There’s a huge amount of commentary going around about Android and the Open Handset Alliance. Rightly so as I think as its got potentially huge repercussions for the mobile phone and mobile Internet industry.
One of the more lingering thoughts I’m having is about Intel. I’ve been wondering why Intel are in the group and whether it was for their radio silicon or their x86 silicon. It turns out that its because of the latter. In a very brief entry on Intel’s Chip-shot blog they have this to say:
Intel has joined Google’s Open Handset Alliance. The Google Android software running on Intel-based, low power processors will provide a great platform that brings a full Internet experience to mobile devices. Longer term, this could bring more choices in applications and services to handsets, and more device options to consumers.
And that’s all it says. No mention of WiMax at all. Could we see Android on MID’s in 2008? Its certainly possible (JKK thinks so too.) although it sounds like there will be a wide range of devices and I’m sure many of them will be based on the ARM architechture. Peter Choo of HTC describes a "3 inches by 5 inches" device that sounds remarkably similar to the ‘swivel’ ultra mobile PC I had my hands on at CeBIT. If Intel have smartened up the design and made it smaller to enable it to be used as a phone, it could be it! Take a look at the video and think "navigational controls at the base", "The bottom end of the handset, near the navigational controls, is slightly beveled so it nestles in the palm." and "The screen also swivels to one side, revealing a full keyboard beneath." [Quotes from a Forbes.com article about the ‘Dream’ Gphone]
In my article about the Swivel I had this to say:
The mouse button and keys appear at the bottom of the keyboard but when the keyboard is rotated away, the mouse button protrudes from the side. Of the three devices I played with, this was my favorite. I wasn’t a fan of the twist design before but having played with it now I think it makes a better two-handed ultra mobile PC than the Q1 Ultra.
With an Android stack and application suite, the Menlow chipset could be clocked right down solve any thermal issues and at the same time dropping the drain rate for the CPU and GPU returning a much more useable battery life.
Could ‘Dream’ be the first x86-based smartphone?
