Yes,
everyone's going crazy over the
Ultra-Mobile PC
(UMPC), the new class of handheld devices that run Windows XP and are supposed to be the best thing since sliced bread
(sliced bread with
two and a
half hours of battery life, but that's a different story). I don't know what all the hype is about, really. My
Apple Newton 2100, which was discontinued about a decade ago, does just about everything else a UMPC does, and has a
similar form factor. Let's do a modest feature comparison.
According to Microsoft, a UMPC boasts:
- A touch screen. My Newton does as well. Check.
- WiFi
connectivity. Using the drivers written by Hiroshi
Noguchi and any 5 volt Lucent/Orinoco/Agere WaveLAN, I can connect to an 802.11b access point for internet (using
either the NewtScape or Net Hopper browsers), email (with SimpleMail), IM (over jabber with NewtJabber), blogging (with nBlog) and web hosting (with NPDS. Go here to check out a few live Newton web servers). Check.
- Bluetooth connectivity. With a compatible card and the Blunt driver, I'm exchanging/synchronizing data with my desktop Mac and enjoying
wireless printing from my Newt.
Check.
- A good sized hard drive. Ok, the UMPC has me beat, but with Paul Guyot's ATA Harddisk/Flashcard drivers, I can have a few gigs of
storage space available to me. Check.
- Digital music. MAD Newton lets me store and play Mp3's. Heck, I
can even stream internet radio and download music directly to my Newt from
iTunes 3. Check.
- Movies on the go. Well, I can watch The Simpsons and South Park on my Newt. Check.
- Customizable wallpaper. Thanks to Avi's
Backdrop, I have a picture of my daughter as my Newton's "wallpaper," and there's a slew of other images I can choose from. Check.
- Word Processing/Spreadsheet apps. Newtonworks. Check.
- An optional,
external keyboard. Check.
In fact, I'll say "good luck" to anyone trying to enter information onto a UMPC without the keyboard, while
the 2100's handwriting recognition is great.
- A weight of about two pounds.
Check.
- A 7" diagonal display. Actually, the Newt's display can rotate to either
landscape or portrait. Double check.
- Entertainment. Well, I can play games and read
books, plus all of the other stuff I mentioned. So, check.
- Plays nice with both Windows and
Apple desktops. Ooh, sorry! This one appears to be Newton only. Now how did that get on the
list?
Plus, the Newt gets a lot more that 2.5 hours of battery life (?!?), boots almost immediately since
there's no hard drive, has a built in voice recorder and does all of the PIM stuff you'd want to do. Really, people.
There's nothing to see here with "Origami." Move along.
Note: This is all a bit of tongue-in-cheek
fun, folks.
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