Techno Cop

Install Windows 7 Upgrade in Macbook Air

My Amazon order of pre-release Windows 7 Home Premium UPGRADE arrived on schedule last week. Since the Release Candidate (RC) installed in all of my computers are good until March 2010, I decided to install the first of the 3 copies in the Macbook Air under bootcamp.

I did not have any problems installing the release candidate before, but that was a full working version. I had to search the web for the workaround in installing the UPGRADE version which is what I got. Luckily, I found a very helpful guide courtesy of PAUL THURROTT’s Supersite.

So how did it go? I can tell you that everything went without a hitch. The activated version of the Windows 7 Home Premium (UPGRADE) was up and running in the AIR in under an hour, exclusive of the extra 2 hours to install my fav software and to get all Windows Update downloaded and installed.

Here is the step by step:

1. Preparing the Macbook Air

• I saved most of my files and settings to an external drive using Windows 7 RC Windows Easy Transfer.
• I also insured that all my software installers are on hand.

2. Windows 7 Home Premium (UPGRADE) Installation

• On the Mac side, I fired-up bootcamp assistant and started with the repartitioning of the MAC HD into a single partition. This step effectively erased all the files containing the old Windows 7 RC. This step is basically a repeat of my previous installation using the RC. Simple Help provided a very elaborate step by step guide of this process. Note that I selected CUSTOM installation when prompted. This is the option that allows for a clean install of the OS, which is what I wanted.

3. Activating Windows 7

Even the instructions that came with the DVD of Windows 7 detailed the need to have a running XP or Vista in order to activate the UPGRADE version. That is why I readied the 3 licensed copies of XP and 1 Vista Business just incase. As it turned out, this was not necessary if you will follow the steps provided by THURROTT’s:

• After performing the clean install, ensure that there are no Windows Updates pending that would require a system reboot. (You'll see an orange shield icon next to Shutdown in the Start Menu if this is the case).
• Then, open regedit.exe with Start Menu Search and navigate to:
• HKLM/Software/Microsoft/Windows/CurrentVersion/Setup/OOBE/
• Change MediaBootInstall from "1" to "0".
• Open the Start Menu again and type cmd to display a shortcut to the Command Line utility. Right-click this shortcut and choose "Run as administrator." Handle the UAC prompt.
• In the command line window, type: slmgr /rearm
• Then tap ENTER, close the command line window and reboot. When Windows 7 reboots, run the Activate Windows utility, type in your product key and activate windows.

4. Installing all Software

• With the external hard drive containing my old files connected, I double clicked on the file WindowsEasyTransfer.MIG. This immediately started installation of all my old files and settings.
• I then clicked on START, typed easy transfer reports, and clicked on that application. This presented me with a neat listing of all the software that used to be installed in the old computer.
• I then just installed all of them one by one (Office 2007, Photoshop CS4, TextAloud, Windows Live writer, Firefox, Sugarsync, Mindmanager Pro 8, and Microsoft Security Essentials).

Voila! A Macbook Air with Windows 7 Home Premium that will never expire.

Next up will be to find time to install the 2 remaining W7 OS on my 2 desktops.

WINDOWS 7 for Now

My friend and business partner,ALLAN JARLOS, recently offered to give me a license for the latest MAC OSX upgrade – SNOW LEOPARD. I politely declined saying that doing so would require me to re-install under boot camp my daily OS of choice- Windows 7. Besides, I hardly ever use MAC OSX anymore since I downloaded the Windows 7 beta. I told him that although my everyday computer is a MACBOOK Air, it is practically a PC since I only use it with Windows 7 running under boot camp. I detailed in this post some of the Windows 7 experiences that made me fall in love with this soon to be released OS from Microsoft.

As it turns out, a veteran tech columnist and analyst Joe Wilcox would have done the same.

His reason for his current love affair with Windows is practically the same as mine. He really likes the Windows 7 interface, and he feels it makes him more productive. Here is an excerpt of his article in BetaNews:

The Mac OS X user interface, once trendsetting, is now a tired motif overdue for overhaul. Worse, Apple hints at what the UI could and should be in a few places, with QuickTime being the most visible example. The QuickTime UI is refreshing and new -- delightful. Something similar should skin much of Snow Leopard. Worse still, QuickTime's more modern UI is jarring reminder when switching back to the Snow Leopard Finder about how old most of the rest of Mac OS X feels.

By comparison, Windows 7 feels surprisingly fresh. Microsoft is finally doing good user interface design.

I find myself to be way more productive using Windows 7 than any Mac OS X version, and that's surprising to me. For years, the greater productivity claim belonged to Mac OS X. Consistently, I get about 30 percent to 40 percent more work done using Windows 7 than either Leopard or Snow Leopard. Windows Vista doesn't rate. The combined usability flaws -- everything from slow resume from sleep to nagging pop-ups to UI pauses or hangs -- are too much for me to use Windows Vista any longer.

More importantly, I have loads more fun using Windows 7 than Mac OS X. I haven't had this much fun using a Microsoft operating system since Windows 95. After more than three months running Mac OS X, I really missed Windows 7. By comparison, for the six months I primarily used Windows 7 test builds, I only missed Mac OS X for iLife.

I can say that these are the same reasons why, for the past nine months, my productivity has greatly improved working mainly in Windows 7. My personal experience has only been stellar that all my computers are now running the Windows 7 release candidate. The same reasons why, in July of this year, I pulled the trigger and ordered 3 copies of Windows 7 at a pre-release price of $49.99 each.

Yet Another Gadget Bag

In a recent post I wrote:

Back to the HK trip, my long-time friend and mentor, MARTIN CEPEDA, asked me to accompany him to a Montblanc shop to buy a pen. We went to the branch in Pacific Place and he went inside the store as I wandered through the other signature shops nearby. When he finally got out of the store, he was carrying a huge shopping bag with the store’s logo emblazoned on it. So I asked, “ boy, that must be a hell of a lot of pens that you brought there.” To which he replied, “Nope, this is my gift to you.”

As promised, here is what my friend got me from the MontBlanc shop;

It is an elegant messenger bag made from deer skin. It does not offer much support to a laptop that is why I always have to carry the Macbook Air in a Speck hard shell case. However, It is spacious enough to fit my daily mobile gear. Here is what I always carry with it:

L-R: MontBlanc Messenger bag, Macbook AIR, USB modem,  Minimax speaker,  Plantronics 925  bluetooth headset, notepad, VGA adapter, Nokia E71, iPhone 3G, and Bang & Olufsen A8 earset.

Windows7 on the Macbook AIR

In a previous post I wrote that, “2009 will be the year where I will be less distracted by new gadgets.” Well, compared to years before, I can say that that has been quite true. We are almost at the end of the 1st quarter of the year and I have not added any new gadgets to the TECHNOCOP HQ. In the cellphone department alone, I have stayed with my very sleek E71 and iPhone 3G.

But all that has changed and I would have to blame Windows 7 and a recent business trip to Hongkong together with a close friend. After being extremely happy and productive in Windows 7, I found myself walking the streets of Causeway bay looking for a thin and light netbook. You guessed it, a thin and light netbook that will sport Windows 7 just as soon as I lay my hands on it. Heck, I even brought with me the installer and an external DVD drive. Let us cut through the chase, I bought a Macbook Air 1.86 GHZ Core 2 Duo with 128 gig SSD and 2 gig RAM. At 3 lbs, it is just as light as any netbook on the market.

The Windows 7 install (Using Bootcamp) on the AIR went without a hitch as expected. I simply followed the very well-written step by step guide in Simple Help. Here is my quick take on the experience thus far:

• My eyes are thanking me for the AIR’s very crisp 13 inch screen.
• I enjoy using the trackpad that I do not carry a mouse with me anymore.
• The processor speed is decent. It boots Windows 7 in just 40 seconds and WORD 2007 in 3 seconds. 
• The battery is good enough for my regular day of use. The meter shows 3+ hours but I will have to validate that some more.
• Even with its brick power adapter, the AIR hardly occupies space in most of my bags.
• All my software are running without any issues (Office 2007, Photoshop, TextAloud, Windows Live writer, Firefox 3 beta, Sugarsync and the Mindmanager Pro).

As I put the AIR with Windows 7 to the test in the days to come, I will report here other experiences that you may find helpful.

Back to the HK trip, my long-time friend and mentor, MARTIN CEPEDA, asked me to accompany him to a Montblanc shop to buy a pen. We went to the branch in Pacific Place and he went inside the store as I wandered through the other signature shops nearby. When he finally got out of the store, he was carrying a huge shopping bag with the store’s logo emblazoned on it. So I asked, “ boy, that must be a hell of a lot of pens that you brought there.” To which he replied, “Nope, this is my gift to you.”

In my next post, I will tell you what the gift was. (HINT: it is perfect for the Macbook AIR).

Intel on NETBOOKS: 'Fine for an hour' but..." Duh!

According to a Cnet article, at a recent Raymond James IT Supply Chain Conference, Stu Pann, vice president in the sales and marketing group at Intel, said his company sees the Netbook differently now.

His most jaw-dropping statement was, "If you've ever used a Netbook and used a 10-inch screen size--it's fine for an hour. It's not something you're going to use day in and day out."

I could only speculate about the logic behind this statement especially considering that the Intel Atom processors found in most netbooks are perhaps the hottest selling in Intel's product line. However I could say for certain that there will be millions of netbook users who will argue with that viewpoint.

Techradar in their recent article "Notebook vs Netbook: which should you buy?" found the netbooks to be extremely capable but not as one's sole computer especially if you are a gamer or fond of heavy multi-tasking. This is what they say about the overall netbook performance:

Speed-wise, we didn't experience many problems when working on Word, Excel or PowerPoint files on a variety of netbooks. File opening and saving times were fairly nippy and even cutting and pasting large images or lots of tables and graphs didn't slow things down too much. However, if you keep a lot of documents open at the same time and are constantly switching between them, it can place a strain on a netbook's limited spec.

This is mainly because netbooks tend to come with a limited amount of memory, but it's also due to the nature of the Atom processor, which isn't a patch on the dual-core and quadcore processors found in full-blown laptops when it comes to multi-tasking.

On the whole, we'd say that for day-to-day office tasks, netbooks have enough processing power to get the job done without feeling too sluggish.

My OS X netbook of choice, the Asus 1000H, is not my only computer. You simply cannot beat the speed as well as the convenience of working on a full-featured desktop or notebook. That is why I still have my MacPro setup at the Technocop HQ and my Macbook tethered to a 22 inch monitor at the office. But for my day to day computing chores, I find my netbook to be very capable. At this price point, its reasonable processing power, light weight, and respectable battery life are simply hard to beat. Heck, I recently survived a 1 week consulting job with the netbook as my only computer.

Perhaps, I will not argue with this conclusion by Techradar:

For more intensive tasks, you'll find that a netbook's limited performance really gets in the way. However, as a companion for your existing laptop or desktop PC, a netbook is hard to beat. They're highly portable and the good battery life is also a boon. Add to this the fact that they're so competitively priced and you've got a really tempting device.

Technorati Tags: Netbook

Netbook a junk? Or does it just work?

 

Working as a security consultant for the 2^nd Global Forum for Migration and Development, I found myself for extended periods of time tied to a desk that was to be my co-working space for a week. Having decided that I will put the Netbook OS X to the test, I requested the organizers to loan me an external monitor and a USB keyboard. The first image below was my setup with the OS X Leopard Desktop showing. But with just one click of a button, I have access to the XP Desktop (second image) configured under Leopard's Spaces.

For the duration of the Forum, I used the Netbook OS X as my only workhorse to write and print wirelessly (using a Canon iP90v with portable battery pack and connected via Bluetooth) the nightly critique reports, downloading and editing digital pictures, preparing the occasional Powerpoint presentation, web browsing while listening to iTunes, and even blogging using MS Word 2007 as I am doing now.

The only problem with this setup is the endless distraction that I get from the people looking over my shoulders ogling this very cool setup. Some simply could not believe that this tiny 2lb machine could handle practically anything I throw at it. Yes, the Netbook OS X simply works and when you factor in the price, weight and battery life, it is simply amazing.

Jeff Attwood of Coding Horror had a similar observation of the netbook;

I didn't expect much from this cheap, diminutive laptop; it's mostly for web surfing, light email, maybe a tiny bit of miscellaneous office work. And in case the color choice didn't make it clear, it's not even for me. That's my story, and I'm sticking to it!

As I sat down to configure this machine, I belatedly realized that for most of what I do with a computer, this cute little netbook is perfectly adequate. Sure, the keyboard is a bit cramped, it's no performance powerhouse, and the screen size, at 1024 x 600, is definitely the minimum necessary for it to be practical. It took some adaptation, but it wasn't frustrating or disappointing to use. It delivered (almost) the same web experience I'd get on my desktop or laptop, with no serious compromises. It just.. worked.

To whoever said that $500 Netbooks are junk, my netbook OS X is the best piece of "junk" I have ever laid my hands on for the almost 2 decades of computing life.

Netbook OS X on the Asus eee 1000H

In a recent post, I wrote about the computers that I own. 3 are Windows OS and 1 Mac OS X. Recently, my Tablet PC HP 2710p for the nth time started having problems recovering from sleep mode. As a longtime windows user, this is nothing serious considering that what it all requires really is PATIENCE. I waited for 5 minutes, and still no progress from the 2710p with Vista Business. I decided to instead go to the ever reliable macbook which stays tethered to the 28in Samsung:

I opened the display and almost instantaneously, the macbook is on with the wifi indicator showing that it is connected. I triggered Firefox from the dock and up comes Gmail. I scrolled down to the labels to look for the file that I need to send, opened the email, clicked F in the keyboard, and out comes the forwarding email dialog box. I then typed the first 3 letters of my intended recipient's email address and out comes a slection of email addresses. I clicked from the selection the correct address, clicked the send button and I am done. At just about this time, I noticed that the tablet PC has finished initializing.

Looking back to the 1 1/2 years that I have had the Macbook, I simply could not recall experiencing even a minor hiccup. Something I could not say about any of the Windows only computers that I own. I believe that experiences like these by Windows only users contributed immensely to the dramatic rise in sales of Apple computers.

As much as I would love to carry the 5++ lbs Macbook with me all the time, there are just more times when travelling light is paramount. This is why I recently bought the Asus EEE 1000H PC with XP OS, which at 2lbs and 10 in screen, is snappy enough for my daily computing needs. I have been reading a lot lately about the EEE PC and MSI Wind being hacked to run OS X. Imagine having the reliability of OS X in a 2lb package...the Macbook Air, you say? But at a little under $2,000.00, it is definitely not the only option to most. Last weekend, I took the plunge and had a friend install a DMG image of the Leopard OS of my Macbook onto the EEE PC.

The process went fairly straightforward and Leopard was running in the Eee 1000H in under 2 hours. There are just a couple of issues which could be deal breakers for some:

1. Wifi works fine but with the use of a software utility - Wireless Utility Cardbus PCI. The Netbook OS X connects alright with most any wifi router. However, even coming off from sleep mode, you would need to initialize your connection from the utility.

2. Audio works fine but only with the use of a USB soundcard the size of a small Bluetooth dongle. Once the dongle is attached, you can install your external speakers or earphones with standard adapters.

3. Installing a Mac OS X in a non-apple hardware is in violation of your Apple agreement.

4. You can no longer avail of Apple's software update as these may render your netbook install inoperable.

Barring the above issues, the following are what I love about the Netbook OS X:

• It recovers from sleep in under 3 seconds. Though not by just opening the screen. You would need to depress the power button of the netbook.
• Mac OS X is very snappy in this 1.6 ghz atom with 2 gig RAM.
• It runs all the softwares I have installed in the Macbook to include XP under VMware.
• I am getting a decent 4+ hours of battery life with the 6 cell battery.
• The weight, the weight. At a little over 2 lbs, I hardly even notice that I have with me a full featured "MAC"
• The price. At around $500 dollars, one can buy 4 of these netbooks at the price of 1 macbook air.

  I am simply loving my OS X in the Eee PC. It is has become my permanent mobile computer. I believe that this is also the case for the thousands of netizens who fell in love with the netbook form factor. This early, PC manufacturers are worried that the phenomenal rise in Netbook sales May Hurt Laptop Sales. Since Cupertino is always listening, I believe that it is only a matter of time before they finally start turning out more affordable laptops.

The Asus eee 1000H

The Asus EEE 1000H is the newest addition to the Technocop HQ. The 1000H comes with an atom 1.6ghz processor, 2 gig RAM (after the upgrade), 80 g HD, and Windows XP. It is in the category of what is now becoming to be the very popular Netbook. But do not be misled by the category (netbook) as this laptop is just as capable as any other computer that I own. It could do most anything that I need a computer for like image editing (Photoshop), mindmapping, blogging, email, websurfing, you name it.

What I especially love about the eee 1000H are its size (compared to the Macbook 13 in above), the weight (barely 2 lbs), the battery life (5-6 hours with the 6 cell battery, and the price (around $500). At this price point, this full featured laptop is very affordable that the 'desktop only' users in my organization have started to enjoy the benefits and convenience of owning a laptop. During the first week alone of owning the 1000H, at least 33 officemates already bought theirs.

I highly recommend the 1000H as it has become my daily workhorse for the past 3 weeks. You can read detailed reviews of the 1000H here, here, and here.

The above image shows my everyday gadget bag. Inside the bag I have the 1000H, Nokia E71, iPhone 3G, PenX and journal, and the MyPowerAll external battery which gives the 1000H an additional 4 hours of battery life.

My mobile life is now even sweeter!

Mandatory Vista Tweaks on the OQO 02

Below is the wallpaper now residing in my OQO 02 courtesy of DeviantArt. If you click on the image you can read the message which sums up everything about what a lot of users think about Vista, myself included.

Readers of this blog know that Vista is to blame for my switching to Mac OS X last March 2007. I bought the OQO with Vista installed thinking that factory installed Vista would be immune from the lock ups and other distractions I experienced before the switch. Well, could I be more wrong? The problems I encountered in the OQO were in fact more serious given the considerably slow processor and memory of the OQO (1.5 GHz VIA with 1 gig RAM) designed primarily for ultra mobile devices.

To cut through the chase, the OQO 02 is now very responsive after applying several suggested Vista tweaks. Let me say that the OQO 02 is now my everyday mobile companion with the Macbook waiting at home always ready for more serious work.

The following were implemented in Vista courtesy of Marcuscake.com:

1. Optimize your page file size. Windows XP sizes the page file to about 1.5X the amount of actual physical memory by default. While this is good for systems with smaller amounts of memory (under 512MB) it is unlikely that a typical XP desktop system will ever need 1.5 X 512MB or more of virtual memory. As a simplified guideline. If you have less than 512MB of memory, leave the page file at its default size. If you have 512MB or more, change the ratio to 1:1 page file size to physical memory size.
2. Edit the registry and change DisablePagingExecutive = 1(see Beginners Guides: 101 Tips and Tweaks for Windows ). This was the single most effective change.
   
3. Edit the registry and disable SuperFetch entirely by changing EnableSuperfetch to 0 (from the default of 3).
   
4. Adjust Visual Effects in Windows Vista: right click on My Computer and select "performance options" and then "Visual effects". Turn off as many of the Visual options as you can. I turned all of mine off.
   
5. Prioritize important processes: you can use Task Manager to set MS Outlook to high and Firefox to "above normal".
   
6. Disable unnecessary Windows Vista services: see Disable unnecessary services the quick and easy way
   
7. Disable Readyboost service
   
8. Stop the 'last access update' from taking up system resources (see Beginners Guides: 101 Tips and Tweaks for Windows )
   
9. Stop real-time operation of Windows Defender.
   
10. There was a time when I like to party naked and work without any anti-virus or firewall. But I now use
    Kaspersky Internet Security 7.0. A virus scan is scheduled to run every day from 12am-3am.
    

Having done all of the above, the OQO 02 now literally looks and feels like the old reliable Windows XP Tablet PC machine. The above tweaks have in fact turned the OQO 02 'from a dog to a star.' Hell, come to think of it, Vista really is nothing more than XP with all the bells and whistles. With the OQO now behaving like the old reliable XP machines that I own, I second the opinion of James Kendrick, the master of all mobile devices, in his blog "JK opinion- Vista will never run well on mobile devices."

The whole Vista mobile experience is very unstable and that is unsettling to anyone who needs to get their work done, and get it done now.  I don't care how pretty the OS is or how much new sophisticated stuff is going on under the hood if it makes my performance unpredictable.  That is such a big step backwards that you have to wonder how it can be fixed in the short term.  I fear it can't.  Say what you will about Windows XP the one thing it is on mobile devices is stable.  Rock-solid stable.  Can anyone say that about Vista on mobile PCs?  I have a very bad feeling about the immediate future of mobile computing on the Vista platform.  And that hits me where I live.

OQO 02 Experience

The purpose of this blog is not to do another extensive review of the OQO 02 since I feel that nothing can beat this great review by NEIL BALTHASER. In fact it was his review that finally made me decide to buy the OQO. Besides, I have had the OQO barely a week to do a detailed review.

My intention for writing this blog is just to highlight, based on my hands on experience, what I feel are the real strengths and weaknesses of the OQO. Here they are:

Digital Ink. Inking is my primary reason for buying the OQO. With it, I have gained back the productivity in meetings that I have sorely missed since I switched to the Macbook 4 months ago. This is by no means a Mac OS X vs. Windows issue but merely the lack of inking capability in the Mac. My blog here explains in great lengths what I have been missing before the OQO.

Factory Installed Vista. The problems I encountered when upgrading to Vista a few months back is another reason why I decided to switch to the Mac. Even then, I have friends running factory installed Vista who could swear that it is one, if not the, most stable OS they have ever used. I can say that with the few days with the OQO, the experience has been nothing short of superb. I will hold my final say about Vista after a month with the OQO.

iPhone-like Screen Rotation. Yes, by simply installing this application found in OQO talk, I can get the OQO to rotate every which way I want. I find this especially useful when inking in OneNote where I want the Touch scrollers to be out of the way. It is also useful for when I am plugged in and in laptop mode (wireless keyboard and mouse attached).

Speech recognition. With very minimal voice training, I am getting very good accuracy with Vista's built in voice recognition. Using Plantronics DSP 400 USB headset and the OQO's processor set at around 60% seem to give me some very good results. In fact, I am getting pretty much the same accuracy as when I am using Dragon Naturally Speaking 9.  Well, almost but not really as accurate as DNS 9. I attribute this mainly to the extensive speech training I have undergone with DNS 9.  My guess is that Vista's accuracy is going to improve over time. But even with this very minimal training, the results I have been getting are very impressive.

Battery life. With Bluetooth and wifi always on, processor speed set at 60%, and brightness level set at 1 bar, I managed to get 2 hours and 35 minutes and close to 5 hours from the standard and the extended batteries, respectively. Seven hours of juice is more than good enough for my daily computing needs. My standard practice is for the OQO to go on sleep every time I press the power button. I find that keeping the OQO in sleep mode for 8 hours straight only results to a 15 percent battery loss.

Working in bed or on the couch. I find that nothing could beat the OQO when doing this type of 'work or play.' Its ergonomics makes it very comfortable when used purely handheld. What makes it even more useful are the horizontal and vertical touch scrollers found at the bottom right corner of the OQO. These allow for easy scrolling just with the flick of my right thumb. Something that brings a smile to the face while browsing in bed. Yes, even while lying in bed. With the keyboard extended, I can rest the OQO on my chest and still do some very serious browsing. The scrollers make this activity especially enjoyable. Since I received the OQO, I now look forward to some last minute browsing just before day's end. This is something that I have not been able to do much of even with the old tablet PC's.

Laptop Replacement. The OQO is very usable with the Bluetooth keyboard and mouse paired up. During the rare times when I need to type up a report, I know that the OQO is extremely capable. In fact, this portion of the blog was typed at the confines of a Starbucks coffee shop. If not for the stares and the over the shoulder look that I keep getting, I would say that using the OQO in this configuration is very liberating indeed. I just set the OQO in its native resolution and move WORD 2007's magnification to 120%, and I have a fully configured 'laptop'. I find that leaving the OQO keyboard fully extended allows for a better angle when typing this way. However, when I need to be plugged in, I have no choice but to have the keyboard closed and the OQO turned upside down. That's because the power connector of the OQO is at the bottom. See the picture below.

 

       Figure 1. Note that the OQO is upside down when plugged-in. 

The Dreaded Fan noise. Yes, I have heard it myself quite a few times but only while multitasking at an extremely quiet environment and only for very short spurts. When I have the CPU running only at 60%, I don't think the fan is even running. This may be annoying to some especially if they are running at full CPU power. Provided however that you have made the slight adjustments in power, I do not even see this becoming an issue.

Cursor Drifting. On my second day, I experienced the dreaded cursor drifting where the cursor seems to have a mind of its own. I have experienced this before in other devices and have since found a cure. Go to Control Panel/Hardware and Sound/Mouse Properties/Pointer Options/ - and under Motion, uncheck Enhance pointer precision.

The weight, the weight. I really can't seem to get the smirk off of my face every time I grab the gadget bag with the OQO, the TUMI. My Sammy grab bag for the Macbook and all my gear weighs a hefty 13 lbs. The TUMI weighs a measly 5.5 lbs with everything I need for a day.

 

Desktop Replacement. Maybe, but that would be stretching the OQO to its limits. The OQO's 1.5 GHz VIA processor is a tad slower than that found in SONY UX. But browsing, downloading email, and typing in Word all the same time has never been a problem for me. Mobility and not multitasking is what the OQO is really designed for, IMHO.

 

The Verdict. The OQO Model 02 is not just a novelty gadget but an actual workhorse worthy to even be a laptop replacement. In fact, I find that I now bring it with me more often than the Macbook. However, as near perfect as the OQO 02 may be, it is not without problems. More in my next blog.