Looks like a very ambitious machine, especially since durability, economy and simplicity were the starting ideals.
I must say though, my first thought is: good luck touch-typing on a virtual keyboard.
Update: it seems it's canceled. [Thanks to Bert.]
4 comments:
This looks brilliant. For an ultra small compact book like device I'd be interested. It probably wouldn't replace my main computer and be the place I type a lot so the keyboard isn't critical as long as it's usable. I'd like to see what develops out of the idea of "synthesized input devices". For example, how well would a virtual piano keyboard work. You know if you play a melody running up a scale could the keyboard scroll up to higher octaves. I'm sure there would be resistance from many to a touch keyboard but I'm excited to see what they make it do. I'm curious about the cost difference (to manufacture) between a screen and a keyboard.
The thing I liked was not the laptop mode (though cellphones now have e-ink and LCD keypads, so they are "usable") but the tablet/board game mode, and the color book mode.
As for screen v's keyboard cost to manufacture, I am sure it's getting on a par. The MTBF should be higher on the screen, and one neat trick is the internationalization issues. Can you imagine changing every key from a reagular latin qwerty to maybe Greek, Cyrillic, Japanese. The possibilities are endless.
The original XO is fine as an e-book reader and okay for emails, but there is something about the flash memory that makes it slow in general.
Not so sure this will ever see the light of day, start digging here for details.
Thanks, I will "dig", 'cuz I did notice the page seemed rather old, over 18 months.
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