- Sunday, 22 November 2009
- INQ Mobile
- RSS
We've got a number of tools in our armoury [Not weapons? Ed.] - Hazel Lewis - UK government minister
Techcrunch geezer builds his own web tablet
TECHCRUNCH founder Michael Arrington is set to release a $300 web tablet.
People in the know have been expecting someone to come out with such a gadget and most of the Apple-favoured press in the US had been expecting it to come from Jobs' Mob.
Now, according to leaked snaps it seems that Arrington is ready to do it. The CrunchPad, has a 12-inch touchscreen and virtual keypad. It is built on Ubuntu Linux loaded onto a solid state drive.
Writing on his bog Arrington said he wanted a simple and dirt cheap touch screen web tablet to surf the web.
Over Easter there were several spy shots which appeared here. APC claims that Apprington's design is similar to something that Apple would come up with. We guess it is because they had not worked out a way of advertising Jobs' Mob in the story.
The machine bypasses any desktop interface and goes straight to Firefox. It then connects to Google Docs, email and Skype for communication.
It is powered by an Intel Atom and has 512MB of RAM. µ
Share this:
ShareBusiness Intelligence Software
Customer Relationship Management (CRM)
Enterprise Accounting Software
Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP)
Enterprise Systems Management
Now this is so star trek I'll take 2 of those. Sit in my lazy boy watch TV and surf the internet.
Seems Like UpGrade of Tablet. Heard on News last Eve, St.Joobs Is Resting Well At Home. One Last Chance To Ram 7 Into Tablet, Steve, Hey-STEVE!. Think Duel Core aTom does NT6. Could Be J.I.T.(Just In Time) For Serious SSD. Call 'Er MacBell. Cox Gives 12.5 to 50 Mb/s Wireless.One Thing Here Is Serious Price Incentive Plus For: theLABSTER@TechCrunch.mil. drashek
I've been wanting one of these since I first became a fan of Star Trek. 4GB isn't much, but I can deal with that small quibble, especially if it has a slot for a thumb drive.
Where does the line queue up? :D
It needs Windows XP and a 50% more powerful cpu/ram spec. Then it can run most apps in the business and home arenas.
I can think of car workshops that would find this very useful. A car diagnostic software solution (£2k-£3k) would work perfectly on this.
It can also do surveying, teaching, etc.
If they can make a more powerful windows one for $400/£300 then it's easily a top seller.
Like above posters, I'd buy this in an instant for $300 over the sub-notebooks like the asus and msi units hot on the market right now. I agree with the creator; I want a simple to use thing instead of some dumb OS (XP or linux, linux can go to hell IMO) and not be bothered with the hassles an OS brings. And no recompiling kernels or apt-get ridiculousness. give me a break linux fails.
Sounds fantastic, storage isn't even an issue if your stuff is all hosted online.
It'll be like an iPhone or Android with a bigger screen. But cheaper.
They should really contact those guys at http://xpud.org/
Hey, hey, we got the ill communication. And doesn't Nokia already make a connection device that can't do anything else. Maybe Sprint will pay a couple of bills to add some mobile broadband-like network kit and all of the USA+dog can get one for $50 and two years of struggle and pain. With only a touchscreen interface, maybe we could get some of that snap and spin content manipulation or better yet a proximity sensor type of interface that lets you control it with voodoo like hand gestures in thin air. Oh, please techno-Jesus bring me a life that's just like my favorite sci-fi show, AMEN.
Ok, so we had livingroom appliances that used your TV and were good for the net, email, etc. WebTV. They had wireless keyboards so you could lounge in your easy chair and surfe. They didn't sell well. Technically, viewing the web on a regular telly isn't much fun, but the real reason they didn't sell is because the market wasn't there.
Then we got smartphones and they sold well but people aren't crazy about visiting a limited number of sites with a tiny screen. So, it's a phone that can surf the web but usually doesn't. The market is finally there, the delivery sucks.
Now we have another net-only appliance, it has a decent screen and can visit any site (like WebTV) but this one is portable (like the smartphones). Maybe it's the right gizmo for the right market.
Or maybe for $300 I can get a sub-notebook with a smaller screen and a small but real keyboard.
The problem is, a 12" screen with what appears to be a 9:16 aspect ratio is a lousy way to surf the web.
Maybe this is the future of the internet cafe: you walk in with your bluetooth/wifi device (that's the next bluetooth spec, after all) with a lousy screen, you sinc it to a 'real' bluetooth/wifi monitor at the cafe, and surf.