Hot on the heels of Raon Digital’s apparent demise comes word that Everex US have shut their doors. Best known for the Cloudbook, a rebadge of VIA’s original Nanobook reference design that met with middling reviews and relative consumer apathy, the company had most recently revealed plans for a WiMAX version and a touchscreen model.
It looks as though one of the mainstays of the UMPC segment, Raon Digital, has closed business. After stock shortages have prompted concerns over the past few months, more recently speciality sites have reported no word from their contacts at the company and, according to Pocketables, Korean news sites have published bankruptcy notices.
Sony have received FCC approval for a WiFi, Bluetooth, EVDO and HSPA equipped “notebook PC” that, going by the accompanying photo, looks to be the company’s much-rumored netbook. The device, described as both the PCG-1P1L and PCG-1P2L, uses the Qualcomm Gobi WLAN chipset, and measures approximately 9.5 x 4.5-inches.
After Raon Digital announced their two new SSD-based Everun Note models, the S16S and D24S, we’ve been waiting to see how the switch to solid-state storage affects their performance. Given that the original Everun Note was known as something of a pocket power-house, only held back by its traditional 60GB hard-drive, the stakes are certainly high. UMPCPortal’s Steve has just received the Everun Note S16S and D24S, and tested them out in a huge 2hr marathon.
Check out the video demo after the cut
AMD are preparing to reveal their netbook intentions at an analyst meeting on November 13th. Management at the company have previously been apathetic toward the segment, with VP of advanced marketing Pat Moorhead suggesting they only really made sense “around the house” rather than as a valid mobile warrior tool; CEO Dirk Meyer is now describing the AMD strategy as a “complicated answer”. It’s likely to address both battery life and video performance, both key areas criticised by Moorhead.
Laptops big and small have monopolized the headlines this week, with the most anticipation being Apple’s upcoming MacBook event on Tuesday October 14th. SlashGear will be live-blogging the whole thing, so join us at http://Live.SlashGear.com at 10am PST. Meanwhile the ‘Brick’ rumors of what Steve Jobs might be announcing keep on coming: we’ve seen water-jet cutting systems, $800 price-points and several purported photo leaks. Of course, Apple are saying nothing until Tuesday; they’re too busy blaming NVIDIA for a spate of MacBook graphics failures.
Raon Digital’s Everun Note has generally done a great job impressing reviewers with its balance of portability and power; the only two areas of real contention have been the speed of the hard-drive and the device’s price. Raon Digital ship the Everun Note with a standard 60GB hard-drive that dragged down the benchmarks, and the sticker price of $879 is high compared to other ultraportable devices. Now the company has announced two new versions, both with SSD storage, to slot either side of the existing HDD model, and in the process offer a cheaper path to ownership.
Read SlashGear – or any tech website – even semi-regularly and you’ll see new netbooks appearing pretty much every day. The niche that started off with the Eee PC 700 as an unusual budget ultraportable has flourished to the point where most major notebook manufacturers have at least one on sale or in the pipeline. Just as common, however, as the new models is the phrase “another 1.6GHz Intel Atom”; the netbook market may not have reached saturation point, but has our interest in the same old hardware?
Raon Digital were holding up a red-rag with their Everun Note, including a PCI-Express Mini slot and SIM card holder: it was only a matter of time until someone slotted a 3G WWAN modem in there. Taking the guts of an AT&T AirCard 875U, a UMPC Fever forum member dismantled their Everun Note and threaded an antenna around the LCD bezel.
It can’t be in too many hands as of yet, but the Everun Note is about to be snatched out of them and dragged back to base. Raon Digital have recalled the compact touchscreen notebook over “failure symptoms” that include high-pitched fan noise, blue-screening, overheating processor, inaccurate battery monitor levels or “an error related to the preinstalled e-dictionary and/or PDA authentication”.
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