Qualcomm has long been at the forefront of the smartbook movement and today (Nov. 19) it showed journalists that its money and its mouth were strongly aligned…
The company demonstrated three exciting concepts in London,, the first a traditional smartbook model with impressive styling and the other two more radical futuristic takes on a next generation MID and tablet.
Speaking to Tech Radar, Qualcomm’s Ben Timmons revealed a fully-working smartbook model (above) based around the 1-GHz Snapdragon chipset, and built by third party manufacturer Quanta. He did not get into specifics, but did admit the cost of such a machine should be considerably less than a netbook, while promising better battery life and integrated HSDPA. In short, everything we hope the sector will provide.
Next up were two far more futurist models, the first a MID-style touchscreen device (right) running Windows Mobile 6.5 and the latter a non-working prototype tablet with detachable wireless keyboard (bottom). Again, Timmons was unable to go into specifics, but he did admit that the MID was likely to be a niche device while the tablet was an indication of the type of designs he hoped would evolve out of the smartbook platform.
Happily all three do look like they could find a place in consumers’ hearts and, if the price is right, we could well be witnessing the birth of an even bigger sector than we had imagined.
Gordon
