Here is a device I wish some company would try to recreate.  In many ways, this device was the zenith for Sony Clie’s and even for Palm devices in general.  As you can tell from the picture, the device was shaped like a miniature tablet PC, with a relatively spacious thumb keyboard and a 3.25″ screen that could flip and fold over it.  Therefore, it could be used in both tablet mode and mini-laptop mode.  The UX50 had both Wi-Fi and Bluetooth.  The Wi-Fi alone makes it useful, even today, more than 5 years after it first came out.  A quick look on eBay reveals that used UX50’s still go for well over $100, if not $200.

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Lenovo IdeaPad S10

To prevent the previous post in this series from becoming a one-off, one-hit wonder, I have been tirelessly searching the past two weeks for another Blast from the Past.  The inspiration came to me when I saw that Lenovo began selling their IdeaPad S10 netbook earlier this week.  Looking at the IBM WorkPad z50 lying next to my desk.  I began to realize the similarities.

Even though the IdeaPad is much more of a full-fledged notebook than the WorkPad ever was, they occupy a very similar niche and have similar form factors.  The WorkPad z50 for those unfamiliar was a Windows CE-based Handheld PC.  It had a QWERTY keyboard and the trademark red eraserhead trackpoint from the ThinkPads.  It was meant to be an ultraportable companion for a computer when portability was key and a true ultraportable notebook was too expensive or did not have enough battery life.  In this regards, the IdeaPad S10 is the spiritual successor to the WorkPad z50.  Fast forward 9 years, and true ultraportable laptops still cost an arm and a leg.  Netbooks, like the IdeaPad, offer the portability of a small computer without the cost.  They also have limitations, like the WorkPad, in that they cannot do everything a full-sized computer can.

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