There has been a lot of discussion lately about the prospect of Android being employed full time as a netbook OS. It looks like Acer is taking one of the first big steps and officially stating that they will bring an Android running netbook to market in Q3 according to Acer’s head of IT products, Jim Wong. Acer has been showing an Acer Aspire One D250 [Portal page] around at Computex with Android as the OS. They are saying that this isn’t the actual product, but just a test platform. And that of course would leave one to believe that they won’t just be releasing one of their previous netbooks with Android as an OS option, but instead be developing a new netbook specifically for the inclusion of Android.
I still can’t quite see the major appeal to running Android on a netbook instead of a more mature computer OS. I’m sure costs factor into the equation; maybe Android is cheap and requires little configuration from the selling companies end, but then again, wasn’t that what they were trying for with Linux? Would you buy an Android powered netbook given the choice between Android and XP (or even Linux)? Let’s say that choosing Android saves $100….
[Register Hardware] [Engadget] (additional pics and video through the Engadget read link)
New article: Acer confirms netbook running Android in Q3, shows it off at Computex (kind of) http://cli.gs/EYt0Ws
Acer confirms netbook running Android in Q3, shows it off at …: There has been a lot of discussion lately abou.. http://tinyurl.com/odkes9
Acer confirms netbook running Android in Q3, shows it off at …: There has been a lot of discussion lately abou.. http://tinyurl.com/odkes9
I’m with you on this one.
Whilst I’m excited about having a play with an Android phone, I want my notebook/netbook to run Windows too.
I think tablet or UMPC based on Android should be interesting, netbooks should run Windows
The next moment is weight, i aways ask you and JKK what are the specs, especiall weight (ans size for MID’s). Android netbook should weight less than 800 gm.
And the third is wider range of form-factors. Always Innovating plan to offer 450gm UMPC + keyboard block (with extra battery, ports, etc.) that is also 450gm. + internal USB-ports
Acer confirms netbook running Android in Q3, shows it off at … http://bit.ly/1alSUN
You can try Android on a PC or virtual machine like VirtualBox by using this image from here :
http://code.google.com/p/live-android/
The appeal of Android over some other linux: the UI is better designed, more complete, and more consistent than most linux UI’s… it’s more polished, and a more mature UI. So, there’s an expectation that it will be more accepted by/acceptable for end users.
Would I pick it? There is a list of things that I expect to be able to do on a netbook that I can’t currently do on my G1. In order for me to want Android on a netbook, they’d have to be resolved (and, really, I’d like them resolved on the phone version of Android as well):
1) Full Gmail (send mail as one of my other personalities, recover messages from the trash more cleanly, create/edit filters, create/edit labels, see the full details of a message, see the original message, edit the quoted message in a reply (to trim it down, focus on a particular passage, etc.))
2) Full Google Reader (use keyboard short cuts, add/edit tags)
3) Full Google Docs (edit documents, view Gmail attachments, etc.)
4) Better built in IM (more than one Jabber account, more Jabber servers than just Google talk, more protocols (IRC for example), more than one active account at a time on each IM protocol, more than one active IM protocol at a time, logging conversations to SD card (or to the netbook’s storage))
5) better VNC viewer (technically 3rd party and not Android proper, but still … I can’t get it to do both ssh tunneling through ConnectBot _AND_ use VNC passwords; I require both on my servers… a novelty on my phone, a requirement on a netbook)
6) As a netbook, if should have the ability to act as a tethering client (Wifi client to a wifi router/wmwifirouter-phone/joikuspot-phone), Bluetooth DUN, Bluetooth PAN, and USB tethering), and have an OPTION, but not a requirement, for built-in 3G (ideally through a removable PCI-Express Mini card, so that the device owner can change carriers easily; here in the US that’s more than just an unlocked card and a different SIM card, that might mean an entirely different protocol).
Those are what things I would need to see different in Android. In the netbook, I want a 9″ screen size, and a convertible tablet form factor. I want to be able to use the wider virtual keyboard from cupcake (the one for landscape mode) when I’m in portrait mode, so that it gives me a nice wide virtual keyboard across the bottom of the screen (but where I can still see a good portion of the app on the top of the screen), yet isn’t as prone to errors as the G1’s portrait mode virtual keyboard.
The main advantage of Android on a netbook I see is that you run the same OS on your smartphone and netbook.
I like the idea of being able to run whatever is on my desktop on a PPC. This is just turning the logic around.
People are often resistant to change. Give us what we know is often preferable to something new (hence Windows dominance in part.)
A similiar idea would be to run Maemo on a netbook and a PPC.
I don’t agree that that’s the “main advantage of Android”.
The main advantage of Android, IMO, is that it’s the friendliest/most-usable Linux platform. It gives you the advantages of a user-friendly/usable platform that end users can actually fully utilize without getting lost … with a Linux based open-source platform that reduces costs and provides all of the other advantages of an open source platform.
Some will reply that, to an end user, it’s not as open as other forms of Linux. I would counter that for the bulk of end users (the ones that have eluded Linux so far) … that level of open-ness (access to the Linux command line, for example) is not only unimportant, but perhaps intimidating and repelling. Yet, for the low-level developer, Android is still open to the kernel hacker, os hacker, device hacker, etc. who want to download the source and create a customized Android instance, or port it to new hardware. And those users who are interested in that extra level of utility will still have access to other flavors of Linux (and thanks to work going on at Canonical, they’ll be able to run the same Android apps on that other Linux flavor, as well).
That’s the reason we’re going to see Android on consumer grade computers, such as netbooks, nettops, smartphones, etc. It’s because Android is the first consumer grade Linux. And, IMO, that is Androids main advantage and real value.