What I think is Microsoft’s biggest mistake with origami is to limit and direct too much to the OEM’s hardware visions. They should just stick to the OS try to make it flexible for a variety of sizes and shapes and not demanding on power and cpu. Rather than telling the market how they think the hardware they should have let the market do that.

They were completely wrong with the mainstream wanting 7″ slates. To me while that is ok for some, the mainstream wants what UMPC’s have failed to deliver. That is just a small version of what they find the most popular mobile device a laptop. Everyone uses a touch type keyboard so UMPC should have that but also have touch screen too. They should be more like the clamshell handhelds a jacket size laptop with a touch type keyboard running full windows XP.

If pro-mobile devices are expected to be more expensive than their consumer counterparts, Microsoft may simply be trying to get their cut. This is assuming they will license XP at all. If Microsoft really means to end-of-life XP, then, of course, that’s different.

As someone else said, this may simply be Microsoft’s way of ensuring that machines with touchscreens run Vista rather than XP. Lots of people have said horrible things about Vista. The one thing everyone agrees on though is that it has superior handwriting recognition, and more support for gestures.

Having said that, I think creating arbitrary limits is a bad idea. What is top of the line today may be tomorrow’s low cost part. (If we believe Moore’s Law, low cost computers which run Vista well will eventually exist.)

Somebody need to port Nikia’s Maemo Linux distro to X86. In fact, Nokia should make their Mk.V (n810 is Mk.III according to them) internet tablet an Atom based tablet. It only make sense!

So as bad as Vista is, Handwriting recognition is a huge issue to consider before shooting it down.

Or they’ll start shipping there UMPC with the touchscreen disabled, and all you need to do is, is some small update/drive, whatever to enable it again. Its been done for ages to get past some of those limitations…

To be honest, you can tell the license is written for the EEE.

The only reason for the ULCPC response is that EEE was a runaway hit without Windows. As long as they can prevent Linux from taking off, they’re fine with complaints from a few customers.

And they DEFINITELY don’t care if you get a Macbook. That’s a boutique product. What they need to prevent are cheap clamshell packages of EEE hanging on pegs near the checkout of Walmart.

I have proof that MS is pursuing the right strategy. It’s in your assumption that the solution is for MS to pay more attention to its customer needs. As long as you complain to MS that they need to do something, MS is clearly doing the right thing. It’s only when you’re prepared to defect to something cheap that they need to change. You (a lot of you) have to want a touchscreen Linux EEE in order to get the XP you really want.

That aside. Vista Embedded has been terribly delayed and would be perfect for this situation.

I’ve also thought XPe would be a better fit than XP Pro. Especially for SSD devices with limited space.

So we really need a componentized Vista which is what XPe is and Vista Embedded is supposed to be.

About Windows Mobile x86. This is *not* new at all. Actually WinCE kernel on x86 is probably like 10 years old. We just never had x86 chips small enough / efficient enough for mobile devices.

Some industrial devices do however run this platform but the numbers are the smallest of all CE based devices in comparison to ARM, SH3, etc.

Windows Mobile is a viable option, the main thing missing is a better UI (WM7) and browser / more apps.

Ideally Vista Embedded with an Origami / Windows Mobile home screen like interface but more functional for larger devices is what I envision being the best match. Unfortunately there’s no talk of any of this going on.