I wouldn’t count Sony out in terms of releasing brand new designs based on Intel’s latest Core Solo and Core Duo processors. I’m just speculating that it won’t happen until later this year.
My theory is that a lot of companies are waiting for Windows Vista to ship since it will allow them to introduce new types of designs due to the fact that Vista does the following better than XP:
1. Far better power management
2. Support for secondary info screens
3. Support for new types of hard disks
4. Intelligent “SuperFetch” that uses Flash Memory to cache stuff
The power management is a huge thing since it allows the system to run processors at lower power states and it forces all drivers to be compliant. You’ll allegedly never have to “turn off” the system since it has new standby/hibernation modes. I think the secondary info screens are potentially a really neat feature. For instance, if your notebook is closed, there might be a secondary screen on the lid of your notebook that displays the notebook’s status (battery life, new e-mail, or whatever else you configure it to do).
Actually, the above affects all manufacturers so I’d expect better designs overall once Vista comes out.
In the meantime, the new Fujitsu is well done and a nice change for them. They’ve always built good quality stuff and occasionally release designs that do look quite nice.
I doubt we’ll see the X505 again in a similar form. To me, the X505 was a “QUALIA” type product. Basically a cutting edge product ahead of it’s time that was made just because they could make it. It was (and still is) sweet because of so many firsts it introduced. Luckily for us, Sony took the knowledge and experience of building the X505 and trickled it down into their other models such as the TX and the new SZ.
Ultraportables all the way. 8)
