Next generation of PDAs?

Noel J. Bergman noel at devtech.com
Mon Sep 10 17:23:14 UTC 2001


> Ned is rumored to have written:
> "Only if the hard drives get smaller, lighter, and less power-hungry."

Actually, I believe that was my comment, and I wouldn't want Ned "blamed"
for it.

IBM and Reitek microdrives are already smaller and lighter.  Interestingly,
solid-state memory has made far more progress compared to microdrives
recently.  When the 340MB and 1GB CF drives came out, they provided
massively more storage than was otherwise available.  Now we can get 640MB
solid-state CF with far lower power requirements, while the largest
microdrive is the new Reitek 1.6GB drive.

Power is still an issue.  I've heard of some recent work on fuel cells, but
who knows when they'll show up commercially.

I agree with you that eventually the power, storage, CPU speed, and other
problems will be solved.  Hey, it only took 20 years to get from the idea of
a dynabook to a point where you can go out an buy one.  And it only took 30
years to get from Xanadu to the WWW.  In 10 years, we might be able to
eliminate film from color photography.  Somewhere in that timeframe, I
suspect that we'll eliminate most wired LANs.

Why a folding screen?  Why not a HUD?  And perhaps some day direct
stimulation of the visual cortex.  Forget window blinds; how's about a
display *for* the blind?

	--- Noel





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