Why so small? [LWN.net]

Why so small?

Posted Jan 8, 2007 16:10 UTC (Mon) by justme (guest, #19967)
Parent article: Nokia N800 announced

Since it's already bigger than wallet/blackberry size, why wouldn't they just increase the size to, say, notebook size? Would this make the LCD/touchscreen too expensive, or kill the battery life?

Otherwise, I like where they're going with it.

Why so small?

Posted Jan 8, 2007 17:43 UTC (Mon) by rossburton (subscriber, #7254) [Link]

Because if it were a laptop, it would be a really bad laptop (300MHz ARM, 128M RAM). The point is that this slips into your bag or coat pocket easily and you don't notice (not like the average laptop) so you can carry it around with you.

Also, laptops are not useful in the bath, whereas I've used the 770 + lastexit and Opera to catch up on RSS whilst listening to music. I won't do that with my laptop...

Why so small?

Posted Jan 8, 2007 18:20 UTC (Mon) by broonie (subscriber, #7078) [Link]

It's a surprisingly effective form factor: while it is bigger than a mobile phone or similar it's still easily portable in a pocket (so much easier to carry than a notebook). The win from the additional size is a much bigger screen than you'd get on a phone, giving you web sites rendering much more as they would on a full sized computer than on a constrained device like a mobile phone.