Zara Baxter explains the thinking behind Intel's new mini-devices, and notices a distinct absence of the term "UMPC" in Intel's ultraportable demos.
Until recently, Intel was talking UMPC (ultra mobile PC) and MID, when it came to tiny portables. But now it's netbooks, nettops and MIDs. What does it all mean?
In a nutshell:
Netbook = basic needs (eg. the EeePC)
Nettop = like the nettop, but in a desktop
MID = mobile entertainment (handheld device, smaller than notebook, sometimes with slide out QWERTY keyboard. See photo above right of Compal's MID concept)
Notebook = full featured
It's hard not to attribute the change in terminology to the sea-change generated by low-cost tiny computers such as the EeePC. Many commentators have talked about the EeePC and similar gadgets as being a race to the bottom that threatened the drive toward ever more powerful computers. By partitioning the market into netbooks and nettops, Intel leaves a clear path for notebooks to be about the continuation of Moore's law and performance-based computing in a mobile form factor, while also capitalising on the current popularity of small form-factor, inexpensive internet devices for those with basic needs.
Apart from the sleigh-of-hand rebadging, Intel is also pushing Montevina, the new mobile platform, which is due out in June, and boasts a large number of developments that allow it to provide the processing power for notebooks, netbooks, nettops and MIDs.