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Communications Hardware

Qualcomm and Lenovo's Project Limitless is the First 5G PC (tomshardware.com) 54

Qualcomm said today that it's teaming up with Lenovo on "Project Limitless," the first 5G PC. From a report: It's still really early days for the laptop, which was teased at Qualcomm's press conference, and is pegged for an early 2020 release date. The laptop uses Qualcomm's Snapdragon 8cx processor paired with a Snapdragon x55 5G modem with 7GBps transfer speeds. In its current form, Project Limitless looks like one of Lenovo's Yoga-series of convertible 2-in-1s, with a bend-back hinge and scallop-shaped chiclet keys. That design is subject to change between now and 2020, I was told.
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Qualcomm and Lenovo's Project Limitless is the First 5G PC

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  • by nospam007 ( 722110 ) * on Tuesday May 28, 2019 @05:40AM (#58665654)

    The same type of no limits as my phone contract?

  • Unfortunate Tech (Score:5, Interesting)

    by mentil ( 1748130 ) on Tuesday May 28, 2019 @05:50AM (#58665680)

    Unfortunately the laptop fails to work if you don't have direct line-of-sight to a 5G tower, so try to set it up in a windowsill in your house across the street from the local Verizon tower (who doesn't own one of those nowadays?)

    More unfortunate, you're trying to run a PC on a Snapdragon, so it's only good for tethering your REAL PC to it, or more likely, using WiFi. Since you live across the street from a Verizon backhaul, you already have FiOS.

    • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

      Lots of laptops run fine on ARM processors, i.e. Chromebooks. Also lots of tablets.

      The real problem is Windows. Get rid of that and you can have a decent machine with an ARM CPU.

      • by tepples ( 727027 )

        The real problem is Windows. Get rid of that and you can have a decent machine with an ARM CPU.

        Wine still required an x86 or x86-64 CPU last I checked.

        • The real problem is Windows. Get rid of that and you can have a decent machine with an ARM CPU.

          Wine still required an x86 or x86-64 CPU last I checked.

          Fortunately, iOS runs just fine on an ARM.

          • by tepples ( 727027 )

            If the developer of a Windows application on which you rely is unable or unwilling to port it to iOS, you won't be using it on iOS except through Remote Desktop to a server running Windows.

    • Re: Unfortunate Tech (Score:4, Informative)

      by peragrin ( 659227 ) on Tuesday May 28, 2019 @07:39AM (#58665918)

      Even worse is you have to have the window open.

      5g needs line of sight, no obstructions. A typical double pang glass window provides to much obstruction.

      I really don't see much use for 5g tech outside of wifi. The limits on the ultra fast stuff makes it worthless.

    • Unfortunately the laptop fails to work if you don't have direct line-of-sight to a 5G tower, so try to set it up in a windowsill in your house across the street from the local Verizon tower (who doesn't own one of those nowadays?)

      Direct line-of-sight means something different at high frequency than what we're used to.

      The glass in your window will block the signal. Windowsill doesn't help unless you also keep the window open.

      This is only something you're going to use while you're having a picnic under the tower.

      • by ls671 ( 1122017 )

        This is only something you're going to use while you're having a picnic under the tower.

        This is a win-win situation, fast Internet and microwaves from the tower to cook your hot-dogs!

  • So, Qualcomm and Lenovo are going to create a laptop with a 5G modem that most people will never need, and add a few buzzwords like "limitless" in order to sucker a few early adoptors into paying far more than it is worth. Most people who need it and understand it will just buy a 5G modem and plug it into current USB.
    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Everyone will need/want a 5G modem in a couple of years, and nobody is going to want to lug a separate modem around with them and jam it into a USB port every time they want to connect to the network.
    • by Rosco P. Coltrane ( 209368 ) on Tuesday May 28, 2019 @08:02AM (#58665994)

      Of course they called it Limitless. What did you want them to call it? Disabled Fat Sally?

      Just be glad the eighties are over and they didn't tack the word "turbo" to it...

    • So, Qualcomm and Lenovo are going to create a laptop with a 5G modem that most people will never need, and add a few buzzwords like "limitless" in order to sucker a few early adoptors into paying far more than it is worth.

      It's even less meaningful than that. They're going to create a laptop with a mini-pcie slot, and then plug a 5G modem card into it.

  • They mean a Windows PC running on ARM, i.e. horribly limited.
    • by Anonymous Coward

      I guess everything's about gaming laptops now. Even Best Buy hides the pros in the corner. Second laptop? Phablet? The sales guy actually laughed when I asked where the standalone desktops were. I was like OK, I've been watching too many geek shows. Soooo sorry.

  • by cerberusss ( 660701 ) on Tuesday May 28, 2019 @07:13AM (#58665824) Journal

    This should've been announced by Apple, in my opinion. The MacBook Air and MacBook Pro are positioned as the highest quality laptops, and I'd expect that always-available mobile data connection would be part of the package. Especially since the iPads have had it since forever. So you've got the cheapest iPads having a cellular option, but the most expensive laptops not.

    (And yeah, I know, you can very easily choose your iPhone under the Personal Hotspot section in the Wifi menubar item).

    • Re:Apple (Score:4, Insightful)

      by tepples ( 727027 ) <.tepples. .at. .gmail.com.> on Tuesday May 28, 2019 @07:30AM (#58665880) Homepage Journal

      This should've been announced by Apple, in my opinion. The MacBook Air and MacBook Pro are positioned as the highest quality laptops

      Apple has never been the first to support a new cellular interface. There were other UMTS phones before the iPhone 3G, and there were other LTE phones before the iPhone 5.

    • by mjwx ( 966435 )

      This should've been announced by Apple, in my opinion. The MacBook Air and MacBook Pro are positioned as the highest quality laptops

      I think I see where you've gone wrong here.

      Apple were never the highest quality laptops, just the most overpriced. Price != quality in the slightest, the saying "you get what you pay for" is patently false.

      Now that's been dealt with, manufacturers who are not Apple have offered mobile antennas built for years only to find that they are rarely bought because no-one wants them. There are quite a few challenges for the manufacturer here not the least of which is adding an accessible SIM slot, then custom

  • by Anonymous Coward

    He might have by the time you read this.

    • by Anonymous Coward

      The 800 number is right on the box. I highly recommend letting the press listen in for the entertainment value of the president's inevitable oops.

    • by Anonymous Coward

      I recently started working for Lenovo and my brother in law started giving me crap for be an agent of the PRC. Let me tell you Lenovoâ(TM)s back end systems are so broken thereâ(TM)s no way theyâ(TM)re doing any big brother stuff.

  • I happen to like the scallop-shaped chiclet keys introduced in the recent generation of Thinkpads.

    I hope they don't change that.

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