Introducing Origami

I don’t remember if we registered the name, but “Origami” was the name of a handheld PC created by National Semiconductor and announced at Comdex in 2001. It used the NatSemi Geode processor and had Bluetooth, camcorder, mp3 player, a little keyboard and other gizmos built in. It ran Windows XP Embedded and had applications like Windows Media, NetMeeting and IE. Since NatSemi worked closely with Microsoft on this project, the origin of this Origami project at Microsoft is pretty obvious.

We called it Origami because you could twist the components in your hand like a Rubiks Cube or Transformer robot. You twisted things around depending on the functionality and form factor you wanted. Twist one way and it’s a camcorder. Twist it another way and — presto whammo! — it’s a cell phone. Untwist everything around and you have the boring (but very functional) tablet PC introduced in this video. This was easily the coolest product that NatSemi had ever created, so naturally the company sold the division that created it to AMD a couple of years ago.

Off topic but – New Office12 visuals are now public!

http://www.microsoft.com/office/preview/uioverview.mspx

OFFTOP For Rob:

Is Rob a sycophant? If you are a blog publisher, you might lose your reader’s attention using words like this. I’ve developed a service for publishers and readers that allows a reader to use an online reference, such as a dictionary, and return directly to the post they were reading.

Try it by clicking the link below:
http://www.postref.com/postref/?url=http://scobleizer.wordpress.com/2006/03/09/introducing-origami&lookup=sycophant&toolset=Dictionary&tool=Encarta%20Dictionary

I’m surprised I still haven’t seen a vid or screenshot of someone using Remote Desktop with the UMPC. The thing is a full Windows PC, so it should be capable, and it’s an extremely useful feature that few people even know about (I use it almost any time I go out of town to hook into my home PC, and folks usually flip out when they see it)

Considering the only other mobile device presently on the market with a form factor nearly the same as the Origami is the Etch-A-Sketch, I thought it would be helpful for potential Origami buyers to compare their feature sets:

Weight: Origami 2.5 lbs, Etch-A-Sketch 1 lb; Winner Etch-A-Sketch.

Able to use Microsoft software: Origami yes, Etch-A-Sketch no; This is a tie depending on your perspective.

Requires batteries: Origami yes, Etch-A-Sketch no: winner Etch-A-Sketch.

Cost: Origami $500+, Etch-A-Sketch $39; winner Etch-A-Sketch

Ergonomic control: Origami one wheel, Etch-A-Sketch seperate vertical and horizontal control wheels; Another tie depending on your perspective.

Winner: Etch-A-Sketch

Mike: that’s funny!

Now, can you run iTunes on your Etch-a-sketch?

Oh, and the Etch-a-sketch has evil DRM. After all, you can’t share your sketches with anyone else!

Trainwreck.

not only using it as a remote desktop, but I can see it as a home remote x-10 controller, securtiy cams etc.

Just like the $25000 home automation systems remotes.

When will these start using e-paper?

Battery life: too short to be useful (3 hours)
Weight: too heavy to be truly portable (2lbs)
Size: too big to fit in your pocket (7″)
Price: too expensive for Joe Public

http://anonymousprogrammer.blogspot.com/2006/03/underwhelmed-by-hype.html

hmmm…less powerful than my laptop…just about as functional as a Treo…*yawn*…why is Microsoft doing this again?

Nick: I didn’t realize a Treo can run Photoshop or iTunes. Got it.

Scoble, quit with the running Photoshop on it crap. Nobody will want to run Photoshop on this thing. Its too underpowered to run PS anyways.

Visually, it reminds me of a Newton. But I’m not buying anything like this that has a hard disk inside…too fragile imho.

Thanks for the video Robert – I like the look of the thing, though 3 hours battery life is a bit offputting. A ruggedised version might be good – slung around in the car / garden / (dinner)party / pub? There comes a point during a lot of social occasions nowadays when phones come out, photos are taken / exchanged and this could, if it were rugged enough, be a part of that “internet for the everyday” exchange.
Re: pre-launch hype – you can’t win, seems to me: keeping quiet and no excitement is generated, leaking info and the web effect kicks in. Stick with the latter would be my suggestion, FWIW.

Scobes, the careful reader will note that I said it had “just about” the same functionality as a Treo
Other than that, I can’t imagine myself using Photoshop on this thing given it’s specs and iTunes isn’t enough to make me shell out the coin to buy it.

As usual, I agree with Christopher Coulter on this. Typical Microsoft.

I wrote up a lengthy review of this concept (I’m in no hurry to actually try one until some retail store has the nerve to leave one unguarded next to the regular laptops):

http://macbeach.blogspot.com/2006/03/thick-as-brick.html

In short: Battery life is still abysmal. I want something that will last months, not hours. I’d settle for a couple of days, but 2-3 hours is ridiculous.

Can it be dropped on a carpeted floor (or based on that ad showing a bike rider checking directions, on asphalt) without cracking wide open or at best, something inside coming loose?

How hard can you poke the display before something stops working? I always got Palm Pilots with covers so that when not in use they could go in a briefcase and have things land on top of them with no harm. I don’t want something that both has important data on it and must be handled with kid gloves. This is the downfall of all such portable devices, unless you can con your employer to foot the bill for the original, and the several replacements you will need.

Color LCDs, without exception, do not work well in bright (as in sun) light. The good old reflective LCDs like our digital watches are made of reflect light, and use almost no power to boot, but of course we HAVE to have color now don’t we? Which means that you have to either shade these things if you are going to read them outdoors or have them so bright that you have much reduced battery life. Take your pick.

Since I don’t run a bicycle currier service, I’d rather have the longer battery life than the ultra bright display. Maybe one of these days they will come out with a device that allows you to get a few extra hours of batter life in exchange for turning your brightness down. Now that would be innovative wouldn’t it?

For Microsoft, this thing sells additional Windows licenses, and sadly, that is still about as far as the MS business model goes. Samsung and other companies are taking the risk of unsold inventory here. One of these days maybe Microsoft will “bet the company” on some revolutionary new hardware, with razor thin margins, it will be a business that only the loss leading XBox has prepared them for. This device isn’t that revolution though, for the company, or for consumers.

could you add audiofile & picture gallery on channel 9? it would be smaller.

I have a Nokia 770 and I think most comments about UMPC’s are missing the point. It’s for all those things that the desktop and laptop and PDA do poorly. It’s a second or a third computer.

You’re not tethered to one location as you are with a desktop and, really, a laptop. It’s instant-on. I surf for a few minutes here, a few minutes there, when I can’t get upstairs to a computer. 800 pixels wide, so you don’t have that awful PDA surfing experience.

I check email from all kinds of spots I didn’t before (warming up the car, waiting for the kids).

I can control my desktop — run any of my Windows apps there (yes, the Nokia 770 runs Linux; no problem) when I don’t have some app/capability on the 770.

Read e-books whenever I have to wait (boiling water for tea; waiting for the train). Play music while I read. Watch video. Play games. (Let my kids play a game while THEY have to wait for me.)

Read in bed (770 weighs only 6 ounces).

Make notes — in meetings, in the lunchroom — without having to bring my heavy laptop.

Once I borrowed a Bluetooth phone and surfed all the way into NYC on the train. Then walked all the way down to work, still surfing.

Yeah, sure, I’m addicted to the web. Extending my web access is what I want. But I don’t think I’m alone in this . . .

“I want something that will last months, not hours. I’d settle for a couple of days, but 2-3 hours is ridiculous.”

Are there any mobile, lightweight computing devices running full blown OSes like OS X or XP (not some lightweight Linux variation) that last 2 days of continuous use on a single battery charge?

Please give me some links cuz I would be very interested in getting one.

…

Oh! You mean there aren’t any devices that do that? Funny that.

BTW, most of you are missing the point of “The Photoshop Argument”. I’m sure Scoble knows running PS on this thing is impractical for production use. It the resolution is too low and the processing power is not adequate for professional-level work.

The reason for bringing it up is that if this device can run PS (which it can), then it can run just about any useful desktop application. This hints at the potential range of applications that you can run on this device effectively.

Ariel, you undermine your own defense of Scoble’s continuing misleading claim that Photo shop can be run on an Origami device. The truth of the matter is that it hasn’t been proven that PS can be run. And, even if someone were able to establish that, no one would want to run Photoshop on an Origami device. Anyone who can afford one can also afford a desktop or a laptop. That is where he is going to run Photoshop. The devices will used as supplemental entities, if they don’t prove to be DOA.

I raised a warning about a similar misleading claim on this thread yesterday. I said that Microsoft should have been more honest about the likely cost of Origami devices. Turns out that the Samsung device is even higher priced than the highest price point I had read about. It will sell for $1,190. More than twice the $500 figure one saw most often. Wiggle out of that, Scoble.

To sum up my feelings about Origami:

iPod > Origami
PSP > Origami
Nokia N90 > Origami
Treo 700w > Origami
Palms > Origami
Apple II > Origami

This will be a flop.

Microsoft. lol

“Are there any mobile, lightweight computing devices running full blown OSes like OS X or XP (not some lightweight Linux variation) that last 2 days of continuous use on a single battery charge?”

As far as I know, no. That doesn’t make a reason to buy this one though does it? If you are obsessed about running photoshop on a pocket device (which this isn’t) then by all means go out and get one. You did notice the LONG pause when the question was asked about Photoshop, no?

The Nokia 770 device has about the same 3-hour run time. That is with a slower processor and less memory, and no hard drive. Clue: it’s the display folks, not the processor.

The question is not whether Microsoft and its partners have done a better job than Nokia has or Apple might, the question is, given today’s technology, can such a device be well done at all. The answer is, without making significant compromises: NO.

Microsoft will gladly support any technology, be in pocket computers, cell phones or talking toasters that allow it to sell copies of Windows. they don’t care whether the product makes sense or not, because they don’t end up stuck with the unsold inventory. XBox would be profitable if Microsoft could convince some poor sucker like Sony to foot the bill for the hardware.

To paraphrase Steve Balmer: it’s all about licenses, licenses, licenses, licenses, licenses, licenses, licenses.

Endless repetition of a theme seems to have a hypnotic effect on some people. Such people and their money are soon parted. By all means, go buy one of the things. Buy several. You’ll need ‘em.

http://www.mitsubishi-mobile.com/products/pen/cp/amity_cp.htm

After all the hype, the irony is that there is really nothing new here. Devices of this nature have been available in the past. We used the device linked to above at work for a couple yr back when Win98 was the ‘in’ desktop OS of the day……and Win2K was *just* coming to market.

Undoubtedly, a few improvements have been made, but the overall concept is nearly identical.