The Compaq Airlife 100 just arrived from Spain

It’s one of the first true smart-books / social netbooks (*1)  and a device I believe will show us exactly how touch, always-on, always connected and social networking will play a role in netbooks of the future. It will be available soon in Spain through Telefonica’s Movistar service provider.

Here’s the plan. The unboxing and overview is done and uploading now to my YouTube channel

Later, I’ll get down to the studio for a LIVE video and chat session. Lets say, 2200 CEST (check the time at your location) at Carrypad.com/live.  See you there for a few hours testing of one of the first ever social netbooks. (*1) Some parts of the session, not all, will be recorded. Tomorrow I’ll write my first impressions here on Carrypad.

[*1 Smartbook is a trademark of  Smartbook A.G. in Germany where my company is based. They sell netbooks and laptops. To avoid legal issues, Carrypad uses the term ‘social netbook’ to describe an always-on, always connected netbook running on a mobile focused OS and hardware platform.]

I just hacked this image up (apologies HP and Apple) as an easy way to illustrate how Windows on netbooks is at risk. Add either of the touch, UI, app store and always-on features and you’ve got something that Microsoft can’t currently compete with.

This scenario would immediately affect sales of Windows-netbooks where people are buying netbooks as second devices, gadgets or for family, friend and other social and casual (online or off) scenarios . For productivity scenarios, Windows still counts because the apps don’t exist on the common app-store ecosystems yet. I don’t have figures but in the U.S. and Europe I guess 30% of netbooks are bought as a second PC, a gadget or for the sofa/family/friend social (online and off) scenario. That’s a lot of lost Windows 7 license sales.

I talked about the 4 ‘lock-in’ opportunities (more than just ‘good’ opportunities’) for ‘Social Netbooks’ in this article. Google could make it happen by enabling Marketplace on Android A potential risk for Intel. Intel themselves could make it happen with products like Moorestown, MeeGo and AppUp  or a surprise player could enter the market.

My opinion is that  THIS WILL HAPPEN. Someone will add a touchable, dynamic, fun user interface, an app-store, location and always-on features to a netbook form factor leaving just the productive applications as the missing piece. Given the chance (i.e. an application store) developers will move quickly to fill those  gaps in software for productive uses making the smart device BETTER than the Windows-based, traditional netbook device. What that means for Microsoft is that a huge portion of the netbook market could be served by a  non-Windows OS solutions. Just think of the market positioning too. Isn’t it easier to market an ‘upgrade’ from a smartphone than a ‘downgrade’ from a laptop.

When does this happen? I’m expecting Google to announce a move into the ‘third screen’ space with Android very soon. Intel are ready with Moorestown and MeeGo in Q4 so the change starts to happen in 2011. I estimate that while netbook sales (of both sub-genres) will increase, the percentage of Microsoft netbooks will stay level or even drop. [Sidenote: Intel thinks that the non-windows sales will reduce in percentage by 2012.  I think they are underestimating the ‘smart’ device opportunity.]

Is Intel at risk? Yes. If Google, Android and ARM reach the flag before Intel and MeeGo, Intel start to lose market share in the netbook market but also remember, Android could run on Intel’s new Moorestown platform offering smartbook manufacturers a more powerful computing experience. Also note that if netbooks flip to non-Windows ‘smart’ devices it serves as a nice dividing line between laptops and netbooks for Intel, restoring the need for different netbook, CULV and laptop processing platforms and allowing them to make more and more powerful Atom CPUs without hurting the laptop segment.

I’m not the first to talk about this and it’s certainly not the first time I’ve thought about it myself but that image just makes it crystal clear for me. Netbooks will change dramatically. If Google doesn’t enable it, someone else will and in any case, Microsoft will suffer.

This is the forth report on key trends in PCs below 12 inch screen size appearing in the German market through the popular price comparison engine, Geizhals.at . (Based on SKUs, not model families.) The last one was done in November 2009

In this report you’ll see the big jump in numbers coming from the new Pinetrail devices. Below the graphs I highlight some key numbers.

Number of SKUs in the market.

The big jump in numbers is clear to see from the top graph. Total numbers jumped by 115 with Pinetrail making up a large portion of that number. A bigger trend I’m seeing is the introduction of 1366×768 displays. Nearly all of the 101 devices with hi-res screens have appeared in 2010.

Other ‘trends’ that are clear from the data provided in the comparison engine:

• 78% of the devices are running on Intel Atom. Remember that the segment includes some devices running laptop-grade CPUs. This is not just an analysis of netbooks.
• The percentage of devices in the 10% segment dropped but the number of devices still rose.
• There were percentage increments in the 5 inch, 8 inch, 9 inch (ipad) segments. Previous reports showed decline in these segments.
• Only 5% of the devices are offered with Linux.
• There’s a 3:2 ratio of Glossy to Matt screens.
• Only 10% of the devices weigh 1KG or less.
• Very few Nvidia ION devices have reached the market. Only 3% include the ION option and all of these are ION V1. Devices with Pinetrail + ION are expected in the next snapshot so this number should increase.
• The cheapest device (based on lowest price offered) is still the Hercules E-Cafe EC800 is more expensive now – 183 Euros (up from 151) but the cheapest Intel Atom netbook isn’t far behind at only 188 Euros. (lowest price.)

One thing I note every time I do this is that there are a lot of end-of-life PCs still being offered. For example, the EeePC 701 is still hanging around. It’s difficult to measure but it looks like up to 100 of the devices in the market are remnants.

When we look again in June I expect we’ll see a much smaller increase in numbers. The first ION2 devices will appear though and if the ‘tablets’ and MIDs start flowing into the market as promised, we should see growth, albeit very small,  in the sub 1KG and sub 10 inch segments with a corresponding increase in non-Windows numbers.

Meet:Mobility Podcast 45 is now available. Streamed live (meetmobility.com/live) on 12th March 2010 with special guest Charbax (Twitter, ARMDevices.net)

In the podcast we talk about the mobile computing highlights of CeBIT including the Archos 7, four convertible netbooks, the new Atom processors and ION GPU options and much more.

Full show notes and links to download/listen are at Meet:Mobility

The Internet experience has split into two in the worst way possible. The mobile internet is no longer a subset of the ‘Full’ Internet; it is now a separate world offering features that the desktop just can’t offer and the worst thing is that there isn’t a single device and operating system out there that spans the two Internet worlds. In this article I look at the feature-set of the ‘Full Internet Experience’ and how those features impact netbooks and other ‘mobile’ PCs.

Read the full story

Back in August 2009 I took a look at some of the keywords in mobile computing. My top tips at that time were Moblin and Maemo. Obviously I was wrong on that one as both of those two keywords disappeared! My heart was in the right place though and those two keywords merged into another one, MeeGo, that I will also tip as an important one for the next 3-year timeframe.

MID continues to be a difficult term to search for. EeePC and PocketPC continue to decline. iPhone continues to dwarf everything else. Nothing much changed there but the updates I wanted to give you today are based around the ‘netbook’ and ‘android’ keywords. When we last looked at the graph, Android was just overtaking Netbook. Both keywords were on the rise.

6 months later and things are looking quite different…

I’ve removed the search term ‘windows mobile’ and you can clearly see that search volume for netbooks has dropped-off dramatically while Android continues to rise.

Christmas will have caused the peak you see in the netbook graph but look how it was dropping before that and look to where the level has dropped since Christmas. If the graph falls further we could be leaving the peak of the mass-market stage for netbooks and from that point on it becomes a scramble to sell to the remaining adopters. Prices will drop, marketing will get heavy-handed (the 1.8Ghz and DDR3-capable Atom CPU’s appear to be an effort to assist marketing teams in that effort) and there’s a chance that quality will drop as cheaper builds flood the market. There’s also a chance that someone steps in to re-energise the market and that some effort goes into tailoring the netbook experience for different types of user. If the Nvidia ION 2 platform and rumors of dual-core Atom processors for netbooks is anything to go by then there’s every chance that the processor, screen, GPU, memory and feature restrictions will all be dropped. In that case we can hope for some nice high-end netbooks, mobile-focused netbooks, gaming, video other focus areas. To be honest, neither of these moves will really help. One is just an indication that netbooks really are entering the ‘laggard’ segment; the other an indication that netbooks are merging into laptops. It’s highly possible that both of these moves will happen at the same time.

Watch that graph. Where are we moving to next? Tomorrow I’ll be posting an article that looks closely at the possible death of the desktop OS for mobile consumers and professionals which is another reason that the netbook keyword could be on the way out.

Note: This post will update as new solutions are found. Bookmark and check back regularly for updates. The RSS feed for the comments on this post is also worth subscribing too. You can follow me at @chippy and the website @umpcportal

You know the problem. You install a fully featured application on a 1024×600 screen and there are so many status and info bars that you end up with a tiny space in the middle of the screen for content. The same occurs with web pages. Google docs are a classic example of a web app that leaves too much screen space unused. Then there’s the problem of memory usage. With 1GB of memory you need to be careful. A fully featured app running on .net or Adobe Air can easily use 10-20% of your free memory. Even web apps and plugins can take huge amounts of memory. Finally, there’s the CPU problem. Web apps are the killer here and it’s not uncommon to be locked out of your PC while a big AJAX-heavy web site fills the screen. Netbooks and UMPCs need efficient apps.

I’m usually very careful with my ultra mobile PC builds and tend to run XP Home with very few background apps running in order to leave as much as possible for my work suite. I use GTalk as my mail and IM notifier and of course, Firefox might as well be in my startup folder too because it will be running within seconds of me booting the device but apart from that, I don’t run anything other than the standard build software.  Apart from a twitter client…

I’ve been testing a number of Twitter clients to try and find the most efficient (based on the criteria above) solution. You’ll probably have your own thoughts and favorites and this post is just as much a stimulus for your comments as it is a tip-list so please help us all by adding your experiences int he comments section below.

My Top 5  Twitter clients for netbooks and UMPCs.

Echofon – Firefox plugin. An extremely lightweight plugin that takes a very small amount of memory, sits quietly in the status bar and offers 3 tabs (Friends, Mentions, Messages) of 6 tweets of variable size (see image) when clicked. Each tab is scrollable and everything can be controlled using keyboard shortcuts.  The refresh rate is adjustable as is the notification sound. There are the usual reply, retweet (both types) and a handy button for pulling the current tab URL into a tweet. It supports multiple accounts and you can change the font size too. Missing is list support, the ability to limit notifications to mentions and messages (useful if you follow tons of people like me) and URL shortening.

iTweet.net – Web-based client. Light on memory and CPU with a nice format for a 600-pixel wide screen. The great thing about iTweet is that it’s very feature-rich and it offers the user a great layout of basic and extend-able information areas. It includes automatic updating although I don’t see any way that you can set it to notify via pop-up or sound. There’s also no way to collapse the input and sidebar which limits the screen space slightly but for for the memory and CPU footprint, it’s one of the best featured solutions I’ve found. A Chrome tab running iTweet takes between 25 and 35MB of RAM which is about 1/3rd of what Tweetdeck takes.

Note: The above two solutions appear to complement each other well. One, a simple notifier and the other, a great web-based search, list and research tool.

Hootsuite – Web based client. This one is for the power user! It’s a huge web application with features that I haven’t even tested out yet. Multi-column and multi-tab support with search, lists, notifications, stats and support for multiple social networks including Facebook and Ping.fm. It’s got everything you would expect from a fully featured client. It certainly takes some CPU to get the application running but once it’s stable and you’ve collapsed the status box and gone full-screen with the browser it provides a good working area. 36MB – 70MB in a Chrome tab in my test.

Twhirl. Adobe Air application. Twhirl used to be my favorite twitter app. It runs in about 70MB (which, like all the solutions here,  can rise as you use the app) and allows multiple account windows and variable font sizes. Searches can be interleaved into the tweet stream too which is great for following an event but there’s no list support which, for me, is a major limitation. It’s still in my arsenal of apps but I rarely use it now. One also gets the impression that Seesmic, the company that bought it, are focusing on their other products.

Dabr.co.uk Web Application. Dabr is a no-fuss web application. Quick and easy with various screen layouts and good support for lists, trends and search. Many photos can be shown inline but there’s a text mode that works very well on even the smallest screen. It will run in a Chrome tab in about 20MB which is about as small as a Chrome tab gets! In Firefox you can throw up three tabs with friends, a list and a search result in about 50MB of RAM and very little CPU load. Tip: Bookmark multiple tabs in one folder and it’s easy to open all the bookmarks in a folder in one go. No auto-refresh available on this application.

The ‘not-so-good’ list.

I’ve taken a look at some of the more popular web and windows-based solutions and these are the ones that didn’t work out well on my ultra mobile PC or netbook.

Brizzly. Web-based client. Basically, Brizzly is a screen space hog. On my 1440×900 monitor here I saw a total of 5 tweets on-screen. Can you imagine how that looks on a netbook?!

Tweetdeck.  Adobe Air application. Tweetdeck is a fantastic twitter application and up until today, it’s been my most often-used solution but it’s not very CPU and memory-friendly. Expect 150MB or more of RAM usage. If you’re on a limited RAM budget, 150MB is way too much. This application is the reason I started the search for something more efficient.

Seesmic Web. A great web-based application and comparable to Hootsuite above. It’s not as screen friendly as Hootsuite as it includes a permanent top and sidebar. It does have a nice single-column text mode though which is good for getting a lot of tweets on the screen.  Memory footprint is comparable to Hootsuite although I get the feeling (untested) that it’s putting a bigger load on the CPU.

Seesmic Windows Application. Running initially in about 75MB of RAM I found Seesmic to be a big load on the CPU. Using my U820 as the test bed (for all the apps here) I noticed the fan coming on more than is usual. Fan noise is a good indicator of battery drain so I dropped it fairly quickly.

Yoono. Firefox plugin. Plugins are usually small little applets that do one thing very well. Yoono is different. It’s a full suite of social tools in a plugin and it’s got the memoryfprint to prove it. After installing it, my startup Firefox memory usage went from 39MB to 140MB.  I uninstalled it.

There are thousands of Twitter applications out there. The Twitter Fan Wiki is  great list if you’re looking for something specific.

Tip: As with all Web-based apps, choose your Web browser carefully. Firefox 3.6 and Chrome are working out well for me right now as they seem to process web applications a lot quicker than other browsers. Opera 10.5 is also good and includes the great mobile-friendly ‘turbo’ and ‘fit-to-page’ feature but it has a big memory footprint which is probably because of Opera’s Unite and Link integration.

Security Note: Authorising via Oauth or passing your username and password to multiple applications is a sure way to increase the risk of your account being hacked. It’s already happened to me through a previously authorised web application that was hacked and it’s not funny to see rude and spam tweets going out from ‘you’ to your friends. When you’ve finished testing out a series of twitter apps, change your password and revoke the Oauth permissions through your Twitter connections page.

As I mentioned before, you might have already settled on a Netbook or ultra mobile PC solution for twitter. If so, tell us about it below and I’ll be happy to update this post. (And don’t forget to follow me: @chippy)

I had hoped to get a big big updated version of the mobile computing guide out before the end of 2009 but time was definitely not on my side. I’ve done a lot of work on it but it’s going to take many more hours before it’s finished. In the meantime, the late 2008 version is still available as a re-flowable PDF and is still worth reading if you’re thinking about buying a mobile computer, tablet, MID or other mobile computing device this year.

Click on the image to download the free 28-page PDF.

PDF now removed. New version of this book is planned for Q4 2010

If you want to view it online, use the links below.

Part One: ‘What is an Ultra Mobile PC.’ We give you a history of Ultra Mobile computing, show you how the devices break down into segments and show you what each segment is capable of.

Part Two: ‘Details and Choices.’ It covers the form factors, the keyboard, storage, the screen and connectivity elements of an Ultra Mobile PC. You’ll find a good overview and a lot of tips that will help you refine your choice.

Part Three ‘Details and Choices continued‘ continues the details about the components and covers CPU (including a detailed overview of the currently available solutions) GPU, memory, battery, weight and cost.

Part Four: ‘Additional Information and further reading.‘ In this section we cover some of the less commonly found features on Ultra Mobile computers and give you information and links to further reading resources.

If you find the buyers guide useful, think about donating. It all goes back into making UMPCPortal a better place.