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Handhelds Communications Hardware

Phone As Your Next Computer? 244

Posted by michael from the ubiquity dept.
Octagon Most writes "Newsweek magazine ponders if a mobile phone will be 'Your Next Computer' and enlists Frog Design to mock-up an 'Integrated Fusion Device'. With mobile phones selling at a rate of 650 million per year and climbing, there are already three times as many phones in use as personal computers. PalmOne's Jeff Hawkins predicts that devices like the Treo will become the new centers of our digital lives as millions of people own phones but not computers."
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Phone As Your Next Computer? More

Phone As Your Next Computer?

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  • I am shocked (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 04, 2004 @12:02PM (#9335546)
    Someone at Palm predicting their device will become the center of our lives.

  • /. effect (Score:3, Funny)

    by millahtime ( 710421 ) on Friday June 04, 2004 @12:02PM (#9335548) Homepage Journal
    Imagine the /. effect from that many devices

  • my next pc? are you crazy? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Mz6 ( 741941 ) * on Friday June 04, 2004 @12:03PM (#9335554) Journal
    Jesus Christ... My cell phone can barely be called a phone based upon it's service track and they want to make it my next PC? Is anyone else in the same line of thinking here?

    "One hundred nineteen hours, 41 minutes and 16 seconds. That's the amount of time Adam Rappoport, a high-school senior in Philadelphia, has spent talking into his silver Verizon LG phone since he got it as a gift last Chanukah. That's not even the full extent of his habit. He also spends countless additional hours using his phone's Internet connection to check sports scores, download new ringtones (at a buck apiece) and send short messages to his friends' phones, even in the middle of class. "I know the touch-tone pad on the phone better than I know a keyboard," he says. "I'm a phone guy."

    So this kid spends an average of 1025 minutes a MONTH on his cell phone? That rivals most business people.. And I would hate to be the parent who pays that bill including the ungodly amount of ringtones that he probably also already has.

    • Re:my next pc? are you crazy? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by rjstanford ( 69735 ) on Friday June 04, 2004 @12:13PM (#9335706) Homepage Journal
      So this kid spends an average of 1025 minutes a MONTH on his cell phone?

      Why is that so weird? Think about it. You're being overwhelmed by a large number. First, divide 1025 by 60 to see that its 19 hours. There. Already that doesn't sound so bad. 19 hours a month. Divide by four. Round up. That's five hours a week.

      NEWSFLASH! High school student talks on phone for five hours a week! Parents and community amazed! Film at 11!

      C'mon. Most, if not all, of those minutes were probably used in the evenings, or on weekends, when they're unmetered anyway. Since when was this excessive phone usage for an eighteen year old? Just because its a celphone, not a regular cordless phone?

      I mean, really.
    • My cell phone can barely be called a phone based upon it's service track and they want to make it my next PC?

      While I sincerely doubt that phones will be the next PC, I do think that you'll see some merging between the various carry on devices. Imagine for a moment, something about the size of a standard Palm Pilot or PocketPC device. It's fully connected to the Internet via wireless, has a built in harddrive, and a pencil thin pull out "handset" that talks to the main unit via Bluetooth.

      This device would let you check your email, store extra files (which can be synced via bluetooth), keeps track of your calendar and alerts, and would allow an exchange of business cards via wireless connections (IR or Bluetooth). When a phone call comes in, it will buzz until you remove the handset (fitted similar to a the stylus of a typical Palm) and press the accept button. Notes can be entered via handwriting recognition, or a virtual keyboard [ananova.com] projected onto a surface.

      Now you may not find this device tremendously useful. But it would be a God-send for people who carry a Cell Phone, PDA, BlackBerry, and Laptop.

      • Convergence devices are crap. (Score:5, Interesting)

        by *weasel ( 174362 ) on Friday June 04, 2004 @01:04PM (#9336264)
        Convergence devices are crap.

        I'd rather see a standard for wireless personal data network access and portable storage -- and let individual devices miniaturize and specialize.

        E.g.
        I don't want a camera phone with a bad camera interface, crappy resolution, limited features, tiny memory and nonexistant output choices.

        Instead I'd like to be able to buy a wireless data storage device: HD, Flash, Removable media, whatever - it doesn't matter. Just an independent device that stores data and can wirelessly transmit it to devices that need it over a common protocol (bluetooth would be fine).

        Then I can buy a phone that grabs my contact list, ringtones and games from there. No more having content locked to a service provider or a device. Then I can buy a PDA which uses the portable storage for apps, data, contact list, etc. Then I can buy an MP3 player, a digital camera, etc, etc.

        I don't need my screen and battery life being sucked out of my phone when I'm just listening to MP3s. I don't need PDA processing burning through my battery when I just want to use the phone. I don't need a device which tries to wrap one bad interface around a half dozen sepcialized functions.

        Furthermore, I want to be able to take my mp3 player or my phone into the gym, or the corporate offices of my clients, while leaving the camera functionality in the car so I don't violate the camera bans.

        Not to mention the benefit of finally being free of the nonportability of data. No more duplicating contact lists to new devices. No more shuffling CF cards between the MP3 player, the camera, and the PDA. No more waiting for the right device to show up with the right storage solution.

        Of course, I'm not holding my breath.
        • I'm afraid I disagree with you on convergence devices being "crap". For example, my DVD player is also a CD Player, a VCD Player, and an MP3 CD Player. Does this bother me? No! I love it!

          The real difficulty in convergence devices is that they're hard to do right. e.g. I think that Camera Phones are a really dumb idea. The core concept (catching impromptu moments) is sound, but the execution sucks. Similarly, I don't want to buy an extra headphone gizmo to listen to MP3s on my Sony Clie. By the time I've bought the headphones, a large memory stick, and fought through their proprietary software, I'll find that it would have been cheaper and easier just to get an MP3 player in the first place!

          It's for this reason that I left MP3 and Camera features off my list. Do these features really make sense? Well, I didn't plan for headphones, so MP3s would require more hardware. (I only planned for a pullout handset for talking on the phone. You *could* listen to music that way, but holding a pencil-like object near your ear would get pretty tedious.) I also didn't add a camera, so I need more hardware still. How am I going to fit this in a device that's already packed?

          Let's look at it from another angle, however. Let's take the convergence device I suggested. First and foremost, it's a bluetooth enabled hard drive. On top of that, it's an internet connected, bluetooth hard drive. Plus it can make and receive cell phone calls (using VOIP perhaps?). Add a decent screen and handwriting recognition and you've got a PDA on steroids. The projected keyboard would be "cool", but not absolutely required for a first gen device.

          Now, let's say that someone comes out with a "multimedia convergence add-on". This is a device that looks like today's memory card MP3 player. But instead of an internal memory, it connects to your supercharged, bluetooth enabled, hard drive. It gets MP3s from there, and can even stream radio stations over the Internet. Now how long will it take someone to add the camera to this MP3 device? Now you can listen to music AND take pictures, but store the results (plus email, upload, etc.) on your PDA device.

          How's that for a good design?
          • Your example isn't quite what most consider a convergence device. It's performing essentially the same operations through slightly different media. It plays audio, or it plays audio and video.

            I'm talking more about devices that try to take functionality that is dissimilar at its core: say talking on the phone, and taking pictures.

            A single-purpose DVD player interface looks and functions much like a single-purpose CD player interface. The hardware requirements for both are quite similar. laser, decoders
    • In all honesty, I think his habits have probably grown from a situation where he doesn't have to foot the bill. It reminds me of CEOs who have ridiculously expensive laptops - if they had to actually plonk down the cash out of their own wallets instead of just having their company buy it for them, they'd stop being so silly.

      Or at least, you'd HOPE they would.

    • My cell phone can barely be called a phone based upon it's service track and they want to make it my next PC?

      It's a well-known quote, but it seems applicable:

      I have always wished that my computer would be as easy to use as my telephone. My wish has come true. I no longer know how to use my telephone.

      - Bjarne Stroustrup

      Cell phones have a long way to go before they replace my computer, and reliability is only part of the problem. Handheld devices inherently require tradeoffs in usability.

      • I remember when an old AT&T "Merlin" PBX system was first installed in an office where I worked.

        After a dumbfounding demonstration of its many features, a colleage muttered under his breath, "They call it 'Merlin,' because you have to be a wizard to figure it out."
    • The oldest generation of cell phone users don't really seem to get it. They leave the phone off because they don't want to charge it, so you can't even reliably reach them. For them the cell phone is for emergency use only.

      Most people I know fit into the next generation. We have our phones with us all the time, but we don't use more than a hundred or so minutes a month. The cell phone is used mostly for making plans.

      The youngest generation might as well have the phone surgically implanted. They'll us

    • So this kid spends an average of 1025 minutes a MONTH on his cell phone? That rivals most business people

      If he uses 1,025 minutes in one month that is equivalent to 12,300 minutes per year. (1,025 x 12 months)

      Which is 33.676283938921307392522844820568 minutes a day. (12,300 / 365.242199 [google.co.uk] days)

      I think if you added up all the little phonecalls through the working day a lot of business people would beat this kid. Sorry for the big numbers but I wanted to

  • Fuck that (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 04, 2004 @12:03PM (#9335557)
    Seriously. Screen size? Input? Output? Assorted other sundry capabilities?

    Phones will not replace computers as they currently stand unless our technology begins to approach near Star Trekian levels (which I'm not entirely ruling out, but won't be for a little while at least). Sure, *some* people might use phones instead of computers, but that's because if they used computers they wouldn't be using computers to their full capacity. They just need an addressbook and a few stupid games anyway, so let them have their PDA-phone. Me, I'll keep my computer.
    • I'll keep my computer too, but I know a lot of people that only use their computer for two things, email and web apps (including the internet).

      Many people found they were able to live with a laptop even though it was less powerfull than most desktops because it was a)powerful enough and b) portable. Obviously cell phones are even less powerful, but if they're a) powerful enough then their portability will win out. Seriously, if a cell phone has a good internet brower, a good email client, a good word pro
    • Seriously. Screen size? Input? Output? Assorted other sundry capabilities?

      After a short stint with holograms, voice recognition and features like that... these would become networked mind controlled implants. No IO required outside your brain.

    • Re:Fuck that (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Cthefuture ( 665326 )
      Imagine a tiny "dock" station that had VGA-out, USB connectors, and ethernet. You wouldn't need it all the time, but when the occasion arises, like to play a game of Quake3 or write a report in Abiword, then you just plug it in and it becomes a normal computer. Pop it out and it goes with you.

      The Internet cafes wouldn't even need computers any more because everyone would carry one with them. All they would need are monitors, keyboards, mice, and a little (cheap) dock thingamajig.
      • I know it's not a phone, but Toshiba PDAs have such a device. It only adds a tiny amount to size but it has VGA and USB ports. These devices actually have more power than most 4-year-old laptops.

        TW

    • Re:Fuck that (Score:3, Interesting)

      by swordboy ( 472941 )
      See Intel's Personal Server [com.com] concept for more information. The bottom line is that we'll all likely being carrying around a replica of our data and operating environment and, like in Soviet Russia, a "dumb terminal" will LOG ONTO YOU. It won't matter what PC you are sitting at - it will look and feel just like your own.

    • Different uses (Score:5, Interesting)

      by AlecC ( 512609 ) <aleccawley@gmail.com> on Friday June 04, 2004 @12:32PM (#9335914)
      At this point, you have got to stop thinking of a computer as a single defined device. Even if you ignore mainframes and restrict yourself to the PC-compatible market, people use computers for many things. Cellphoneas are never going to be web-servers. They are never going to be full-blown geek machines - you are not going to program on them. But probably 90% of users never do anything like that.

      The fact of interest is that CPU power is no longer a restriction - a cellphone has enough oomph to run most applciations that mist users run. Where it lacks, as you point out, is input devices, output devices, and to some extent storage.

      Input on most cellphones is frankly awful for anything other than dialling numbers or very simple menu driven systems. Output on that tiny screen is poor, but not that bad. In fact, if the possibility of it beaing read on a cellphone screen stops people sending HTML email, I'll count that a win. Likewise, storage is enough for most peoples text needs, but will be rapidly drained by images, even still.

      So the "killer feature" to make these work is better input. Of course, one day one day true voice recognition will arrive, delivered by a flight of pigs. Until that porcine dawn, people will keep trying to find other input mechanisms that work. Until they do, I think the proposal by the OP is, so some extent, wishful thinking.

    • Re:Fuck that (Score:4, Interesting)

      by nickco3 ( 220146 ) on Friday June 04, 2004 @12:38PM (#9335973)

      Me, I'll keep my computer.

      And so will I, and so will nearly all Slashdotters. The point is, the market will expand dramtically because many, many people who will never own a PC will own one of these phones; and the phone will be the biggest percentage in this much bigger market.

      Phones supplanting the PC is like the PC supplanting the mainframe. The mainframes didn't go away, there are probably more companies using more mainframes today than there ever were during The Age of The Mainframe. It's just that vast hordes of ordinary people bought PCs, so that's currently the major part of the market. The same will soon be true of phones, they will knock PCs into second place. Nothing really bad will happen to those that own PCs (or mainframes).

  • Vice Versa (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Dachannien ( 617929 ) on Friday June 04, 2004 @12:04PM (#9335564)
    With VoIP services making inroads, and broadband becoming much more popular, perhaps he should have been asking whether your computer will be your next phone.

  • Already is (Score:3, Interesting)

    by SYFer ( 617415 ) <syfer@[ ]er.net ['syf' in gap]> on Friday June 04, 2004 @12:04PM (#9335565) Homepage
    For all practical purposes, mobiles have already become many people's secondary computer at least. For me at least, the mobile has become my defacto "little black book," primary timepiece, alarm clock, egg timer, to-do list, stock ticker, IM device, etc.

    Voice mail on the mobile is actully higher-priority than my e-mail (and spam free for the moment). I think people's overall relationship with their mobiles may even be deeper than with their computers--especially in the world out there beyond slashdot.

    • World? (Score:2, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward
      You mean... there's actually a world outside of this fascinating website? Continue... please.
      • "Interesting, and how does that make you feel?"

        Ananova meets Eliza.

        I imagine the first true voice recognition systems for phone to pc will sound a lot like that.

        Of course, we could outsource that to India, and have typists at $5/day. That would come up to less than a penny per minute. I talk, you type, the computer reads it out to me. I talk some more, you type some more, I hear what the computer says. ...sorry, gotta run, got a patent to file.

        (j/k)

    • Re:Already is (Score:2, Interesting)

      by Sir dies alot ( 782598 )
      Spam free may be fading from the cell phone text messaging sector. Recently (past 2 months or so) I have recieved 2 different advertisements in the form of unsolicited text messages over my LG Sprint cell phone. Although 2 over the span of 2 months is nothing to worry about, there was a time when spam over email was that low too.

      In case anyone was curious, the ads were for some stupid diet pills or something like that.

    • Re:Already is (Score:3, Insightful)

      by glesga_kiss ( 596639 )
      I'm the same. I still use several PCs at home and at work, but my phone can do most of the things I use the PC for. However, I won't use the phone when I've access to a PC, that's just silly. But for checking your todo list, sending short e-mails, listening to mp3s or watching the occassional divx on the bus, my phone is ideal.

      Plus, talking to someone on messenger while you are in the park with beer and nice weather while they are in work is a lot of fun! Especially when you attach a photo to the jibeing.

  • My phone is more powerful than my desktop PC.... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by gagravarr ( 148765 ) * on Friday June 04, 2004 @12:04PM (#9335571) Homepage
    I have three "computers". One is a 1ghz laptop, the second is a desktop 486 (which works just fine for email, IRC etc) I also have a Nokia 6600, which is a series 60 (symbian) phone. It has a 100mhz arm processor powering it, and takes MMC cards for extra storage. It too can do email (IMAP or POP), irc, ssh, and also browse the web (using Opera). Since you can program for it with C++ or Java, there's not a lot you can't then get it to do For a lot of people, it almost does everything they want of a computer (writing documents on it is a bit icky, even with a bluetooth keyboard. Won't be long until someone's done a good word processor for it. It already supports printing via BlueTooth). So, I'd say it's pretty likely that many people (non tech types) will quickly get smart phones like (or just beyond) mine, and just use those
    • Comment removed based on user account deletion
      • I just got a Nokia 6600 and after going through several iterations of Pocket PCs (casio E110, E115, Dell Axim) and just ending up tossing them into the drawer never to be used, I settled with the 6600 and love it -- for what it's designed to do. Occasional browsing the web and doing light email.

        The Dell Axim was my latest PDA attempt and I got a bluetooth card for it and connected to the net via my Sony t610. Pocket Outlook still just sucks for use with a regular ole imap server (I'm sure it's great with

    • Re:My phone is more powerful than my desktop PC... (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Gitcho ( 761501 ) on Friday June 04, 2004 @12:28PM (#9335874)
      Lets not kid ourselves here ... the "convenience-factor" is the issue that will tip the scales. The buying public really only cares if its going to make their lives easier.

      My last job was managing a wireless retail store - and although I happen to drool over specs, most people think benefits, not features.

  • This till be HUGE!!! (Score:3, Funny)

    by funkdid ( 780888 ) on Friday June 04, 2004 @12:05PM (#9335575)
    Once people can get broadband porn on their cellphones, then maybe!

    My cellphone offers the absolute slowest access to e-mail imagineable. I've never tried to pull up a website on it, it can only hold a few lines of text. I have seen some Clie` models that could possibly replace a person's need for a laptop but a PC in the home, I think not.

    • Once people can get broadband porn on their cellphones, then maybe!

      No work will ever get done. Everyone will spend all day surfing for porn at work. How can they block it?

      Just one more piece of undeniable proof that the internet is built on porn

  • Check out the "Mini" (Score:3, Interesting)

    by YetAnotherName ( 168064 ) on Friday June 04, 2004 @12:05PM (#9335584) Homepage
    Artist Howard Hallis came up with The Mini [howardhallis.com] as a concept for such a device.

    Oddly, he created this work of "art" in the medium of "lenticular," those tilt-the-page things to see a different image.

    Still, I wouldn't mind such a device.

  • Finally! (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Jonny Ringo ( 444580 ) on Friday June 04, 2004 @12:06PM (#9335599)
    That's great! Since, I cancelled my cell phones services (because I got sick of people getting a hold of me when I was trying to be OUT) I've been using it only as a address and phone book keeper. I'm excited about other useful features for my out of service cell phone.

    Thank you!

  • This is something (Score:2, Insightful)

    by lancomandr ( 785360 ) *
    that I have been interested in for some time. I have done a lot of reading on wearable interfaces etc, but the mobile phone seems to be a prime unintrusive platform for 24/7 computing. Some phones are coming along with cameras and the like, but it still seems a long way off. I still use text messaging to communicate via AIM on my phone. I think this has the potential to be come a reality with the miniaturization of hardware. Sony Ericsson seems to be leading the industry in putting more computing power into

  • What is what? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Ars-Fartsica ( 166957 ) on Friday June 04, 2004 @12:07PM (#9335620)
    Hawkins says we will own phones but not computers. But the Treo can also be seen as a small-form-factor computer with built-in telephony. Its just a matter of whose stock you own.

    In any case, until hands shrink or eyes focus more tightly or web sites start publishing for 100x100 displays, there are going to be big monitors and keyboards that will likely be connected to big boxes of some kind for the forseeable future.

    • Why not build a machine that can function as a dumb terminal for your cell phone? The whole thing could work wirelessly using, say, wireless ethernet. Comparatively big display, full-size keyboard, mouse of some kind (probably a trackball), all powered by the cell phone on your belt. When you're done, push a button on the terminal and it disconnects. You could install these things in malls, next to ATMs, whatever. And you could sell a much cheaper black box that lets you use an existing KVM this way.
      • I was thinking the exact same thing. Right now as I am typing it wouldn't really matter if I use my beige PC or my 1Ghz cellphone. With WiFi, Bluetooth, Wireless USB and all this stuff it should be easy to build something like that. Heck, the phone could just be another part of it. You could build a central server in your flat (maybe another smaller one in your car) that holds all your huge files and liferecords (the next big thing, if I understand future right) and the cellphone just sucks down what you wa

  • Already true outside of the US (Score:5, Informative)

    by costas ( 38724 ) on Friday June 04, 2004 @12:08PM (#9335635) Homepage
    This is basically already true outside of the US where home broadband and home PCs are much less widespread than in North America. This is due to many reasons IMHO, from a different work ethic --where you don't bring work home with you, and thus you have less reason for a home PC-- to cost to lifestyle differences to infrastructure (simply put, GSM phones are much more reliable and sometimes cheaper than regular PSTN lines).

    This extends to other products as well: PDAs and portable game consoles are also much less common than cell phones and phones are taking over those niches too. Nokia is a much bigger threat to Windows than Linux internationally :-)

    So, the article is not really news, it's just US being behind the curve on this one.
    • >This is due to many reasons IMHO, from a
      >different work ethic --where you don't bring work
      >home with you, and thus you have less reason for
      >a home PC-- to cost to lifestyle differences to
      >infrastructure (simply put, GSM phones are much
      >more reliable and sometimes cheaper than regular
      >PSTN lines).

      >So, the article is not really news, it's just US
      >being behind the curve on this one.

      So, we're behind the curve because we have
      flexible work arrangements and great wired
      infrastructure?

  • Fusion Device? (Score:5, Funny)

    by Bazzargh ( 39195 ) on Friday June 04, 2004 @12:09PM (#9335644)
    Integrated Fusion Device? Well, I guess they'll need it to power all that crap.

  • PDA as center of life (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Matthew Weigel ( 888 ) on Friday June 04, 2004 @12:10PM (#9335665) Homepage Journal

    My finances are already basically all tied up in my PDA; just about any personal application development or service rollout I consider has to take into account access from a PDA, too. It's not as powerful nor can it handle complex tasks as well as my computer, but it's an extremely valuable data entry device and it can handle basic computing tasks quite handily. In the past, people ran an entire small business on a computer with less power.

  • Grid technology (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Paul Townend ( 185536 ) on Friday June 04, 2004 @12:10PM (#9335668) Homepage
    I think that mobile phones could well become the "killer app" for Grid technology. By "outsourcing" processor intensive tasks to a powerful server owned by the phone company and then seamlessly integrating results returned by that server, each mobile phone could effectively be made just as powerful as a desktop machine (well, in a few years time, anyway).

    Of course, you have obvious constraints like screen size, but if you coupled voice technology with the phone (audio being sent to server and processed there, over 3G or 4G link) then you could end up with something not too unlike a Star Trek computer!

    USER: Hello Mr. Phone! Can you tell me what the weather is like in Las Vegas, please?

    MR. PHONE: Yes! It will be 87 degrees and a little windy! By the way, you're running low on credit - want to top up?

  • All I want is... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by BigGar' ( 411008 ) on Friday June 04, 2004 @12:11PM (#9335673) Homepage
    A phone that works and it confortable to use, A computer that works and is comfortable to use. They do not/need not be the same device. A cell phone is too damn small to be very useful as a computer. Hell I think they're too damn small to be useful phones anymore. They get you by until you get somewhere with proper facilities.
  • For a lot of tasks, there's no substitute for screen real estate, and a full-size keyboard is the way to go for entering large amounts of text - even voice recognition can't compete in many environments.

    If you had a phone/PDA combo that could plug into commonly-available docks, like a laptop dock, you might be on to something. Add in wired networking (which will always be faster than wireless, by the nature of signals) and extra, long-term storage, some good speakers for gravy.

    For now, I have a PDA (Handera 330, sweet little machine), and I love and use it... but I'm typing this in on a desktop, 'cause I code for a living, and coding on a PDA, while possible, is painful, even with a plug-in keyboard.

    • Re:Maybe if there were docks everywhere... (Score:4, Insightful)

      by rho ( 6063 ) on Friday June 04, 2004 @01:06PM (#9336288) Journal
      I almost bought the 12" Powerbook because of it's size. Small and lightweight, I could more or less carry it anywhere. I didn't go for it, and went with the 15" TiBook instead, because at the time the 12" would only go to 640MB of RAM. I needed the gig of RAM the 15" TiBook offered. (I can't fucking believe I'm saying that. Anyway...)

      I can certainly see the phone becoming an uber device, eventually. The various PalmOS phones already are nearly there. A friend who is in anthropology was trying to figure out a data-entry solution for a few months while he was in Chiapas state. We discussed a few options (such as buying a cheap ThinkPad in the 133mhz Pentium range like the 760e), but what we eventually figured would be his best option was his Palm IIIxe with one of those collapsible keyboards.

      The IIIxe is a complete computer in itself. It can do almost everything a bigger computer can do, functionally. It's only real limitations are speed and storage--you can do a whole lot of useful work with just a B/W text interface. Where the device might fall down (such as with photo editing), it can be enhanced by external server-based services.

      For example, assume you store photos in your phone/PDA/camera. A processor capable of doing real photo-manipulation would be more than such a small device is capable of. So, when you get home, you plug your phoneto a USB keyboard and mouse, and to a big monitor. The phone talks wirelessly to your home server (or to a server on the wider Internet), and you run a local X server on the phone with the photo manipulation software running on the beefier server.

      When you're done, the photos are synced back to the phone, all nicely edited.

      It's things like this where the Free software community could really be forging ahead with new ideas and new ways of thinking. The old, traditional X, often thought of as bloated and outdated, is actually a great solution for situations just like this. This is a business opportunity just waiting for somebody to pick up the ball and run with it. Imagine real estate agents--they can access everything they need from a convenient device that can interface with various I/O devices that meet a relatively simple standard. Plug the phone into a cradle in their cars, and the agent's client can browse through photos and whatnot while they're driving around.

      The business traveller only needs to bring his uber-phone, since the hotel he's staying at will have one of the stripped-down terminals available on demand.

      Never mind all that, though--I'd rather re-implement Microsoft's Exchange protocol so I can strike back against the Evil Empire by installing a Linux server. Take that, Bill!

  • Fusion

    Every time I hear "fusion", I can't help but think of the restaurant which used to be near where I worked in Westchester county(NY). Not exactly your typical definition of "Fusion".

    The name: McWang's.

    Yup. Half Irish pub, half chinese restaurant.

  • Newsweek magazine ponders if a mobile phone will be 'Your Next Computer'

    it has a >=17" monitor, a 5.1 surround system with subwoofer, a standard 104 key keyboard and a standard mouse. Until then nobody is going to pry my desktop computer from my cold dead hands - that's the reason I don't use a laptop either - can't stand those damn tiny keys and track point/ball/pad.

    • Same complaint, I have an IBM ThinkPad that sits in it's cradle idle 99% of the time. My biggest beef is the 15.1" screen vs. my 19" screen and my second biggest is the finger contorting keyboard layout. If they made laptops with full keyboard layouts (I can live without the keypad but not without the arrows and INS/DEL/HOME/END/PGU/PGD middle grouping) and at least an 18" screen, then it might be an option. As for scaling down to a cell phone, that's pretty funny. Net enabled phones are handy in a pinch bu

  • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 )
    Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • I just want my phone to be a phone and a good one that is easy to use. I don't want to have to pull out a manual bigger than the phone so I can figure out a whole bunch of menus that are not the same from one phone to the next model.

    If I want a good knife, I don't want a Swiss Army one that's so big I can't wrap my fingers around it, I want a Knife that's a knife and just a knife... Same thing with my phone. Yeah, how old fashioned is that?

    All this wrapping everything into one miniature package means too

  • Need 3G first (Score:3, Interesting)

    by michaelmalak ( 91262 ) <michael@michaelmalak.com> on Friday June 04, 2004 @12:18PM (#9335751) Homepage
    Washington, DC and San Diego have had a 3G Network [verizonwireless.com] (1X EV-DO) since October, but the only supported hardware is a laptop PC Card. Nokia is refusing [wirelessweek.com] (!) to build a phone because an incoming phone call would cause the data connection to drop (The "DO" means "data only", an upcoming standard 1X EV-DV would support simultaneous data and voice).

    As Sun says, the network is the computer. We're not going to have phones as computers until the phones are on the Net, and I don't mean 2400 baud GPRS.

    Give me, in a Treo package (i.e. with thumbboard), a 320x480 screen (like a Tungsten, not a 160x160 like the Treo 600), high-speed Internet, and a video recorder with sound (because the failure of the mainstream media demands that the citizenry does its own reporting). Give me that now. Don't wait for the translation. Don't wait for 1X EV-DV.

  • I doubt this will ever happen. You see, unless some act of god changes the way physics work, a larger device is capable of holding more guts. Yeah, miniaturization helps make mobiles what they are today, but they still pale in comparison to a desktop. New software requires desktop power (or high end laptop) and they will not be going away anytime soon.

    So while they may not REPLACE the desktop, I can certainly see them as becoming just as essential as one if they aren't already.

  • you have your 12 buttons and your 1.5-inch screen. consider writing war and peace.. or even a screenplay for the next episode of some twaddle half-hour sitcom... on that freakin' tiny thing.

    ain't gonna happen, total worldwide sales = 0, including gadget geeks.

    the next iteration will have 101 keys and a 1.5-inch color XGA screen in the same palmprint. removeable flash cards. built-in strip printer. snap-on color faceplates. and the buttons will be the size of cockroach droppings with mushy feel.

    total
  • Everyone will have two devices, their "box" and their "portable." The "boxes" will probably be something like a laptop. It's small, but usually stationary. A home will have several of these, maybe one for every person, and they all will be wirelessly connected. They will easily share data and the network will be controlled by a wireless hub that the internet provider, cable or phone company, will set up. Then their portable will be like a phone. It may include a camera and audio player. It will sync

  • most of the way there (Score:4, Insightful)

    by jqh1 ( 212455 ) on Friday June 04, 2004 @12:20PM (#9335782) Homepage
    I've been using the Treo 600 for a few months now (I used the 180 before that). It *has* replaced a number of the functions that were previously provided by my desktop. I use it for email and a lot of web browsing (mostly news sites). I've started reading "e-books" on it (never did that on the desktop, actually), and it provides about 100% of my contact tracking and calendar functionality.

    Just having a simple text editor with me at all times is huge. I've also got an ssh client running, so there's basically nothing I can't do in the area of remote admin.

    It runs moria [sourceforge.net]!

    I've found that I'm in front of the computer significantly less now. I still use it for development (eclipse won't run on the treo :)), but that's about the only thing I *have* to go back ot the pc for.

  • Make it as pretty as you like ... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by El_Smack ( 267329 ) on Friday June 04, 2004 @12:24PM (#9335825)
    ... but if it's the "center of my digital life", it has to be able to play games at least as well as the next gen GBA, fit a gig or two of MP3's and play them back (while I play my GBA type games), have a nice web browser (guess I'll need an external monitor jack) read email (could do that even on a small LCD screen), send email (voice recognition or external keyboard that stays home with the monitor), and be able to do all the PDA tasks. Make it the size of my LG-10 flip phone. Battery life of 6 hours of constant use and 96 hours of stand by.

    Do that and I'll take it at any price under $400 US. Otherwise, don't bother me.
  • in Japan. A lot of people there only have email/data access through their cell phones(the un-geek way to go I'm sure) Most of them have no money/desire to get a personal computer/internet connection, and if they need to go on the web they do it through internet cafes.
    Interesting really. But then again, the cellphone technology in Japan is much more advanced(in general) than that in the US.

  • No Thanks... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by devphaeton ( 695736 ) on Friday June 04, 2004 @12:27PM (#9335859)
    I'm having a hard enough time just finding a simple cell phone that doesn't have neon lights, cameras, built-in video games or vaccum cleaner attachments.

    Just a damn phone, that's all i want.
  • I appreciate having all my devices having different functionalities. I like referring to my cell phone whenever someone calls me, not my laptop, and vice versa when I want to program, or even check mail. I like it when they use bluetooth to communicate with each other (thank you Ericsson and Apple). But I don't want a sucky camera in my cell phone, a phone in my digital camera, or Python in my 4.0 megapixel camera (cool as that might even sound to some of you), and the only thing I'd like them to do is figu
  • Screen too small. Keys too small. Not going to get better in those respects.

    Personally, I want a phone with better voice recognition (at least as good as Wildfire or TellMe), no screen, and good integration with Directory Assistance.

  • Today's most sophisticated phones have the processing power of a mid-1990s PC while consuming 100 times less electricity.

    Can someone explain to me how something can use "less" than 1 times the energy of something else.

    SCENERAO:
    Device A uses X amount of electricity to perform a task
    Device B uses 100X of electricity to perform the same task

    I get that device B uses 100 times the electricity of device A.
    Device A uses 1% of the electricity that device B uses.
    Since when did "100 times less" == 1%?

    • Since forever. In the English language, there are a few idioms used to describe mathematical concepts.

      "times less" == division
      "times greater" == multiplication

      By your logic, if I say "A is 10 times greater than B" and B is 1, does that mean A is 11?

      In reality, "A is 10 times greater than B" is equivalent to saying "A=B*10". As such, "A is 10 times less than B" is equivalent to saying "A=B/10".

  • Its 1982 all over again with the microcomputer (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Billly Gates ( 198444 ) on Friday June 04, 2004 @12:29PM (#9335883) Journal
    I and many others during the .com high predicted this was comming.

    Why is IT viewed as a commidty? Where is the innovation and importance? Innovation in IT is alive and kicking, just on a smaller scale.

    Mainframe lovers trashed the microcomputer or PC and even RMS viewed them as toys and focused gnu on "real"systems.

    Funny how people still do this today with computers. I mean pc computers obviously.

    The microprocessor gave rise to micro's and the internet/networking gave rise to cells.

    But like high end servers and mainframes are still around the same is true with desktops. They are not going away. Rather the market will shift to them and keep them around for background stuff. On your desk you will probably have them for years and use your cell however for IM and some email.

    I think their may be some hope for sun after all and problems for Microsoft. Java is going to be HOTT real soon. All the software companies will target phones and use the micro-edition of java or perl embedded.

    Perhaps MS may be the next IBM, The former monopolist giant.
    • On your desk you will probably have them for years and use your cell however for IM and some email.

      Uh, no. I can't type fast enough on a cell phone to keep up a conversation on IM (believe me, I've tried), and I don't want to push 9 buttons multiple times just to write an email. There is a reason SMS messages can't be very long. I can't imagine writing more than ~160 character messages; I'd go crazy before I got the message out of my brain and into the phone.

      And don't get me started on the teeny little scr

  • Newsweek magazine ponders if a mobile phone will be 'Your Next Computer'

    I think I speak for the large majority of the slashdot crowd when I say 'No'.

  • Misses impact of PC gaming (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Infonaut ( 96956 ) <infonaut@gmail.com> on Friday June 04, 2004 @12:40PM (#9335989) Homepage Journal
    Hawkins is doing what Apple did in the 1980s - totally discounting the effect that games have on the PC industry. The race for faster graphics cards would still have happened without PC games as a stimulus for competition, but my guess is that demand for faster graphics would have been less widespread and therefore less attractive as a revenue stream for hardware companies.

    The CPU speed race between Intel and AMD in recent years has been fueled tremendously by gaming. Once processor speeds caught up finally with the code bloat of business apps like MS Office, most business users really didn't *need* more speed. But PC games constantly push the hardware envelope, and as AMD provided faster chips and the gamer market bought them, Intel was forced to keep up.

    While phones are definitely adapting more features and becoming more powerful, more people are using PCs and game consoles as the center of their home entertainment. Even without digital music, digital video manipulation and playback, and other uses for PCs, the PC gaming market is huge [megagames.com]:

    "Overall, 2003 U.S. sales of console games totaled USD 5.8 billion (186.4 million units) while computer games accounted for USD 1.2 billion (52.8 million units) in sales. Total game software sales in 2002 were USD 6.9 billion, with console games bringing in USD 5.5 billion in sales and computer games accounting for USD 1.4 billion. (Note: The numbers released by the ESA today do not include sales of game hardware or accessories.)"

    The PC is continuing to evolve. I remember years ago when my dad told me he couldn't understand why he should buy a computer, aside from using it for accounting and occasional letter-writing. Now he uses it daily to run his business, communicate with other people, listen to music, find information, and so on.

    A proliferation of other computing devices doesn't mean that the PC is going away any time soon.

  • Size Matters. (Score:4, Insightful)

    by frostman ( 302143 ) on Friday June 04, 2004 @12:47PM (#9336074) Homepage Journal
    One of the main things driving mobile phone sales is, of course, fashion. Especially among the younger consumers.

    And the problem with most of these crossover devices is that they are Huge.

    I know a few people with these Nokias [sidetalkin.com] and these T-mobile-thingies [infosync.no], and they just look ridiculous.

    Now look at Japan. [nttdocomo.com]

    As soon as we have normal-sized phones that do all the e-communicating and surfing we normally use our computers for, without looking stupid, then we'll see them replace PDAs for most people.

  • Who do they think they're kidding? Have you seen what mobile phone companies charge for Intarweb access? Two words: highway robbery.

    Tell ya what, guys...get me a laptop with built-in 3G (better yet, 4G) cellphone, that has a Bluetooth headset interface for the phone part that can operate while the laptop is in "sleep" mode, and does all the same shit a 12" Powerbook can do, and then I'll consider it. But hand-helds? No friggin' way. Too small, too easy to lose/misplace, not enough data storage for an
  • I wouldn't mind seeing something like an iPod/treo/laptop hybrid. Imagine you have something like a iPod (i.e. minimal display, access to calendar & contacts, elegant interface though little actual input options, hard drive) with phone capabilities, and maybe some improved input (like the trio), but with no keyboard, mouse, and not much of a monitor. (this would allow for a smaller and cheaper device) However, when you take it home and drop it in a dock, you can hook a monitor, keyboard, and mouse to
  • A device that performs two functions does neither well. A device that performs the same two functions and is a phone as well isn't good at any of them.

    I want my computer to be my computer, my cell phone to be my cell phone, my GPS receiver to be my GPS receiver, etc. I want them seperate, but easily interoperable.

    Give me a cell phone that can get reception in my basement (see journal) and I'll buy that over my T610, even if it doesn't have a camera or WAP access.

  • You're not going to want to be restricted to the phone's display when you're typing, and you're not going to want a laptop's bulk when you're not working, and maybe the compromise of a handheld suits you or maybe it's just too big... but whetever you decide on, you have to stick with it, because that's where your "stuff" is. Like in the George Carlin skit, you can take part of the "stuff" out of the main place you keep your "stuff", and copy it to another device. Then you take part of that "stuff" and beam it to someone else...

    But after a while what happens is that the "stuff" is the important thing.

    What you really want isn't "a phone that's a computer", it's "a phone that lets you get at all your stuff", whether that stuff is music, contacts, ebooks, news, webpages, or what have you. The phone is a user interface device optimised for realtime audio communications. The handheld is a user interface device optimised for browsing small chunks of data. The iPod is a user interface device optimised for playing music, and so on.

    They all carry little chunks of your "stuff" around.

    What you really want isn't a "phone that's a computer" or a handheld or a laptop, what you want is a way to keep your stuff organised, and a way to get at your stuff from whatever device you're carrying, and then you don't care whether it's a phone today or a handheld or a laptop, you've got your stuff.

    So what do you do? You could keep your "stuff" online, then everything becomes a terminal, but now you're tied to cellphone coverage... which probably works in Europe, but it doesn't work in places like the USA or Australia. You could keep your "stuff" in the smallest device, or the one with most space, but then that's the one you always have to keep with you.

    Alternatively, you can keep the stuff in all your devices in sync, and hope you've got the right stuff when you need it.

    How about building a thing to carry your stuff? One of those USB keychain drives would be about the right size. Give it bluetooth or wifi and a USB charge/sync interface for high-speed updates, and keep all your stuff in that. Have web-based interfaces as well as file-like interfaces and syncML and everything else.

    That's where your stuff is.

    Plug it in to a computer, that's now YOUR computer. Bring it near a blank bluetooth phone, now that's YOUR phone, and so on...
  • Maybe a useful device for data access; but, I'll still want a full size keyboard and a decent (>=17") monitor to do real work on...
  • There's only one Integrated Fusion Device [blueyonder.co.uk] I'm interested in, and this ain't it.

  • Future of hardware (Score:3, Interesting)

    by t_allardyce ( 48447 ) on Friday June 04, 2004 @01:51PM (#9336888) Journal
    Let me introduce you to the phone companies wet dream:

    The device is your basic PDA/Phone hybrid that most phones are today, with camera of course. It has little memory of its own, doesnt dock with a PC, doesnt have a removable memory card and once the (write once) PROM has been set, it will only work on one network. You can listen to music on it, watch films, tv, browse the net, whatever. Everything you do, from adding a number to your address book (which is automatically backed up by the network) to saving a photo (which is automatically backed up by the network) requires the network, theres a small amount of memory to buffer things if you happen to be outside network coverage (unlikely) but the phone is essentially a locked device. If your a good little consumer and pay the network you get a gadget to die for, leave them and you loose all your data (unless you pay the transfer fee). It does most of what you need, but for things that require a big computer with a big screen and printer, you'll still need a PC untill they trick you out of that. The future of hardware is services, money and DRM, the idea is to make the hardware as cheap as shit, controllable by the corporations and to extract as much money from you as they can. Forget a Beowulf cluster, this is a money making cluster, 24/7 baby!
  • The Wired NextFest [wired.com] issue showed six different conceptual designs for convergence devices, which combine phone, camera, and PC functionality. Click on the thumbnails to pop up images of the various concepts, many of which are similar to the one discussed in this article.

    Personally I'm waiting for retinal painter displays, unobtrusive little gadgets that can make windows appear in space in front of us. That way we can have a big screen for gaming or computer work, anywhere we are, without lugging around the

  • Ergonomics make me uneasy (Score:3, Informative)

    by mfterman ( 2719 ) on Friday June 04, 2004 @01:59PM (#9336993)
    The Nokia N-gauge makes me uneasy, and for that matter some of the early PDA-cell phone combos that are a bit bulky. The fact is that a cell phone has a different style of usage than a PDA and the ideal ergonomics for each are different.

    Still, expanding a cell phone and putting a display and a few more controls on it doesn't strike me as unworkable. I sometimes think existing cell phones are way too small, even if it makes them easier to carry around.

    Computers are multifunction devices. A lot of people here are way too young to remember the dedicated word processing devices that used to be so common. People don't think anything of using their computers for a vast range of things. Now think about setting up a handheld computer that can do a vast range of things as well, including VoIP. Then it looks more reasonable.

    I can easily see cell phones with a small display being used for making voice calls, surfing the web, playing video and music, and being used for playing games as well.

    It will not replace the desktop computer, people still need to sit down with a full size keyboard and a gross display, but the amount of time that people have to spend at a full computer will drop and the amount of time they can spend away from the desk will increase.

  • Jerking it? (Score:2, Funny)

    by phizman ( 742537 )
    Considering the amount of time people surf porn on their desktops, I highly doubt it will ever be replaced. Hard to look at boobies while holding a 1.5 x 1.5" screen that you can't hold still.
  • There are already a few mobile phones based on Linux [tuxmobil.org] available. Two Linux editions dedicated to mobile phones, the one from Mizi [mizi.com] and the other one from Trolltech [trolltech.com] are out. As well as Linux PDAs [tuxmobil.org] which come pre-installed with Linux. So it shouldn't take too long until a true Linux smartphone will hit the market.

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