Sharp’s netbook-cum-MID is something of a surprise–a shrunken laptop running an ARM CPU and Ubuntu linux, like the Zauruses of yore.
Featuring a 1024×600 pixel display, an 800MHz Freescale chip, 4GB of flash storage and 512MB of RAM, it won’t challenge the latest from Asus and MSI on the performance front. But, like the perpetually sold-old Umid mBook, it has both a “real” qwerty keyboard and a pocket-friendly format.
The big claims, to my eye, are the 10 hour battery life and a 3-second boot time. If those are true, it’ll be a real contender. Type on these tiny keyboards, though, is a chore: Sony’s Vaio P is the smallest I’ve been comfortable with in the past.
Expect a price point around $500.
NetWalker, Sharp’s Latest Ubuntu Netbook… Is the Zaurus back? – Hands-On !!! [Akihabara News via Lilliputing and Engadget]
I am tempted, dangerously tempted. Assuming the Pandora ever gets out of preproduction, I may have to let them battle it out to the death for my heart(and wallet), possibly bringing in the n900 for a three way match.
Yay for options, eh Phisrow?
The Pandora already has my heart, but the n900 may become my new phone later on.
I’m just glad this “Smartbook” niche is starting to take off. I really do want the power of a Desktop OS in my pocket.
I really wonder if it actually has 512MB RAM, though. Almost all of the Cortex-A8 based SoCs have 512MB divided evenly between RAM and flash storage, where the quickboot OS would actually reside, as far as I know anyway.
If only it had the rotating screen like the SL-Cxxxx series. Otherwise, perfect!
@Musicalwoods: TI’s Cortex-A8 SoCs are offered in a 256MB RAM/ 256MB flash stacked chip package, which seems to be the primary cause of so many A8 devices shipping that way.
By the look of the datasheet(linked in the article) the i.MX515 ships bare; but supports a variety of flavors of external memory. Given that, I’d assume that they mean what they say.