Yokemate of Keyboards
Posts: 2720 from 2003/2/24
@SoundSquare
I agree that it probably is confusing for the general consumer that netbooks *looks* like real laptops, while their purpose and ambition clearly is something different than the ones of laptops.
I think this affects peoples opinions of "mini laptops" (as they are generally marketed as here, by the major consumer electronic reseller giants and phone operators). According to
this survey,
"Performance, display & features/accessories are the most important laptop product attributes".
I'm sure netbook manufacturers would have liked the focus in consumers mind to have been elsewhere for *their* products, but unfortunately when people looks at a netbook, they actually see a laptop (only smaller). This misconception only gets worse by the fact that it uses the laptops OS, UI and Applications.
As a result, the netbooks are erroneously measured and compared by the *laptops* benchmark units, and it's only because of that you see results like:
"While performance is the #1 attribute driving laptop advocacy, the performance Net Advocacy for the Netbooks product category is predominantly negative."The Pegatron/Genesi netbook (as will all other ARM based netbooks) will try to hammer in a new product category brand for themselves -- the
Smartbook. I see this as a try to distance it from the current Atom based ones with all their limitation, and to highlight the strengths and benefits of ARM technology. The "netbook" brand is too polluted by laptop values, and those values are working *against* it. It's a good thing to distance away from that. At least worth the try.
And then Google ChromeOS will (when it gets here) furthermore help distancing the Smartbook away from laptops, by steering the consumers focus towards the core purpose and areas of use for a Smartbook instead. This can only bee good. And it can easily be done, much thanks to Google being a super brand, a trade mark everyone knows and mentally buys into without hesitation.
Question is if this will be enough? Steve Jobs has on numerous occasions proclaimed that he doesn't look at the netbooks as something viable. And as it turned out, Apple is taking their own path into this market, and distance itself away from laptops/netbooks not only by a new product category brand, but most of all a new physical shape of the product.
I wrote the following on a different site, quite some time ago:
"I think people are getting confused by netbooks looking like *real laptops*, and maybe Apple will set things straight and show the way with *their* definition of "netbooks" (see below). Xraale said in another thread: "End-users don't care as long as it gets them onto facebook and it's cheap". I think this is boils down the essence of "Netbooks", and it corresponds perfectly well with *Google's* definition, outlined by their Chromium OS:
ChromeOS Video
Watch that clip. It's good, and serves as a very good definition of the word "Netbook" IMHO.
Here is an interesting (but a little old) article about ARM and Apple:
Computerworld Article
A quote from Steve Jobs in the above article, reveals that Apple sees the iPhone as an entry to the "Netbook" market.
IMHO Steve Jobs is quite right there. What *he* sees, is the "Core Product" (i.e. the *benefit*, it's a term from the (IMHO) most important model in marketing, anyone can google it): The iPhone does exactly what you want a netbook to do!
A logical continuation to this, would be the tablet device, i.e. everything the iPhone is, but *even more* media/Internet centric, and with a bigger touchscreen. I think this will be the Apple "Netbook", I don't think they will confuse the consumers by making it look like a laptop."And voil?, the iPad was released! It's doing what you would like a netbook to do, all day. But nobody will confuse it with a laptop.
Apple has taken the lead, but more will follow.
You can easily build a tablet device from the Smartbook reference design, based on the very same i.MX515 chip that's inside the new ARM Efika products. Freescale even posted some pictures of potential products with a Tablet form factor:
4244072261_24e0b30cef.jpg4244846724_15f4114825.jpg4245164959_5a052d08e5.jpg4244846236_d0f967eeb2.jpgAnd here is a video presentation of the concept:
YouTube presentationThe building blocks are there. I think what they have been waiting for is for the i.MX515 SoC to become polished enough for real products. And judging by the subject of this thread, I think it may be the case now. I don't know what's holding back a release, probably the SW/OS/Driver side of things...
But it seems like it's getting there!
(Edit: Hmm, I'm pretty sure there should be some images visible here, I even submitted the URL's through the "insert image" icon instead of typing the markup myself. Where did I go wrong?
)
[ Edited by takemehomegrandma on 2010/2/8 10:06 ]
MorphOS is Amiga
done right! MorphOS NG will be AROS
done right! 
