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NETBOOK PC : DREAM

Hi-res netbook for the traveller
Posted in netbook | October 29, 2008 7pm

The worst issue I have with current netbooks is the low-res display. There are really really few that sports 1280x768 display. The screen does not have to be big, actually I may accept 1024x600 for a 7inches display or smaller. 8inches at 1280x768 would be great. Would 1366x960 on 9inches possible? Well the more pixel the better. But I want it small and compact too...

Additionnally I want it in a small, compact and light design with SSD for the traveller perfect match.

But not any SSD: it definitely should be some fast SSD otherwise the booting process is too much slow...

NETBOOK PC : IDEA

eBook reader netbook / e-paper cover PC
Posted in netbook | October 29, 2008 6pm

The top cover of the netbook sports an e-paper display so that it can be used as an eBook reader when the lid is closed.

e-paper is a great technology that enables power-efficient yet fully-readable displays in full sunlight because it acts like a paper.

Today we begin to see the first mass-products using this technology in eBook readers. However these eBook readers are just too much limited and people often prefers a fully-fledge computer.

But using a computer as an eBook reader is not perfect either first because of the LCD display and second because of the form-factor of the device. (1) The LCD display consumes a lot of energy and is hard to read in sunlight. (2) The form-factor (that is, mini-notebook) does not allow comfortable use like a tablet would provide. Other form-factors works better but are not perfect either: tablet form-factor is good but then the lack of keyboard and touchpad is limiting for a lot of usages; convertible tablet form-factor fixes that issue but adds to the cost, weight, size and weakness to the device because of the rotating hinge.

So I think that one should take a light-weight netbook and adds a secondary display using e-paper technology on the top cover. That way the computer could effectively be used as a eBook reader while closed. The netbook should be relatively light to enable a comfortable use as an eBook reader. Of course the e-paper display would have some buttons next to it so that pages can be changed without opening the device. Display orientation shall be changeable by some button(s) too.

From the hardware point of view, the e-paper display wouldn't be used as a typical computer display because this technology isn't very well suited for moving images. So it would not be a "display" as we currently mean for computers (that is something that you plug on the video card), but rather an accessory driven by special software that issue the page changes.

The driving software shall be well-designed to enable a good usage of the e-paper display. Typical usage includes but are not limited to:
- eBook reader: customized version of Adobe Acrobat Reader enables to read PDF on the e-paper display; in the same way, customized versions of Word or OpenOffice, and another one for basic TXT files...
- news reader: RSS feeds, HTML pages displayed on the e-paper
- screenshot: the current desktop is shot and displayed on the e-paper
- slideshow: display a set of images on the e-paper display
- PIM: display the set of appointements for today, TODO-lists and what's the weather on the e-paper display

The power-management of the computer shall be carefully done too to provide a power efficient eBook reader usage. Basically using the e-paper display instead of the LCD display means that the display does not consume any power; but the CPU still does. In that case the CPU could be underclocked to very-low clock frequency because not much processing power is needed. Or the whole computer could be put to some kind of sleep if it is able to awake fast enough to provide a quick page change when the user requests it. The storage also drains some power and should definitely provide some good power-management features. However since the loads of RAM today computers have (for a eBook reader usage), fetching the whole readed file in RAM should be fine and so for the eBook usage the HDD/SDD could be shut down. If the file is really big, contents of it should be fetched before the user needs it so that unless the user "jumps" in the book the HDD/SSD won't be used most of the time.

Note that even with the computer shut down, the e-paper still displays the same image. It opens the door to a lot of fun possibilites :-) For instance one could write a small list of things to remember and just display them on the e-paper. It would be there forever until the user decides to do otherwise, whatever is the computer is one or off.