Can the Atrix 4G Really Become Your Next PC? 297
GMGruman writes "The Motorola Atrix 4G got a lot of attention at CES because of its ability to dock to a monitor, keyboard, and mouse and run the full desktop Firefox browser in addition to its Android apps. Now that it is shipping, I took the Atrix 4G and its Multimedia Dock and related peripherals out this week for a test-drive to see if delivers on this 'post-PC' promise. The verdict: It's a good first half-step toward mobile devices being your primary computer. The end of the Windows hegemony is in sight."
Real convergence (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Not as long as it's done in a crippled way. (Score:5, Interesting)
How about something more original, like docking into a tablet?
Re:Not as long as it's done in a crippled way. (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Not as long as it's done in a crippled way. (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:single page link... (Score:4, Interesting)
No point, the author is obviously an idiot who has no idea what he's talking about.
"When you dock the Atrix, the Firefox browser and other dock-provided services aren't running from the Atrix but instead from a stripped-down Linux PC inside the dock. A real post-PC device would run everything from the smartphone or tablet, and it would use the dock to add more processing or take advantage of peripherals."
The stripped down Linuxy interface might make it seem that way, but that's not really the case...
"Running the Atrix's native Android apps on the big screen proved disappointing. All you get is a blown-up version of the Atrix's screen in a window. Android apps such as Quickoffice don't adjust to take advantage of the bigger screen as you would expect -- unlike many iOS apps when run on an iPad [12] instead of an iPhone [13]. For the "lite" PC concept to work, native Android apps will have to take advantage of the larger screen, keyboard, and mouse. Otherwise, you're paying essentially just to have a desktop browser run off your smartphone."
Because QuickOffice and all the other Android apps were surely designed with desktop use in mind, sure... it's not like the Atrix is the first device of its kind and software makers would need a little time to catch up, huh? Not to mention that the Android apps being shown on the screen are shown by way of simple screencasting - no point in doing anything else as the touch interface isn't there anyway.
Sounds like this guy didn't really do much research before buying. All the stuff in the article was pretty much in, well, any normal review of the Atrix. I was hoping for a little more perspective as to installing a more full featured Linux ARM build as the Webtop... which is pretty much the only way I could imagine using the Atrix as a PC. Although come to think of it, custom software on a Motorola device is very unlikely... I'm sure they've locked down and encrypted the webtop in some way as well.