Somebody finally did it; and it was Motorola
The specs of smartphones today rival those of netbooks and some low end notebooks. The Motorola Atrix 4G was touted as above average in the power department. Motorola is onto something, and I think this paradigm is the future in the post-PC era.
The Atrix 4G touts a dual core CPU running at 1Ghz and a GB of RAM. The reviews of this “phone” haven’t been stellar.
This little Android based powerhouse has a 4 inch qHD display, delivering 950×540 resolution and 24bit color. Note that’s a 16.9 aspect ration. The screen is said to be a victim of glare when using it outside due to its glossy screen. Also, the average reception is about on par with the iPhone 4.
So basically, you have a 11mm thick phone with a lot of horsepower, a pretty decent screen, average battery life, and a built in fingerprint reader. It does stand head and shoulders above the completion in one area, though. Accessories.
Someone finally did it. Someone finally did something that seems so obvious I’m surprised it took this long to happen. They’ve turned their smartphone into a potential laptop replacement. Maybe this is a little before its time, but I think we’ll see this more and more.
For the Atrix, its all about the accessories like the lapdock. It’s ultra thin, super light, and super cool if you ask me. This 2.4 pound clamshell device is like a zombie laptop. It just needs the Atrix brains to be plugged in.
It has an 11.6 inch screen, full sized keyboard, and a trackball. Oh, and did I mention two USB ports? It also charges the Atrix when it’s plugged in. All for the currently hefty price of $299.99.
Since it’s Android 2.2, you get your flash games and apps. A true web experience. Just fire up Firefox 3.6 with Flash support and go to town; or Farmville.
Now its not a true laptop in the traditional sense of the word, it is still powered by a phone. Yet, imagine if this phone ran Android 3.0, the version of Android built from the ground up to support larger screens? Then, combine that with Google Docs.
Will someone end up making an aftermarket equivalent for the iPhone? Would Apple even allow such a thing? Maybe when iOS 4.3 reaches the iPhone? Where’s blackberry in this mix? Or Nokia?
There are only two other manufacturers I would expect to see something like this from, HTC and Samsung. HTC’s products like the flyer and their upcoming phones like the thunderbolt (WOW, this phone looks cool) [Verizon] as well as popular Inspire phone [ATT] models make HTC the elephant in the room few people are talking about.
Nielsen’s Jan. ‘11 chart shows manufacturer market share. Yes, Android may be the top smartphone platform, but Apple is in a fight with RIM for a fight as top manufacturer. Checkout the Red boxes, though. Those are all HTC. If Apple and RIM are both at 27%, note that HTC is at 19%+ (There’s a small clump of red in the WebOS column). Yes, it’s seven to eight percent lower than Apple and RIM, but it’s a solid 3rd place globally.
Once those guys figure out to start standardizing phone geometry and IO ports, watch out.
iPad 2 Graphics Much Faster Than iPad 1, Motorola Xoom
Well, the reports are coming in and the iPad 2 seems to have some killer graphics capabilities. Although it had no drastic improvements over the original iPad, it’s a full 3rd thinner and a little lighter.
One thing that’s really impressive about the iPad 2 is the reported graphics benchmarks. Our friends at AnandTech have done some deep analysis and as you can see, the iPad 2’s GPU capability are vastly improved. This chart represents running a benchmark with anti-aliasing turned off. Anti-aliasing makes graphics look better by softening the edges, thus making the image more appealing and realistic. Without the anti-aliasing (AA) turned on, the iPad2 is 5.4 times faster than the original iPad, and 3.7 times the speed of the Xoom. With AA enabled, the iPad 2 is 7 times faster than the original iPad. Click the image to read their analysis.
iSuppli did a full teardown and the shiney new iPad 2 (32GB 3G version) that sells for $729. That unit costs about $336.50 to make. They gave All Things Digital some info and they posted it on their site.
Not all is good in happy Apple good-good super friendly land. Seems some people aren’t really digging the cameras along with a few other complaints. After see a few comments and I decided to Google ipad2 cameras suck to see how big of
a deal it is.
1,190,000 as I’m writing this, 1,190,001 after I post this. Replacing ipad2 with ipad<space>2 resulted in 1.560M results.
I’m sure they’ll be improved in the iPad 3.
Good news from Engadget, also. The iPad 2 has been jail-broken, but no ETA on the public release.
The iPad 2 is certainly a hot commodity! Also, I *totally* called it. You don’t want to be seen at SXSW without an iPad 2. Apple is crashing the event by opening a temporary store. The press is going bananas, as usual.
If Google is an advertising company, and Microsoft is a.. well, I don’t know what Microsoft is anymore, then Apple is a marketing company. The differences couldn’t be more stark, and the Apple marketing machine has another coup on its hands.
Apple Store iPad 2 lines and What “loser” will have an original iPad at SXSW?
Traditionally, Apple has stolen a lot of thunder from competitors by releasing their products before trade shows and conventions. Then, during the opening days of the convention, throwing juicy sales figures onto the PR wire to steal headlines. The press are in overdrive anyway, and when this meat gets thrown into the frenzy it gives reporters something to use to contrast, compare, and analyze. It’s brilliant really.
I don’t want to take anything away from the tragedy of the earthquake in Japan, but today is the official first day of iPad availability.
Remember the mob scene for the iPhone 4? Remember some random local person grabbing 15 minutes of fame by living on the sidewalk outside the Apple store in order to be first in line? A real world manifestation of “first post”? You decide.
The iPad is not the iPhone, so it’s not a fair comparison when it comes to actual market demand. The upfront costs are much higher for the iPad, so the market is smaller. However, the hyperbole around tablets has reached a fever pitch. The Hype machines are in full gear lately.
At the iPad 2 event, Apple proclaimed we are now in the post PC era. Apple proclaimed that they believed it is wrong (with “every fiber of their being”) to compare their tablet technology to other tablet technology based on technical specifications (aka, the technology). Apple is so very, very good and making a product unveiling look and feel like some kind of great discovery. They personalize the story of the product, and speak to the coolness factor of the experience. It’s usually a great story; and one of the most effective and influential sales tactics in the modern era.
Hype was taken to whole new level with the Verizon iPhone. The Verizon iPhone was heralded as the savior to everything and anything that could possibly put the iPhone in a negative light. Apple touted 1M phones pre-sold. The ads flooded our TVs with images of anticipation. The countdown was on! OMG, if you weren’t in line to get your new Verizon iPhone you were going to be left using that crappy ATT network. It was a new day, a new dawn, a new iPhone for you, and it was going to feel good!
Verizon had people come in early as a stampede of clamoring consumers were expected to overwhelm Verizon retail outlets everywhere. I don’t think it went off as planned or hoped. Maybe it’s a great example of how a vocal minority can influence the larger debate. If the iPhone on ATT sucked so bad, where was the tsunami of customers?
I personally had high hopes that the Verizon iPhone would greatly improve on the ATT iPhone. I would have really helped the rest of us who have to talk to iPhone users who sound like they are yelling at us from inside a duffel bag. The Verizon iPhone has a similar antenna issue at the ATT iPhone, so I guess not. Maybe the iPhone manufacturers aren’t working enough of their employees to the point of suicide. Or maybe the antenna engineers were too busy designing the suicide safety nets around the factories in China to address it? Perhaps Apple’s innovation efforts have been less focused on the products themselves and more on finding ways to keep the assembly line workers from successfully killing themselves?
It’s not by accident the Verizon iPhone release happened right before the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. On opening day of MWC, some noted the absence of an Apple press release touting weekend sales of the iPhone. The Verizon iPhone launch day was sort of a bust in comparison to the launch of the iPhone 4. Maybe ATT is better at creating a media circus and a consumer frenzy? Or is it something else? Perhaps that iPhone market share growth has just been stagnate lately?
They unveiled their newer, thinner, faster iPad with cameras, and declared 2011 the year of the iPad 2. A lot of people are very excited about it and can’t wait to get theirs and post their impressions on Facebook.
Will some of them have buyer’s remorse and post that, too?
It’s no accident the iPad 2 is going on sale today, either. South by Southwest (SXSW), the annual music, film, and interactive festival in Austin starts today. And what self respecting social / Internet nerd wants to be seen at SXSW carrying around an original iPad (shudder)?
The iPad 1 is so 2010…
So this morning I sipped my coffee and looked at the iPad 2 stories under the fold. Online sales seem to be brisk as delivery dates went from a few days to a few weeks on the Apple online store. A few well timed press releases and artificial shortages are drumming up breathless accounts of continued hysteria. There are a few customers in lines and stories about them and the predictable hype about total Apple’s absolute domination of the world of all things mobile.
I think there’s going to be a LOT of iPad 1s on craigslist next week.