So what will Happen with the UMPC?
Price is definitely an issue that has gotten some analysts going about the new units. Samsung's Q1 went on sale in the second quarter of 2006 with a manufacturer's suggested retail price of $1,099. It isn't often that Microsoft announces a completely new concept in computing, but at CeBIT 2006 in Hanover, Germany, the software giant finally unveiled details about its Origami Project to a worldwide audience. They used a combination of blogs, messages at various Bill Gates keynotes and a short video showing off a concept of the UMPC that was widely distributed -- unintentionally, it seems. Part of the buzz centered on the "Digital Kitchen video" which was developed by the production group Digital Kitchen as a concept piece (and has since been removed from YouTube for violating its terms of use). The UMPCs that Microsoft announced are small devices -- they weigh less than two pounds and have seven-inch video screens. When they settled on the announcement date of March 9, they needed two weeks prior to build up the buzz and that was the same date (February 23) that Apple picked for one of its announcements.
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One vendor that hasn't announced any UMPC yet is Motion Computing, although the company sells a variety of tablet PCs in various shapes and sizes. One of the program's managers was interested in Japanese culture and liked the name, which refers to the art of intricate paper folded sculptures. Windows Mobile requires new versions of applications to be compatible with that OS, and the applications have to take advantage of the smaller screens on these devices. Hubbard. "The small form factor and touch interaction of UMPC means that to have a really great user experience you need to design your UI to really take advantage of those assets." So chances are if UMPCs do take off, we will see differentiated applications over time that take advantage of its touch-screen features and enhancements that Microsoft is building into the units. The goal of UMPC is to run off-the-shelf Windows applications, with no medications whatsoever other than supporting the tablet/touch screen features. The team is still blogging away and the Web site has an active discussion forum debating various topics, youtube shorts including the features promised for the first several units. Microsoft has promised that once Vista ships that the UMPC will be able to run some version of Vista as well, but since the new OS isn't yet finished it is hard to make any definitive claims in this area.
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We'll also talk about how these new computers will work and how they differ from tablets and PDAs. UMPCs overall are expected will cost less than most tablets and more than most PDAs. While there are many PDAs and PDA/phone combinations that run Windows Mobile (such as the Palm Treo 700w) it isn't the same as running the stock XP OS loaded onto millions of desktop and laptop computers. PDAs don't run standard Windows OS, and many tablets are too heavy to carry around all the time. These plans for the UMPC differ from the existing Motion Computing tablets. Bert Haskell, a product manager for Motion Computing. If manufacturers can get several hours of battery life, if the costs can drop way below $1000, if the touch experience works out for many new users, and if the right distributors pick up the products, this could be a winning product for Microsoft and its OEMs. Different configurations vary depending on the specifications of the machine, but battery life for most UMPCs ranges from 2 to 6 hours.
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It has five applications: a program launcher, a series of touch improvements to the normal Windows UI, a Brilliant Black skin for Media player, a Sudoku game, and Dial Keys, a thumb-based on-screen keyboard for inputting text. Dial Keys makes it easy to enter URLs, e-mail addresses, et cetera. Next is a new skin for Windows Media Player called "Brilliant Black." This skin fills the screen on the devices with large buttons to navigate the media controls such as play, stop and volume. Called the "Touch Pack," these enhancements will optimize the touch screen experience. The other distinction is that the UMPC will be less expensive than the typical tablet. Just because the UMPC runs the tablet version of XP doesn't mean that every tablet-based application is worth running on it, however. But there is plenty of interest in UMPC and the size of the devices is very appealing. There will be units with a variety of processors, including the Intel Celeron M, Intel Pentium M and VIA C7-M. There are several components to the Touch Pack.
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