Edward Distel wonders if anyone needs an expensive, underpowered tablet PC in their arsenal, or if a laptop and PDA would suffice.
Also read: Point / Counterpoint: Why I would buy a UMPC
Don't get me wrong, I'm a fan of specialty gadgets, and the UltraMobile PC (UMPC) is a promising idea. Combining the functionality of a laptop and a PDA isn’t a bad idea, but just packing them into a big black brick is not going to make me throw my current computer equipment into the nearest river.
Origami, or paper tricks?
Conceived by Microsoft as part of their Origami Project, UMPCs do several things well. You can watch downloaded movies with the clarity of a laptop, you can surf the Internet with a normal screen size instead of the rinky-dink display on a cellphone, and the touchscreen input is valuable if you want to manipulate paper documents on the go. That's all great. But in what way is it better to do those things on a UMPC instead of a laptop or PDA?
Portable DVD players cost about $50, so spending $1,200 on a UMPC seems a little excessive if your goal is to watch movies (on a machine that lacks an optical drive, to boot). Most tablets use a 12.1-inch display because that mimics the 8.5 x 11-inch size of paper; that seems like a far better way to manipulate documents than the 7-inch screen of a UMPC. The best use of an UltraMobile PC is probably noodling around the Internet, and it's actually pretty good at that. But no integrated WAN? If I'm going to be relegated to Wi-Fi hotspots, I might as well bring my laptop.
Not even the best of the best
The two most popular models of UMPC seem to be Samsung's Q1 Ultra and Nokia's N800. The Q1 is about 9 inches and the N800 is 5.7 inches long, but both are too bulky to fit in your pocket. The form factor seems to be the principle design element behind UMPCs, but they're still too thick (about 5.5 inches for the Q1) to really be a next-gen device. If Samsung cut off about 4 inches and added 3G radios, then UMPCs would have the kind gadget sex appeal that makes people drool over the Apple iPhone.
Even with all of its flaws, UMPCs still might be an option if the price weren't so high. Starting at around $1,200, UMPCs aren’t going to make headway into the global market unless they can compete on price. Dell and HP both offer entry-level laptops for $500, why get a miniature computer with limited functionality when you can have a full-featured laptop for half the cost?
Never say never
I’m excited to see companies innovate and try to create new products, and UMPCs represent a start of something that could be a standard product in 5 years. Maybe one day we'll all look back at current UMPCs the way we look at carphones -- an ugly, bulky and inefficient grandfather to a mobile category that eventually evolved into something that transformed the way people lived. But in terms of size, price and wireless functionality, they still have a ways to go.
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