The ThinkPad - 15 Years Old
July 19, 2007
Lest we forget, it was 15 years ago today that the first ThinkPad came out. Of course, it’s not the ThinkPad as we know it - more of a Tablet actually, the ThinkPad 700T, or model # 2521, sporting a then-high resolution 10″ touchscreen display (640×480). Even though the ThinkPad 700 and 700C were introduced first, it was the 2521/ThinkPad 700T that rolled out first.
Quoting Reg Hardware:
That honour goes to the IBM 2521 ThinkPad - known at the time as the ThinkPad - a pen-operated portable that Big Blue actually announced on 17 April 1992, but which didn’t ship until the following July - hence, according to Lenovo, today’s anniversary….
Amazingly in an era long before the current debate over the future of hard drive technology and the emergence of Flash-based alternatives, the 2521 incorporated a 20MB solid-state drive. The 2521 ran PenPoint, an tablet-oriented operating system from Go Corporation.
Come 5 October, IBM renamed the 2521 the ThinkPad 700T to bring its naming into line with the three new laptop models. It also tweaked the design slightly to make it more robust.
Technically speaking, as Reg Hardware points out, the ThinkPad design as we know it (clamshell display/keyboard) would not come around until the 300, 700, 700C ThinkPads rolled out.
Specifications:
Model: 2521-001 and 2521-002 (only difference: 4MB or 8MB memory)
CPU: 20MHz 386SX
Display: 10″ 640×480 Monochrome
Hard Drive: 20MB Solid State Drive
Connectivity: 2.4Kbps Modem, Serial/Parallel ports, external floppy, external keyboard
Articles:
- Reg Hardware - The IBM ThinkPad: 15 years old today
- ThinkWiki - 700T - thinkWiki.org
- ThinkPad 700T Tech Specs - pkhour.com
Photos: Wikimedia Commons and ThinkWiki
Announced: Samsung 1.8-inch Solid State Drive - 64GB
June 26, 2007
Samsung has began mass-producing 1.8-inch solid state drives with 64GB capacities. This is good news for ultraportable fans - the drivers help increase battery life, decrease weight, and are much more resistant to being bumped around (not that you should of course), and they are faster than other hard drive options available in this size.
No word on availability or price.
Excerpt from the press release:
Samsung is aggressively expanding market development efforts for its SSDs. Industry wide attention on ultra-light, ultra-slim notebook PCs with flash memory based SSDs reflect early market support for this new storage medium. In addition, Samsung has already introduced 32GB SSDs into ultra-mobile personal computers (UMPCs). SSDs also are being considered for server applications such as in advertising and for Web search engines. Other digital consumer products such as camcorders, PDAs and printers can now be equipped with SSDs ranging from 4GB to 64GB.
Samsung’s mass production of 64GB SSDs makes it the largest producer of high-capacity SSDs in the world.
Rapid expansion of the 1.8-inch SSD market will spark demand for even smaller SSD formats to be used in mobile consumer electronics. The miniaturization of SSDs will give rise to new types of digital products. Over the next three years, 2.5-inch and 3.5-inch SSDs will also gain a great deal of momentum for widespread use in standard notebooks and desktop PCs, respectively.
Samsung expects that sales of SSD units will increase at a rapid 270 percent pace industry-wide between now and 2010 to become the largest growth segment in the NAND flash industry.
Press Release at BusinessWire.com
SanDisk Announces 64GB Solid State Drives
June 7, 2007
SanDisk has announced the addition of 64GB Solid State Drives to their flash-memory based lineup. They come in two form factors:
- 1.8-inch Parallel ATA
- 2.5-inch Serial ATA (SATA)
SanDisk already has 32GB versions of these drives available, and they are intended to be drop-in replacements for existing drives. Among the benefits of Solid State Drives:
- Durability and reliability: No moving parts, helpful if a machine is dropped or jarred
- High performance: No moving parts means booting up a laptop or access files is much faster.
- Low power consumption: No moving parts plus other factors means a lower amount of power consumption which leads to an increase in battery life for most laptops.
Interestingly enough, they mention, in addition to business/enterprise users, gamers, as a target audience of these drives.
Full press release at SanDisk.com
HP: No Intel Turbo Memory
June 5, 2007
CNET News.com is reporting that HP will not be offering Intel’s Turbo Memory as an option on their Santa Rosa-based systems. HP did perform tests, and did see the benefits, but they also saw that overall system memory was more important:
Using Intel’s benchmark test for evaluating the performance of Turbo Memory, HP’s team did see the improvements in performance that Intel had predicted. However, because 1GB of Turbo Memory is effectively split into two–with one half serving ReadyBoost and the other ReadyDrive–adding a 512MB SD card or a 512MB USB stick to the baseline system resulted in the same improvements.
The greatest improvement came as a result of adding more actual RAM to the system. “We added 1GB of RAM and saw a much higher improvement in performance compared to using any of the ReadyBoost or Robson technology,” Doddridge said. He added that: “If you have enough system RAM in the system already, ReadyBoost doesn’t give you a lot.”
This means that the HP Compaq 2710p and HP Compaq 2510p will not have the option of using the memory boost. Both the 2710p and 2510p were recently announced, and have a 12-inch widescreen display. The 2710p is a Table PC/Convertible, with a screen that rotates around and turns it into a Tablet PC.
Review: 100GB Toshiba 1.8-inch Hard Drive
May 22, 2007
Tom’s Hardware has put together a very in-depth review of the new 1.8-inch hard drive from Toshiba, covering performance, features, etc (including power consumption) and comparing it to its predecessors - 1.8″ drives in 40Gb and 80GB capacities.
The review is centered around the 100GB Toshiba MK1011GAH (press release at toshiba.co.jp), a 1.8-inch hard drive that uses perpendicular magnetic recording (PMR) and is geared towards ultra mobile and ultraportable devices, with a lower power consumption than traditional 2.5-inch hard drives (and even previous generations of 1.8-inch drives.).
Sony VAIO TZ - Pictures, Two Hard Drives?
May 21, 2007
It’s being reported that the Sony VAIO TZ (TZ11) Series will have both a traditional 2.5-inc spindle-based Hard Drive (up to 160GB) as well as a 1.8-inch 32GB Solid State Drive (SSD) (via Laptoping.com and Engadget). The TZ series has an 11.-inch display and weighs just over 2.6 pounds, and uses an Intel Core 2 Duo Ultra Low Voltage CPU.
In theory, you should be able to load the OS onto the Solid State Drive, and combining that with the Ultra Low Voltage CPU and the LED-backlit display, the battery life could very well meet the eight hours that has been reported.
Meanwhile, Akihabara News has an actual VAIO TZ and has published several pictures, with a review coming in the next few weeks.
