Asus Takes Another Stab at Revolutionizing Netbook Market 162
Perhaps most well known for their netbook innovations with the Eee PC, Asus is at it again with their latest rollout at CeBIT Germany. The "Waveface Light," a new concept laptop, can be used as a conventional laptop or converted to a tablet by removing the keyboard and opening it to a completely flat position. Sounds like either a stroke of genius or a "small widget broke and now it's worthless" design issue.
You can't really revolutionise the netbook market (Score:4, Insightful)
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Right now I read and browse mostly on an eeePC 1005. If they made a slim, really low power netbook with an e-Ink display on the outside of the lid I'd buy one right away.
Keep it closed and you have an e-Ink based reader. Open it and you have a full fledged netbook.
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Or possibly the EeePad.
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Interesting... (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Interesting... (Score:5, Insightful)
First it will run with a completely user-unfriendly Linux distribution (Linpus, I'm looking at you!), then people will complain about it, Asus will increase the specs and the price massively and will only sell the Win7 edition. The few who bought the original edition will tell everybody that they tried Linux and that it's complete crap without trying some *real* distro, and websites around the world will laud the new win7 edition as much better, and a proof that Linux is not fit for the desktop. Apple will then show off their new product (the iBalls) which will have less feature than anything else, will be so locked it won't be of any use whatsoever, but will have shiny glossy metal, and everyone will announce the death of the Wave Light Devices.
been there, done that
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My daughter's EEEpc runs Ubuntu just fine.
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but did it have Ubuntu on it by default?
My Mini9 did. Granted, it was a slightly modified version of Ubuntu (a few packages were missing from the package manager), but it worked well enough that it was several months before I decided to install the full-blown version of 9.10. Even then, I doubt that any users that don't already have a favorite Linux distro would miss the things (openSSH server, for one) that lead me to install the full version of Ubuntu.
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Pfft, my netbook is a P2 366 Thinkpad running Mint.
Re:Interesting... (Score:5, Informative)
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The media, tech-oriented or otherwise, does not report that Windows is more user-friendly than Linux because they tried it and didn't like it... Oh no. They would happily report the exact opposite if some nice compelling, fluff-filled press release said it was so.
Marketing and advertising exists to bend people into believing the narrative you want them to believe. If you're a hug
Just remove the pc! (Score:3, Insightful)
The "Waveface Light," a new concept laptop can be used as a conventional laptop or converted to a tablet by removing the pc and opening it to a completely flat position.
run that by me again
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I think they meant removing the keyboard.
Re:Just remove the pc! (Score:5, Informative)
From the pictures it even seems the screen can be rolled up when the keyboard has been removed.
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But yes, it should be "by removing the keyboard", not "by removing the PC". What does that even mean?
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It is flexible. Bendable to be precise. (Score:4, Informative)
See the videos below:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oTmzBsx6p_I [youtube.com]
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ceHb98Ri4BE [youtube.com]
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Bendable screens will be excellent if they come to market, because they will allow for a trifold display. It wouldn't actually fold on the ends, but it would make two tight bends. This will finally give a screen that is very portable but not tiny.
The other possibility is a roll-out display.
Always Innovating (Score:2, Interesting)
So they've ripped off the Always Innovating Tablet [alwaysinnovating.com] and are calling it their idea?
And somehow I don't think the Always Innovating tablet was the first.
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No, because the big difference is that the keyboard on this thing was sitting on top of the continuation of the screen, so when you remove it your screen real estate just doubled. Of course, it's a design concept anyway, and until affordable flexible displays are available it will remain so.
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Umm, did you look at the pictures of this new "tablet/netbook"? Always Innovating has a nice-looking detachable screen, agreed, but the WaveFace is something... completely different.
The screen covers both the top and bottom halves of the clamshell, and it's one continuous flexible screen. If you want to use it as a tablet, you lay it out flat then lift out the keyboard, resulting in a tablet that's more than double the size of Always Innovating's offering (which is, after all, just a netbook you can unplu
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I don't think your looking hard enough, it's quite a bit different then that "always innovating" tablet.
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AFAIK, the Compaq TC1000 [wikipedia.org] (followed by the HP Compaq TC1100 [wikipedia.org]) was the first.
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A step in the right direction, but... (Score:2)
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http://alwaysinnovating.com/ [alwaysinnovating.com] touchbook. removable keyboard has an extra battery, just to make the $100 pricetag for that extra bit worthwhile.
What is the Price Point? (Score:2)
!new (Score:3, Informative)
it's an innovative "new" concept, that has been shipping for several months, in the form of the http://alwaysinnovating.com/ [alwaysinnovating.com] touchbook
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Lenovo has something similar... (Score:3, Informative)
Flexible (Score:2)
OK, a couple of things in the article and the youtube videos referenced in comments above imply (or directly state) that at least one of these objects has a flexible screen.
Anybody seen anything flex here? In the video it's all static and under glass so that people can't touch it, and the photos are completely static of course.
Are they touting a new tech or did I miss a big announcement of commonly available flexible displays?
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It's a concept, the things they are showing are mockups. Do you think concept cars actually work?
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concept (Score:2)
don't you hate the phrase 'design concept', almost as much as people who believe that they will look like the production version, if they ever get to production.
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You should probably stay away from my work, then. There's a poster up in the coffee lounge with the heading - I kid you not - "CONCEPT MASTERPLAN VISION".
It's been up for several years and, as far as I can tell, is no closer to reality. The architects' drawings are ooh shiny, though.
Not impressed by this but (Score:2)
I really don't see the point of detachable screen, detachable keyboard thing.
The swivel lid tablet laptops seem to work fine if you just want the screen and If weight is the issue I wouldn't want to leave the keyboard at home and then regret it later.
What did impress me was the DR-900 reader [youtube.com].
I've been waiting for a paperback replacement for a while and this seems like it for me.
The specs I found are 10,000 pages turns, 1024 x 768 resolution, 4GB internal storage plus an SD slot,PDF/TXT/ePUB/HTML.
Now if they
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10,000 pages turns for the battery or the life of the display?
If that is display life then it sucks, battery not too bad.
This is it! (Score:2)
Too cool. I think this might be the kitchen computer I've been waiting for! If I could prop it up in lots of different configurations based on where I need to use it (hang it on the wall over the oven, make a ^ and prop it up next to my cooking, lay it flat on the counter).
Then if I could roll it up and take it into the living room as universal remote...
I'm more interested... (Score:2)
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Umm, get a $399 ION netbook problem solved?
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The ION is a good step in the right direction, but (in my opinion) it is still a bit lacking. Don't get me wrong, it's a vast improvement on GMA, but it's still just one step. From what I've seen though, the ION 2 is going to be a big improvement. I haven't looked it up but are any of the ION 2-equipped netbooks available to purchase yet?
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Like I said, I'm not looking to play something like Bioshock 2 or Modern Warfare 2 on there...I just want something like Civ 4 on Medium settings to run at a playable pace. I know netbooks aren't designed for heavy gaming, but being able to play a game of Civ IV or logging on to WoW and keep things playable and not-ugly would be nice...at least, if for no other reason other than travel and as a cheap "guest" machine at a LAN.
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Net books are designed to be just powerful enough to surf the inter net . If you make them more powerful, they are no longer netbooks. What you are asking for is akin to wanting to meet a 5' 6" midget.
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As I asked another poster further down in the conversation, if that is the case, would you consider something using the new ION 2 hardware to be a regular laptop then? Despite having the form factor and battery life of a netbook?
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A small, efficient laptop is not a netbook. A small, efficient, low-priced, low-power laptop is a netbook. Now, low-power is a relative term, so it will gradually increase with time, but by the time you can easily play Civ 4 on any netbook, you will want to play Civ 5 on your netbook because Civ 4 is too old.
Re:Indeed. (Score:4, Insightful)
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No, I want a laptop with a 9" or 10" screen that can play semi-modern games (Civilization IV being a good example) at lower to medium settings without running at 5 frames per second.
What, in your opinion, defines something as a small laptop or a netbook? Can you point me to a 9" machine and say "that's a small laptop" and then a different 9" machine and say "that's a netbook"?
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You're missing the point of netbooks. Obligatory car analogy; do you buy a motorcycle (because it's portable) and then bemoan the fact that you can't carry four people on it?
Of course not.
No, you get a damn car. Similarly, you don't buy a tiny netbook with a 1.6ghz low powered single core, 1gb of ram and integrated video, and then absurdly expect that it would or should be capable of gaming. Want portable gaming? Buy an alienware.
I'm not upset that older netbooks can't do it, I just want a little more focus placed on it in the future. Look at the performance difference between an original EEE PC and the netbooks that are out on the market now...the difference is huge, with only a couple of years seperating them. I'm simply looking for enough of a performance bump so that I can do simple gaming without having to take a full-size laptop with me. Again, we aren't talking about Crysis with full AA here...we're talking a
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Wow. There's a gamer who really loves Civ IV.
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I keep using it as an example because the gameplay is perfectly suited for something like a netbook...travel, or parked on a couch watching TV.
But yeah...I do love Civ IV :-)
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You're missing the point of netbooks. Obligatory car analogy; do you buy a motorcycle (because it's portable) and then bemoan the fact that you can't carry four people on it?
Better car analogy: Despite common conceptions, an SUV isn't the best choice if you want space, you're better off with something like a Minivan.
To the point, there is no reason why a Laptop with reasonable gaming power should have to be huge. That's the whole point about the recent investment in mobile graphics chips. If we can use them to make 3D Desktops why shouldn't we use them for games.
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Don't draw conclusions from buzzword names. If 'netbooks' were solely about surfing the web, they wouldn't be sold with XP and be using X86 processors and have large amounts of memory. Netbooks are Laptops which can do 99% of what people want to do, just without being huge.
Personally, I think anything bigger than 10 inches is clumsy to be carrying around all day. I can get everything I need to get done on a 9'' netbook.
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I think you are missing the point of netbooks. What you want would add to the quality of the internal parts (cost), would use more power (battery life), and would need a large screen (Size).
What I, and the netbook users I know, are looking for, and using, is something that will have the battery life to make it through several classes (battery life) and is reasonably cheap (cost), light, and doesn't take up much space on the desk (size). I think you would be better served by a regular, or power user oriented
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Not really...I have a relatively up to date desktop gaming machine, I'm just looking for something small to leave next to my couch so when we stream netflix/watch hockey or boxing I can still play modern games. Like I said, I'm not looking to play Crysis at max, nor am I expecting to play something at crazy high resolution at 16x AA...I just want to be able to play something like Civ 4 at medium settings...the nVidia ION is close to providing what I want (and in my price range), and the ION 2 looks like it
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Alienware do a nice looking netbook. That should be able to game!
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You're talking about the M11x, yeah? It does look awesome and certainly has far more performance than I'm looking for, but I can't justify spending that much money on such a small system...~$800 would be a great "full-size" laptop :/ I know that's sort of like throwing your post back at you, sorry about that...
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Small, Fast, Cheap, pick two.
You want all three, that is just not a realistic option.
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Small, somewhat cheap, and slightly fast.
See? Cut two of them down, and suddenly all three are possible.
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Except that, since you don't seem to be able to find what you want, it is apparently impossible to have all three. We all understand what you want, and I suspect a lot of us think it would be cool. I personally would like one of them. I'd also like Centauri's car from "The Last Starfighter" (the one that is useful for highway, aerial, space, and hyperspace driving), but I can't get one of them either.
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I dunno man, the ION 2 stuff [engadget.com] looks like it's going to be exactly what I'm looking for. Here's to hoping.
Oh, and screw Centauri's car...I'd be happy with his super-snazzy suit.
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Everyone else here can see you're a moron. Why can't you?
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For me, the ideal device would be about a 17" light weight touch screen tablet PC, that can stand alone as a netbook; but then become more a dumb display/hard disk at my desk. That way you could have a nice useable display you carry around that functions, but have a fast Processor/keyboard/memory you slap on, and plug it in to game with.
Basically a dedicated GB Ethernet port connecting my "desktop Processor" to this device.
I don't game, but I go out and gather data from a bunch of machines, quickly look th
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Were any good games ever made beyond those systems?
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Go away, and stop ruining products I actually want with irrelevant bullshit I don't need and refuse to pay for.
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I thought early thinkpads did this, too. Not just to be a flat display surface, but so they could have the light source removed and sit as a "foil" on an overhead projector - in the days before video projectors were common in conference rooms.
Don't recall if this was before or after powerpoint.
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Yeah...Blizzard (like Valve) is good about keeping the minimum requirements on their games low, but making the visuals scale quite well. The difference in visuals with World of Warcraft turned all the way down and turned all the way up is HUGE, , but all the way down requires very little computing power while all the way up still doesn't require anything unreasonable.
Out of curiosity, what netbook are you running it on and what are the specs?
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It's a shame that, even after being stripped down with vLite, Windows 7 is still so huge. It runs REALLY REALLY smoothly on netbooks (even lower powered ones), but the amount of storage space it commands is just too much.
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Storage isn't a problem when netbooks come with 2.5" SATA disks.
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Then they are not decent netbooks. If it has a moving part I do not want it. Nothing is as durable cheaply nor as battery efficient as a netbook with no moving parts.
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Your preferences differ from the millions who purchase netbooks with fans and hard disks.
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I agree with the parent poster...I LOVE that my netbook has no moving parts and runs silently.
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And plenty of us that do. Personally, all other things being equal, I'd prefer an SSD on a netbook, but all other things aren't equal.
IMO, though, a netbook is more defined by having a clamshell form factor, being ultraportable (a combination of screen size of about 12" or less, being thinner than most laptops, and low weight) and having battery life for 6+ hours of continuous operation than by the particular technology used to acheive those
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I'm aware of the difference, and I chose a much bigger and faster hard disk.
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Those are the folks that don't know any better. They often buy garbage.
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Your preferences differ from the millions who purchase netbooks with fans and hard disks.
Also Lots of people like watching DVD's on the go.
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As do I and via the magic of x264 you can store an entire DVD in less than 1GB of harddrive space.
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Nowadays sure, but those of us with older ones (like a Dell Mini 9) are a bit limited in our storage options. I'm not paying 1/3rd of what I paid for the machine just to upgrade the storage space to a reasonable level, know what I mean?
I know that purchasing any netbook at this point would make this problem moot, but there are still netbooks out there that are fully functional with a lot of life left in them where storage is an expensive commodity. Being a Mini 9 owner is where my perspective comes from..
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It came with the 8 gig SSD -_-;; It was a gift though...so..you know...free is good :-)
I don't need the increased storage for the games (I have an 8 gig Class 6 SDHC in there, which holds whatever I'm currently playing), I need the increased storage because there is only about a gig of free space even after cutting down Windows 7 with vLite. Even just a 16 gig SSD would be more than enough, I just haven't done it.
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Your OS is too big, try another.
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I have one of those, buy a freaking SDHC card.
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I have an 8 gig Class 6 SDHC in there currently, and it's been great.
My SSD, however, is also an 8 gig. The cost of upgrading the SSD is about equal to upgrading to a larger SDHC. And before you ask, it was a gift, which is why I didn't get it with more internal storage in the first place.
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Windows XP is lightweight compared to a modern Gnome or KDE system.
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LXDE solves that problem.
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Windows XP with no apps is a little lightweight compared to KDE bundled with countless KDE apps in total disc space.
eComStation... (Score:2)
...if they'd ever release v2.
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I believe this has been attempted many times in the past, but when the users fire up their netbooks a few times only to find that everything still *just works*, and that there's no malware, there are no viruses, no unpatched or delay-patched exploits, they freak and ask for their *windows* back.
Being users finally "in control" of their systems only speeds up their return to lemminghood.
The revolution happened long ago - it's the self-professed Windows experts who've become immovable.
cheers,
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It's like a concept car, meaning it looks cool but is probably just a mockup. Plus like a concept car it will never make it into production most likely.
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Exactly.
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Definitely a mock-up. ASUS has no idea when it might become a real product. You can hear it straight from them. [youtube.com]
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My sarcasmometer must be on the fritz. Did you mean this to be funny?