demands, one of those just happens to be SMP hardware.
Comments
I'm thinking the Dell Mini 10 will be a nice sweetspot for Netbooks. Small enough to be very portable, large enough not to feel too constrained and a 1,355x768 display that also isn't too short for web browsing.
As long as the price isn't silly I'm getting one.
What os will you run on it? A flavor of windows, linux or hack osx?
What os will you run on it? A flavor of windows, linux or hack osx?
Windows XP or 7 and then maybe a hackintosh depending on driver availability. Some netbooks just can't get enough working without major surgery.
Not linux because my wife would be one of the primary users.
I've also been looking at refurbed M1330s but the supply has suddenly disappeared.
Maybe I'll look at the Inspiron 1420 but it's getting bigger.
The G3 is old hardware not new low-end hardware though. Plus the G3 is a very old processor now. Cutting off 10 year old hardware is not really a sign that manufacturers will be able to keep people buying at the same rates.
My point is how long into the future will the current Atom processor be supported vs how long into the future the current Core 2 Duo processor be supported.
But in the last 10 years, those laptops weren't good enough vs the higher priced machines. There is a threshold beyond which no matter how much better manufacturers make the high end, a significant majority will deem it too much and opt for the cheaper models. The Mac Pro is a good example - a Mac Pro may be a very powerful machine but a Core 2 Quad is good enough that people who don't want to pay £1400 can pay just £500 and get 90% of the performance and satisfy their performance needs adequately.
10 years ago the difference between the high end and low end wasn't any different that what it is now. Notebooks won't have the capabilities of the Mac Pro anytime soon. Notebooks are tempered by the need to be thin and light enough to be portable, while not generating too much heat and maintaining decent battery life. I cannot see them ever have the problem of being "too powerful" anytime soon.
There is the possibility that developers can move more and more towards interpreted code similar to how the Palm Pre will use Javascript to improve development time but they need to protect intellectual property so I don't see a big shift. They may find ways to tax the hardware further but Windows 7 and Snow Leopard are evidence they are trying to do the opposite. Small footprint, fast code, fast hardware. I'm sure people can imagine all sorts of high end software that could require the highest end machines in a similar way to how consoles develop but consoles highlight this point very well.
I think there will be a growing number of services that work in the cloud. But this is not as necessary for a full computer as it is for a mobile phone.
Looking at their feature lists, Snow Leopard and Windows 7 will continue to use advanced functions in newer CPU's and GPU's, while attempting to downgrade gracefully for older hardware.
Software developers are in competition with each other to continue to build faster - more responsive applications. This pushes them to use advanced instruction sets and frameworks that Intel, Nvidia, Microsoft, Apple builds into their platforms.
The PS3 is arguably the fastest console hardware and yet sells the least. Coming from the back of one of the best selling console in the world - the PS2 - this seems surprising. But contrary to what you have said, developers just can't push the software to a point where the hardware is worth it because the development time takes way too long. Because computers have to have every single behavior accounted for, this level of complexity has to be recreated by solid man hours and that's what will hold back computer growth.
This is an entirely different argument. The gaming platform that sells the best is the one with the best games. That doesn't have anything necessarily to do with hardware.
I looked at the device and wondered if that could be the next iphone. Full 1080p output, playing Quake 3 at 720p, 10 hour battery life.
This type of performance in a device the size of the iPhone, I'll believe in when I see it.
I could see a fragmentation happen in the Mac developer community though. A lot of devs may shift to targeting the lower power, high volume, low cost platforms and innovative desktop Mac software starts to diminish. We're already seeing this happen with Apple's Pro software and Adobe's software. The monolithic apps stagnate and it's the quirky new small apps like Aperture, Lightroom etc that get the attention.
I see no evidence of this type of fragmentation. Which large apps are stagnating? Aperture and Lightroom are gaining attention because they perform a function that no software previously accomplished as well as they do. Aperture and Lightroom don't directly compete with anything but themselves.
Windows XP or 7 and then maybe a hackintosh depending on driver availability. Some netbooks just can't get enough working without major surgery.
Not linux because my wife would be one of the primary users.
I've also been looking at refurbed M1330s but the supply has suddenly disappeared.
Maybe I'll look at the Inspiron 1420 but it's getting bigger.
The Mini 10 and 12 dont use OS x compatible chipsets like the Mini 9 dies, so they won't run it without a ton of hacking.
10 years ago the difference between the high end and low end wasn't any different that what it is now.
I would agree but it doesn't need to be. If the low end right now is faster than the high end back then, this means that people who got their work done just fine on high end machines back then will likely be able to do it now on low end machines. It doesn't apply to all cases but it does in a lot of cases. A netbook for example will do what a powerbook was needed to do a few years ago.
This is an entirely different argument. The gaming platform that sells the best is the one with the best games. That doesn't have anything necessarily to do with hardware.
Not if the hardware of one manufacturer is double the price of another and yet does the same job, albeit less elegantly.
This type of performance in a device the size of the iPhone, I'll believe in when I see it.
There's a video of it in action.
Which large apps are stagnating?
Maya, Final Cut Pro, Photoshop, Illustrator, Indesign. They add very minor things and then give them a new revision number but you can do pretty the same stuff with PS CS1 as you can with CS4. The additions are largely gimmicks. Final Cut Pro has hardly changed for ages. Any major changes they make the the suite are in the quirky apps like Motion or additions to the suite like Color. Final Cut itself will get a new codec like ProRes and not much else.
Maya, Final Cut Pro, Photoshop, Illustrator, Indesign. They add very minor things and then give them a new revision number but you can do pretty the same stuff with PS CS1 as you can with CS4...
Maybe I'm just software upgrade whore but with Adobe CS4 they finally got "it". Smooth and humming well on Intel Macs. Nice interface tweaks. Surprisingly non-bloated while improving workflow.
I would agree but it doesn't need to be. If the low end right now is faster than the high end back then, this means that people who got their work done just fine on high end machines back then will likely be able to do it now on low end machines. It doesn't apply to all cases but it does in a lot of cases. A netbook for example will do what a powerbook was needed to do a few years ago.
Yes this is always the case that the low end has the same capability of the high end from years ago. You want to cast netbooks as though they've hit some point of usability where nothing else has changed. The reality is that everything has changed equally.
Maya, Final Cut Pro, Photoshop, Illustrator, Indesign. They add very minor things and then give them a new revision number but you can do pretty the same stuff with PS CS1 as you can with CS4. The additions are largely gimmicks. Final Cut Pro has hardly changed for ages. Any major changes they make the the suite are in the quirky apps like Motion or additions to the suite like Color. Final Cut itself will get a new codec like ProRes and not much else.
The apps you've listed all dominate their perspective markets. They have little to no viable competition that threatens their positions. I don't make common use of Adobe's creative apps, but they continue to dominate their market.
Final Cut Pro I do use fairly regularly and Apple made a lot of changes in the last update. The media management interface was completely changed, support for different codecs on the timeline, makes better use of intel acceleration instructions for real time rendering, more efficient use of HD codecs, integration with Final Cut Server. These are all big changes.
How you brush off Color shows you don't understand what Color is. Color was a $20,000 color correction suite before Apple bought and integrated it into the $1,300 Final Cut Studio.
You want to cast netbooks as though they've hit some point of usability where nothing else has changed.
Yes, I think it's evidenced by those who use them and post here saying they run just fine. If they didn't, you'd have flat netbook sales and people complaining they were too slow.
Maybe Intel will take steps to stop netbooks stealing away too much marketshare (it looks like they want to) but now that they have Via competing, it could be too late.
How you brush off Color shows you don't understand what Color is. Color was a $20,000 color correction suite before Apple bought and integrated it into the $1,300 Final Cut Studio.
I was saying that those are where the big changes are, i.e not in the monolithic apps themselves but in new apps added to the suite.
This is a lot of development work for a market that isn't very profitable.
Would there actually be a lot of development work. I thought when the Intel switch happened a good number of developers who had 100% Cocoa apps had them compiled for Intel within a few days?
With Snow Leopard dropping support for PPC who's to say they won't add in ARM support for the full OSX?
I don't think it was an attempted fake; just what someone wanted. Of course, we're now seeing this form factor from Sony. There's a good ongoing review of it at pocketables. It's pretty much an ideal size for me and I wish Apple would make one. That said, I'm still not convinced that the netbook is as big a success as some think. And low price is a critical part of it, which immediately lowers Apple's interest. They have said (and continue to prove through their prices) that they are not interested in the low-margin, high volume market. Hardly a surprise given their success in selling expensive consmer products.
About a billion years ago, this pic made the rounds:
I don't think it was an attempted fake; just what someone wanted. Of course, we're now seeing this form factor from Sony. There's a good ongoing review of it at pocketables. It's pretty much an ideal size for me and I wish Apple would make one. That said, I'm still not convinced that the netbook is as big a success as some think. And low price is a critical part of it, which immediately lowers Apple's interest. They have said (and continue to prove through their prices) that they are not interested in the low-margin, high volume market. Hardly a surprise given their success in selling expensive consmer products.
A market that cannibalizes your margins is not a win for your company. Sony and others are testing this market and seeing their more profitable markets being cannibalized because of it.
The reason people want Apple to do it is they expect their UI to be specifically modified to address the obvious Screen limitations and thus do the heavy design work for the rest of the Industry to copy.
Let Microsoft redesign Vista/Windows 7 to recognize this small visual form factor and put forth a UI designed for it.
Don't forget that until recently the Smartphone wasn't smart and it really started with the UI.
The Mini 10 and 12 dont use OS x compatible chipsets like the Mini 9 dies, so they won't run it without a ton of hacking.
That's a shame. What chipsets and components are in the 10?
A market that cannibalizes your margins is not a win for your company.
Right; hence my point that Apple avoids that by charging premium prices for everything they make, just as they would/will for any device even remotely resembling the Sony one.
Sony and others are testing this market and seeing their more profitable markets being cannibalized because of it.
Can you back that up? If the Sony is successful, it will sell in enough volume to generate acceptable margins.
The reason people want Apple to do it is they expect their UI to be specifically modified to address the obvious Screen limitations and thus do the heavy design work for the rest of the Industry to copy.
Well, the reason I *hope* Apple will do it is so I have something I can carry in a jacket pocket as opposed to a briefcase. But I realize the pointlessness of hoping for a certain form-factor just because I want it. That said, if the Sony is a hit, ya never know...
With regard to your second point, Apple is a trend-setter no doubt, and will always be copied.
Let Microsoft redesign Vista/Windows 7 to recognize this small visual form factor and put forth a UI designed for it.
Oh, they will. And who knows - this time they may get it right.
Don't forget that until recently the Smartphone wasn't smart and it really started with the UI.
Yeah, as someone who fought a Motorola Q on a daily basis for a couple of years, I can attest to its lack of smartness. It was like wrestling with a giant octopus in a tankful of jello.
That's a shame. What chipsets and components are in the 10?
The Paulsbo chipset, GMA500 graphics. Future versions will probably use GN40.
http://www.neowin.net/news/main/09/0...d-s10#comments
I've C&Ped a couple paragraphs from the review, as I feel that they are relevant, and match most of the experiences I've had with my AAO.
Everything configured and worked fine I'm used to a 2.5GHz C2D laptop, so I was concerned that the slower Atom N270 1.6GHz single-core processor would be too slow, but I found that it has enough power for what I was doing and then some. I could connect to my mail without any issues and get to my VPN connections from pretty much anywhere as well.
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The machine is quite capable of running almost everything I threw at it (my Office apps, Sage software, Big Fish & Popcap-type games, etc). You wouldn't want to try something like World of Warcraft on it (although I suspect it'd run on the lowest settings), and I did have a few issues trying to play some HD 1080 videos on it, but I never expected it to be able to handle a 1080p source file either. If Intel would let the manufacturers put the Atom 330 dual-core 1.6 in their netbooks, I believe this would change. I installed several of my wife's favorite games on the S10 and let her play with it for a bit. When I told her I'll have to send it back, she asked me when we could order her one of her own.
Really, until most people have actually used a netbook, it's hard to judge how neat they are for many tasks, although I can also see where people could be turned off by the small trackpads and non-standard resolution (Windows XP/7 adjusts fine, but Linux has issues from my experience on certain apps and windows).
I've been running graphics programs for 20 years and got quite a lot of work done with 16Mhz processors. Netbooks are at least 100 times faster; more than adequate for most everything. Of course, not more than adequate for everyone.
About a billion years ago, this pic made the rounds:
>>> deleted pic
That isn't what I'm looking for as right now I believe a handheld tablet is a better choice. In anyevent if the machine where to have a lid I'd rather it would open up to solar cells for green recharging.
When it comes down to it I'd love to see two devices from Apple. One would be an iPhone update with a wider screen. This might make iPhone just a bit longer but they could easily loose some of the bezel and add an inch. I could easily tolerate a marginally larger iPhone for a bigger screen.
The second item for them to deliver would be a paperback sized tablet. Like the book this would be to big to slip into the pocket everyday but yet possible when you really need it. The selling point here would be the much larger screen makin it suitable for Internet cruising, eBook reading and other portable chores.
I don't think it was an attempted fake; just what someone wanted. Of course, we're now seeing this form factor from Sony. There's a good ongoing review of it at pocketables. It's pretty much an ideal size for me and I wish Apple would make one.
Well a tablet based device yes. The key here is pocketable. Personally I'm not all that excited about a keyboard as I'd rather have more screen real estate. That would mean a foldable screen though.
That said, I'm still not convinced that the netbook is as big a success as some think. And low price is a critical part of it, which immediately lowers Apple's interest.
I'm not convinced of the utility of netbooks either as they simply don't work well fully portable. That is for many people a properly designed tablet would be more useful. IPhone and Touch provide solid evidence here as to what is useful stuffed in your pocket.
Your arguement about price makes no sense though. The problem is this Apple already sells computers that are low cost. They are the iPhone and Touch. For many people they are a good alternative to laptops for mobile use. Especially for accessing web and E-Mail. Plus they cut easily into the pocket.
They have said (and continue to prove through their prices) that they are not interested in the low-margin, high volume market. Hardly a surprise given their success in selling expensive consmer products.
When have they said such as that flies in the face of what they do with one entire division. IPods are certainly high volume and their margins actually improved with the drop in Flash memory prices. Yes this is a hint that Apple ought to follow the business model used with the current Touch devices when it comes to new ultra portable devices. Yeah it takes a slight shift in user thinking but I'm finding that App store and the iPhone work really well together. Especially when for the most part you are always connected.
In a nut shell the problem with netbooks is that they try to hard to be very small notebooks and in doing so create problems for the user. That is why I like it when I hear that Apple is exploring interesting ideas related to small devices. It would be nice to see a merged netbook/tablet device that works well as a fully portable device, I just can't imagine anything right now that would work well.
Dave.
An awful lot of people are "spec whores" and can't conceive of the possibility that a non dual-core machine running at 1.6GHz could be useful. The same kind of people are found asking if Photoshop will run well on a Mac mini or a MacBook.
This is certainly the case, that is people imagining what others would need of find acceptable performance wise. The problem with this market niche is that multiple cores bring to these small devices advantages outside of raw clock speed. There are other performance metrics to be concerned with.
I've been running graphics programs for 20 years and got quite a lot of work done with 16Mhz processors. Netbooks are at least 100 times faster; more than adequate for most everything. Of course, not more than adequate for everyone.
Now you make the same mistake as the spec whores in that you make a blanket statement that covers all user needs. Adequate really depends on what you are doing at the moment. For example; my iPhone does OK when Safari is running on simple web pages. However you might as well stop what you are doing if an E-Mail comes in.
So iPhone has some performance issues which brings up the question of how do you solve those issues in the next product release. You basically have two choices, one is a CPU running at a higher clock rate and the other is to implement multiple cores. It appears that at this time multiple cores are the way to go to up performance while managing power usage.
Now this is certainly a learned response as I've come to expect no noticeable performance hit on a desktop when an E-Mail comes in. It is a valid one though as huge lag on a virtual input device for a fireground app is distracting and unacceptable. From Apples standpoint there are a number of ways to meet customer demands, one of those just happens to be SMP hardware.
Dave