Yesterday, in Part 1, I talked about 3 tablet products. Today, there’s more and the first one is something that shouldn’t be a surprise because Smartbook AG have released a ‘Smartbook.’ The only problem is that I don’t see this as a smartbook. A smartbook to me would be in the laptop/netbook form factor and have an advanced CPU that brings enough power for a quality web, gaming and application experience along with an application store. Smartbook’s Smartbook Surfer runs an ARM11 based Telechips CPU and has a basic Android 2.1 install with, as far as I know, no Gmail, maps or marketplace. That’s not to say it’s a bad product because at 170 euro with GPS (possibly not in the 170 Euro version) HDMI-out, stereo speakers and a case, it’s worth considering for basic coffee-table and holiday duties. If you’ve looked at the Archos 7 Home Tablet.

The final 7” tablet to talk about is the Viewsonic which is in a different league to the Smartbook Surfer. It’s a rumor but looks likely to me considering the Viewsonic branding we’ve seem on prototypes around the trade shows this year. Stuff.TV indicates that it will be running Android 2.2 and have 3G, hi-res cam and GPS options making it a competitor to the Samsung and Huawei slates. They say that is will launch in the UK in about 2 month. Again, this is a rumor, but it seems likely.

Before I move on to the other news items I want to talk briefly about smart books. I’ve been very positive about the possibility of ARM and Android bringing an always-on, social, fun and lightweight netbook alternative to the market but as yet we haven’t seen anything that really hits the mark. The hardware is there in my opinion but it was always the Android build that fell short. Both the Compaq Airlife 100 and Toshiba AC100 were build on open-source Android and included none of the important, even critical elements of sync, Gmail, maps, marketplace and other Google software. For a category that would benefit from software re-writes, not having a software delivery channel means no developer is going to bother with the opportunity. I’m 100% sure that Google and ARM know about this and the stars seem to be pointing towards Android 3.0 (codename Gingerbread) as the solution. It will finally branch Android out to non Smartphone devices. Why the delay? I suspect Google is re-writing some of its apps to suit WVGA and higher resolutions just like Apple did with their apps on the iPad. As for timescales, I suspect we won’t see anything until the last weeks of 2010 which is just about when MeeGo/Moorestown based tablets will hit the scene. The differences between the two hard/soft platforms will be clear at that point.

Did you see the new renderings of the Eking slider UMPC? It looks similar to the design we saw in plastic form with Wibrain (sold to Eking) in Sept 2009.

It also looks a lot like the Mui HDPC. I remember using the Amtek U650 in 2007 and liking it a lot. If Eking can bring this to market on Oaktrail with some quality engineering and better aesthetics, it has a chance in the UMPC market but maybe it would be more successful as a ‘smart’ product on a Cortex A9 core with Android 3.0? Slimmer, always-on, great for Android gaming? Just a thought.

Here’s something about MiFi-a-likes. I’ve been using the MiFi for over a year and it’s been a great product but I’m disappointed that there haven’t been any upgrades since launch. The GPS remains unusable, I get the occasional lock-up, it gets very warm, it’s impossible to remember to indicator meanings and the battery life needs to be more than 4 hours. Novatel will fall behind if they don’t watch out because the new Huawei E583C looks to match the MiFi’s current capability and offer an OLED display panel on top. The idea of an on-board application processor sounds attractive with the MiFi but there’s no software for it yet so why bother? I’d rather save 40 or 50 Euros and take the E583C to be honest.

Other news I’ve ‘starred’ over the last few days of catch-up time…

Clearwires Apple-centric 4G hotspot.

Motorola-Verizon Tablet with FIOS TV.

Nokia’s take on the MeeGo handset UI.

Android 2.1 on the Dell Streak

ExoPC slate update.

‘Watchlist’ and ‘Events on the next page…

In terms of mobile productivity, I’m sorry to have to report that the Compaq Airlife 100 has a lot of holes. It does, however, prove that there’s a lot of potential in the ‘smart’ platforms. Long battery life (due to extremely low idle drain) and always-on/connected are features that, once you’ve experienced them, are hard to let go of. Android has potential too but there are 2 key things that need to be done. 1) The browser needs to be improved. The Airlife 100 is not up to doing any web-application work. 2) The marketplace needs to be put into place so that developers have a channel for productive and large-screen apps.  Once these two issues are fixed though, it’s only a matter of time before productive mobile computing moves to ‘smart’ platforms with advanced mobile operating systems.

Do you agree?

As a consumer device, the Airlife is also missing a few features. Better media support and management is badly needed for a start so with the costs running close to that of the iPad, I suspect the latter would be a better choice.

Great progress by HP and signs of real promise mean that smart books have a future for mobile computing / mobile productivity but it could be 2011 before we se a real netbook competitor.

I’ve reviewed the Airlife and published the article over at Carrypad.com

We’ve had ARM-based mini-notebooks and tablets for years and in recent months we’ve even had the chance to test out some new, high-powered arrivals. The Netwalker, Wirelession 1060, TouchBook and many more. The potential has always been there to make a killer product but no-one has executed correctly yet. The Mobinnova Beam gets close but there’s a lot missing from the OS on that one.

The Dell Mini 5 and Apple iPad might change that and in the world of 4-10” ultra-mobile devices are likely to be the biggest sellers this segment has seen for at least the last 5 years. They combine some unique features over X86 devices that I discuss below. These niche-market devices may not see multi-million sales but there are still big opportunities.

Up at the 10”  netbook segment though there’s a well-established market for low-cost, portable, low-end internet-focused mini laptops. Netbooks have 40 million or more sales to-date and over 100 million sales predicted for 2013. Prices are low, battery life high, performance acceptable and even style is playing a role. Netbooks are just cool and very easy to justify. This is where ARM partners have a superb opportunity…in the Social Netbook.

ARM-partners aren’t in the netbook game yet but they do have a big chance if they use some unique weapons that Intel will have to think carefully about in their next-gen netbook platform. The ‘Social Netbook’ is a huge opportunity for ARM partners.

For the first time this week I finally saw an ARM-based netbook that executes well on what I think are the important unique and ‘lock-in’ features and the device slots neatly into a category of ‘social’ netbooks. Jolicloud beware because the Compaq Airlife 100 is good.

The 4 ARM-Centric Features of a Social Netbook.

1 – Point of sale

First of all we have the point-of-sale element. Selling applications, books, videos, music and other online services adds value to the customer and  value to the sales-chain which, in turn, can bring the price of a product down. Android, iPhone OS and other ARM-centric operating systems have proven that the model works and is important for the future. Windows-based netbooks aren’t POS devices. Intel and Nokia are working on this via their Intel Atom Developer Program and app-store framework but it’s in it’s infancy and needs a lot of marketing, development and commitment from OEMs before it becomes interesting for developers and customers. Point-of-sale is a lock-in feature.

2 – Location Based Services and Social Networking

LBS is becoming very big business and customers are starting to catch on to the idea of local search, local social networking and other location-based services. There ARE solutions for Windows-based netbooks but they are few and far between. Take Google Buzz for instance. The only way you can use the location aspect of this service is to use it on an ARM-based smartphone. Windows just doesn’t lend itself to these services and despite efforts to include ‘sensor’ support in Windows 7, developers are just not developing with this in mind. All the action for LBS is exclusively on ARM-based platforms using operating systems built with this in mind. Intel and Nokia do have a solution in MeeGo but like the Intel Atom Developer Program, it’s a long way away from developers minds right now. LBS is a lock-in feature.

As for social networking, although the majority of it still happens on the desktop, the growth in mobile social networking is phenomenal and combined with LBS is something that an Intel/Windows netbook just can not do right now.

3 – Dynamic User Interfaces.

What’s more interesting? A static workbench or a tailored ‘active’ screen with dynamic wallpaper, active widgets, finger-attractions, location awareness and a neat integration and interleaving of notifications from device and external services? Despite Windows 7 being capable of all these things, it’s not delivering a dynamic, exciting, social-centric experience. How many usable finger-centric overlay packages did you see for Windows 7?  What platform are developers looking at when they want to make a dynamic, mobile friendly UI?  The answer is simple. Most of the work is going into ARM-focused operating systems right now and you only have to look to peoples reaction to ‘Sense’, the UI layer from HTC to see what a difference it makes. Funnily enough, Windows Phone 7 Series won’t be offering tailored overlay layers either so in terms of dynamic, evolving mobile user interfaces, Android is in the best position possible. Again, MeeGo is tackling that issue but again, it’s a long way away from developers minds right now. Dynamic user interfaces are a lock-in feature.

4 – Always on.

I’ve left the best until last. Always-on is a killer lock-in feature and the primary trojan horse for ARM-based products. Always-on is not about in-use battery life, it’s about staying connected and active when you don’t use the device. It’s the smartphone usage model and it’s the reason that many of us, despite having laptops with us, will choose to browse the web or do an email on a smartphone rather than on a mobile computer. We’re simply lazy.

I first experienced this always-on computing model with a productive device back in 2008 with the WiBrain i1 which was able to achieve a nearly all-day connected usage scenario but it got hot, was a little temperamental and was hardly the most attractive design. Since then we’ve started to see netbooks achieving a regular 8-hour connected battery life and we’re moving to the point where that is going up to 10 hours with designs based around Pinetrail and Menlow but they are all 1.2KG or more, all have huge 6-cell (expensive) batteries and all use an operating system and platform that aren’t designed for the out-of-use scenario. With the current mobile operating systems you get always-on in a much more efficient manner (expect connected active-standby times in days on an ARM netbook) and the OS is designed for that usage model too. From core OS functions to notifiers and the ability to light lamps and buzz buzzers when necessary – even based on location. Users understand these OS’ as ‘always-active’ whereas with Windows 7, users are associating a desktop usage model and power-down after use.

Always-on usage is one of the best advantages ARM-partners have in this space and the primary lock-in feature for ARM-based netbooks.

And…

Also worth thinking about are casual gaming, in-use battery life advantages, weight, design flexibility (smaller, fanless designs) carrier channels and subsidization models.

We had heard that HP were going to unveil a new ’3G’ device on Monday at MWC and we suspect this is it.

Extended battery life, light weight, touchscreen, 3G and a lower price (or at least some very cheap ‘free with data’ offers) means this is one for us to check out at MWC. No confirmation on the processing platform yet and clearly there’s a question over Android makes a good productive platform. It will be interesting to see if the Google apps are on  this one.

Compaq Airlife 100 puts Android OS, Snapdragon CPU, and an SSD behind 10.1-inch touchscreen — Engadget.