[Arm-netbook] what's up?

[Luke Kenneth Casson Leighton]

On Sat, Apr 9, 2011 at 1:39 PM, Alejandro Mery <amery at geeks.cl> wrote:
> Hi,
>
> did this project die again?

 nope.  i'm just collecting more and more NDAs, that's all.  and
watching R&D managers get fired for incompetence / lack of results.
etc. etc.

> will we see high-end arm netbook during this life time?

 eventually someone will get the f*****g message.  hopefully that'll
be before peak oil hits, not after.

> what happened with the talk with nufront?

 still ongoing.  please do not swamp them with enquiries, they have
enough to deal with :)

> also, as there is a cute omap4430 SoM [1]  from phytec now, is in
> realistic to think in a pandaboard-"based" netbook?

 the cost of the phytec SoM, when i spoke to them, was *more* than a
pandaboard, with less memory.  they *may* have sorted the price by
now, but it is unlikely because the pcb design is extremely advanced
(viz: small).  but it does look like they sorted the memory, at least.
 the problem with POP memory is that although it is easier to design
in (it fits on top, thus is less design work) it is really, really
expensive as it is very high density and not particularly common.

 then, also, i've not yet been able to establish the price of the
OMAP4430 but from experience OMAPs are typically 50 to 80% higher
priced than "straight" (other ARM) CPUs due to the inclusion of the
DSP.

 there's something very very weird going on with all this.  the only
systems that appear to be making it out the door are those with
rubbish amounts of RAM, rubbish CPUs, rubbish LCD screens or GPL
violating rubbish android tablets.  that next.co.uk laptop was so bad
(and was also mis-advertised as a dual-core cortex A9 when it was
probably a GPL violating telechips ARM11) it had to be withdrawn and
the page now redirects to a tegra 250 tablet that's 3 times the price.

 so yes i'm still on the case, but i can't say what i'm up to until
the deals are signed.

 l.