A rare irony
September 12th, 2007
"It's a rare irony to chronicle the demise of an upcoming device by using the device itself." So writes Glenn Derene at Popular Mechanics in an excellent defense of the now-deceased Palm Foleo-1:
By foregoing a hard drive in favor of flash memory and using a stripped-down Linux OS, the Foleo can literally boot up as soon as you push the on button, making off-the-cuff e-mails and gotta-know-now Internet searches easy. Sure, there are handheld devices… but none of them split the difference between the comfort of a laptop keyboard and portability the way the Foleo does. …
Critics in the press (this means you, Engadget) have lambasted the device, saying that there is no point to a device that is shaped like a laptop but lacks the computing power. But I disagree—most laptops are bloated with fat-client software and high-powered chips that makes them run hot and slow, while chewing through batteries. This is the very reason why handhelds have taken off in the past few years. What people need on the go is e-mail, Internet access and light document software. That’s exactly what the Foleo has.
Once again, someone who has actually used the Foleo clearly understands it.
Glenn, I hope you aren't considering sending your Foleo back to Palm.
September 12th, 2007 at 5:56 am
Heh… check out this quote:
It’s only a matter of time before an innovative company such as Apple comes out with a low-cost, super-light, instant-on machine that will wow tech-heads, leaving Palm in the position it is in right now—playing catch-up in a technology category it pioneered.
So the Foleo represents the future of computing, but might not actually be the part of that future?
September 12th, 2007 at 9:55 am
I would prefer to have a powerful hardware (not necessary the fastest). At least it can handle the future application.
September 12th, 2007 at 3:35 pm
Wow, Gfong. You missed the whole point of the Foleo. Makes sense that you wouldn’t want it.
If the first run of applications are all you need in a laptop, what does it matter? And anything written for the Foleo–even in the future–will obviously be written for the Foleo hardware.
September 12th, 2007 at 6:30 pm
I may be alone on this one, but the “smartphone companion / mobile companion” angle was one of the big selling points for me, and I hope that Palm continues to plan this functionality in Foleo-II. It’s not that I don’t want the device to be useful on its own, but something in the article gave me a big “aha” moment: The Foleo itself was not intended to be a laptop replacement, but a Foleo combined with a smartphone could be a laptop replacement for most users. (or something to that effect)
That’s exactly the position I’m in, and the Foleo working in tandem with my Treo would in fact negate the need for me to carry a laptop.
While I think a Foleo-II having direct e-mail support is fine, there is something to be said for letting your smartphone do the e-mail grunt work and simply transfer the e-mail data to a Foleo via Bluetooth. No Exchange Servers to set up, IMAP addresses, or POP servers… just pair the two and off you go.
This also make me think that if Palm can sync e-mail and attachments via Bluetooth, it can find a way for users to share saved files between the units using the same process.
September 12th, 2007 at 7:46 pm
I don’t like his mention of a “substandard screen.” What’s he mean by that?!!?
September 12th, 2007 at 7:47 pm
>>>No Exchange Servers to set up, IMAP addresses, or POP servers… just pair the two and off you go.
Or, at least with YahooMail POP3, let the *device* do it, like the iPhone does.
September 13th, 2007 at 12:52 am
I think the “substandard screen” line is maybe referring to size?? All the other reports have said the display is really nice.
September 13th, 2007 at 1:00 am
I want web access without the fear of some site not loading properly because of the Foleo’s limitations.
Fixing that kind of thing (including but not limited to YouTube) would be a nice first step.
September 13th, 2007 at 2:58 am
I was also looking forward to a smartphone companion. But now my current phone (iPhone) doesn’t do email very well. So now I think I’d use the Foleo for email if it can handle it alone.
September 14th, 2007 at 1:41 pm
@West: the Foleo is/was a Linux device, so there’s at least some prospect of porting Firefox (or perhaps Minimo, which is a lighter version), which is much closer to supporting almost all websites than is Opera.