How Small a PC Is Too Small? 324
Banner~! recommends an article in IBTimes on the search for the ideal size for an ultraportable computer. One device mentioned is Paul Allen's FlipStart, discussed here recently. After watching early users fumble and nearly drop an early version of the FlipStart while trying to perform a three-finger salute, designers ended up including a single key labeled "CtrlAltDel" in the version that will be shipping soon. From the article: "Each device maker... has a different sense of how small an ultra-mobile can get before it becomes impossible to use. For instance, Microsoft thinks the tiniest screen possible measures 7 inches diagonally, but FlipStart Labs settled on 5.6 inches."
These are not PC issues, but Windows issues. (Score:5, Insightful)
All About The Keyboard (Score:4, Insightful)
The Zaurus is a powerful sub-notebook (Score:2, Insightful)
That's not too small a computer (Score:5, Insightful)
This should be obvious. Does it really make sense to load a huge OS like Windows, with all its carryover behaviors for backwards compatibility, for something that really should have its own methodology?
Too Small How? (Score:4, Insightful)
Is this talking about the size of the keyboard (which it sounds like), the size of the screen, or the size of the whole device?
It is obvious that keyboards/pads have a minimum size. Fingers limit that. Also, if the keys are too close together, typing is slowed because more than one key is frequently depressed.
The screen is also limited in its smallness by what is comfortable. I use my phone to read books, but I have heard many people claim (who havent tried it, of course) that the screens on phones are too small to read on. In my experience, screen size is not important as the size of the individual letters (or characters) in the text is what is important. Since my current phone allows me to blow the text up to a size that is larger than the typeface on most children's books, I cannot see the problem.
The limitations on the device size probably depend on what it is used for. If it is a phone, it needs to be large enough to be comfortably held for a long phone conversation. Phones that are too small are irritating and easily misplaced. If the device is a PDA, the screen is probably the limiting factor. It should be about the size of a screen and not much thicker. Ideally, this screen should be a size that would fit in your pocket, something that "Pocket"PC's generally do wrong.
If the device were something like a portable computer, with perhaps a bluetooth or WiFi keyboard and screen, there is probably no limit on its smallness. Why not make a USBkey style computer and keep it on your keyring? At 4+GB, such devices can already contain a decent suite of software. Removing hardware links to the device itself would free it from size restrictions. Theoretically, such a device could also be booted from any computer as its hard drive (Knoppix style), so you could take your computer anywhere.
Re:Not time yet (Score:5, Insightful)
Wrong tree (Score:5, Insightful)
So as long as you need a keyboard, the keys must be large enough to press, and the entire keyboard must be large enough to comfortably hold. But if you think virtual keyboards, i.e. one projected into the air, on a HUD, or on a table (the later exists as a Palm Pilot accessory), then the size of the actual hardware again is irrelevant, the size of the virtual "keys" is what matters.
Re:Not time yet (Score:3, Insightful)
11.87" (Score:5, Insightful)
Can not be too small. (Score:4, Insightful)
What *can* be too small is the interface. I do not like a tiny screen nor do I like a tiny keyboard (or other input device). I have quite large hands, even the smaller "full size" keyboards are uncomfortable and only useful as a portable device, not my main one.
I have seen keyboard solutions that are OK - some project a keyboard on a flat surface and optically(? I do not think the descriptions said and I have never used one and that seems about the only feasible way) sense where you fingers hit. Other than some RSI problems with my finger hitting a hard surface (and that is fixable for a permanent station) that can be made to be any size or layout.
I also prefer small text, but I prefer that on a larger screen. I am currently using a 15" LCD and that is about as small as I comfortably go. I do not like writing much code in it either, my 21" monitor went kaput and this is all I could currently get. A 17" screen is the smallest "normal" lcd I like and I prefer a 19". I know of no current technology to fix this one, but there is no reason it can not be fixed.
Of course, that is for what I would call everyday use. If your computing power is in a small package there is no reason you can not have a docking station for full size stuff and quite small for carry around. I *can* hit some very small keys with a stylus and use a very small screen (lets face it, many of us currently do - or did - with the palm tops). That is nice for something I pull out of my pocket and use for a few minutes. Add in a few larger keys to mash and I can even game, navigate for MP3's, use a cell phone, add something to a calendar, or other typical small device things with large easy to use buttons. At that point I would consider the size my finger can reliably hit and the number of buttons to be the limit (small could use a stylus, but I do not like that idea for simple frequently used functions).
Re:These are not PC issues, but Windows issues. (Score:5, Insightful)
Now they want to put it on a single button, surrounded by other tiny buttons? Someone had a real winner of an idea there...
Re:These are not PC issues, but Windows issues. (Score:4, Insightful)
How do you login without using ctrl-alt-del? How about unlocking a locked XP session? Face it, this abomination of UI silliness is still neccessary all the time if you're unlucky enough to use windows.
Maybe the control-alt-delete issue is fixed in Vista, but frankly it's one of the things that makes Windows not really ready for the desktop.
My understanding of the reason for using crtl-alt-delete to log in, is because that specific keystroke got passed directly to Windows which then could make sure the official login program was running and accepting all input (or something along those lines). I think the deal is that otherwise, there's a chance that what users are seeing is not Windows' real login screen but a fake designed to steal passwords.
Re:These are not PC issues, but Windows issues. (Score:1, Insightful)
Ctrl Alt Del is not hookable by applications (not even by drivers unless they go as far as to patch the kernel..) so you cannot steal a user password simply displaying a logon screen on their desktop (when they press C-a-d and it's not the real logon screen, a different window pops up and a savvy user knows something is wrong.
C-a-d was chosen basically because its behavior is different from any other key combination at the keyboard controller level.
Re:These are not PC issues, but Windows issues. (Score:2, Insightful)
I think the grandparent's point was that it would be much better to deliver a patch so that Flipstart's windows installation allows you to login or bring up the task manager using a DIFFERENT KEYSTROKE.
Given the premium on space in an ultra-micro computer, adding a whole new non-standard button is the worst possible solution, when it would not be that hard to remap the hotkey in the keyboard driver.
Re:That's not too small a computer (Score:3, Insightful)
Personally, I like to run at 3840x1024 or 3072x768 on a desktop. This is nothing to do with Windows and everything to do with the complexity of what I do with Windows.
Re:Wrong tree (Score:4, Insightful)
Price matters, size doesn't (Score:4, Insightful)
OLPC seems to get it right, the small laptop costs $150, make that $250 if it ever hits retail and its still a good price, I can also get PSP for $200, not exactly a full featured PC, not at all in fact, but a powerfull handheld at a good price, an for some uses like eBook reading actually quite good.
I don't need a handheld that can outperform my desktop computer, I don't even need one that gets close, just make it fast enough so that it can run ssh, VNC and friends. If I ever need a full PC, I just log into it remotely, no need to carry all that useless power around with me.
Handhelds need to be affordable, everything else is really secondary in the end, since at $2000 those things will never sell to the masses, no matter how pretty and small you make them, get them under $500 or under $300 if you really care and you might have something worth to buy.
Re:These are not PC issues, but Windows issues. (Score:4, Insightful)
And the funny (or sad?) thing is that this is only "necessary" in Windows because of all the crap that Windows can get infected with. Neither Linux nor OSX needed to implement the ctrl-alt-del scheme.
No, it's "necessary" in Windows for the same reason it's "necessary" on all platforms. To ensure no other application is masquerading as a login screen.
My understanding of the reason for using crtl-alt-delete to log in, is because that specific keystroke got passed directly to Windows which then could make sure the official login program was running and accepting all input (or something along those lines).
It's used because back when NT was first designed, they needed some reasonable key combination to use for the Secure Attention Sequence that was not already being used by some other application. The only one that that was (for obvious reasons, in ~1990 or so) was Ctrl+Alt+Del.
Very stupid comparison (Score:3, Insightful)
You can run Linux with a lightweight software combo too (eg. http://www.puppylinux.org/ [puppylinux.org]).
It's called a PDA (Score:4, Insightful)
No what you are asking for is a PDA.
A good Palm paired with one of the good foldable keyboards (to bad that they did'nt produce non-wireless keyboard for newer Athena Connector) - the good ones (Stowaway keyboard for older Palm Universal Connector) have the same area as a regular desktop keyboard.
has flash / bluetooth / optionnal WiFi.
some software are sold together with (Browser, Mail client, Documents-to-Go, etc), other can be installed for free (beer/speech) like SSH clients, VNC clients, tons of ebook readers.
instant on/off (no suspend to disk) with either battery ram (older models) or flash (newer).
uses database paradigm instead of file load/save (the Palm ones). When it seldom crashes, you just reset and return to the app with the document in the state with which you left it (WinCE crashes more often).
you just instantly jump around from app to app (Palm tend to be more snappy than WinCE)
no mouse. use stylus or fingers.
lower power consumption : battery last enough for the day and can easily be charged from USB (either in craddle or using 220v-to-5vUSB wall socket plugs or 12vCar-to-5vUSB cigarette lighter plugs)
has many other useful functionnality (GPS hardware and software can be installed. Great console emulators.)
Have no personnal experience with Linux based PDA, but I except them to be good too.
Re:These are not PC issues, but Windows issues. (Score:3, Insightful)
But does SAK really improve security? I would argue that in practice it is useless. As you pointed out yourself, physical access to the box permits full access to the CPU (though the data on the hard drive might remain encrypted) and if anyone can subvert the machine over the network then they could replace the login program itself with their own version that popped up when the SAK was hit.
Seems to me that SAK only buys you security if you assume that your OS is not already compromised AND a malicious user with physical access to the box who does not already have Administrator access is running a full-screen application that looks like a login prompt in order to snatch passwords AND they did not already install a hardware keylogger. Times have changed since ~1990, and this use case is very limited to me. The malicious user can just as easily find a local privilege exploit and snarf the entire password database and crack it at their leisure or just run an application that looks and behaves like Explorer.exe but records keystrokes.
Christ, with the standard linux install, I can log in as root without knowing the password if I have console access, just reboot and trigger single user mode during startup. How is that secure?
It's exactly as secure as any PC with a BIOS that allows booting from removable media. I can circumvent Windows security by booting a custom Linux, resetting the Administrator password, and then booting into Windows.
I COULD secure a Linux system by:
1) Enabling a BIOS password.
2) Allowing only booting off the hard drive.
3) Using LILO and forcing it to boot the kernel with no prompting for kernel parameters, hence no single-user mode before password.
This still leaves the ability to open the case and reset the BIOS or replace the hard drive.
Re:Nokia N800: pretty real, and fits in shirt pock (Score:5, Insightful)
Almost 3 years ago I opted for a "converged" phone, a Samsung SCH-i700 PDA phone from Verizon. It was pretty nice, but DAILY use exposed the shortcomings of using a handheld as a phone. Yet there were times that the device was pretty damn convenient, when I needed to Remote Desktop, VNC, or get a "more featured" browser.
Nokia realized that putting a phone in a PDA is dumb, and they have avoided this mistake in their N series tablets. Until wireless data is universal and cheap, there's no point building the expense of a PHONE into your PDA. There's even less point in using a PDA as a phone.
Things are better today -- you can get a "normal" phone with data, and bluetooth modem support. Your PDA becomes "agnostic" about who provides the data layer - 802.11, bluetooth, or the US cell phone cartels. It doesn't matter anymore. Now you have real choices.
The Nokia N800 is the closest thing now to a perfect portable Internet tablet. You don't need to know Linux. It just "works". Developers are finding the device is a DREAM to develop on, combining Linux + GTK to make an open platform for anyone to use and develop on. Desktop Linux apps are being polished and ported over. And applications like 'Maemo Mapper (GPS)' are awesomely free.
You don't get a lot of free apps with Windows CE platforms... and many of the free apps there suffer from developer disinterest. WinCE software dies when the author becomes too busy with life/etc, while Linux and GPL software has a life all its own.
Some will complain about the N800's lack of CDMA/G3 data support, but this is GOOD -- really that is what your phone is for. Same thing with the keyboard... buy your OWN bluetooth keyboard if you want one. This was these 2 features do not bulk up the dimensions of the device.
If you want a "bigger" tablet, the Pepper Pad 3 seems interesting. If you want something that is truly portable, the Nokia N800 is the platform to beat now.
PS - the media player isn't horrible, but it suffers from limitations like any closed source media player. The media player has GOOD format support... many formats except no OGG support. The free 'Canola' media player offers a MythTV-like interface, touchscreen, and it plays just about anything you throw at it. Video performance on this is VERY good for a handheld.
Oh yeah, there's a webcamera built in and meeting software. Now we have to wait for Skype and GnomeMeeting so we can ditch the Nokia meeting app...
Re:Wrong tree (Score:2, Insightful)