Five years ago analysts were predicting that cellphones and PDAs will eventually merge. Many laughed at these predictions (especially PalmOS users of that time) but today we know that the future of PDAs already lies with smartphones. “Convergence” seems to be the key element of all new cellphones, even the ones that are not in the “smartphone” category: they all playback mp3 for example. It’s obvious that convergence will move even further: music & video players and recorders will eventually give in much of their marketshare in favor of a one-device-does-it-all type of informational, entertainment & communication product. And Apple is definitely aware of this trend.Specifications
Let’s imagine how a powerful smartphone device would look like in 3 years time. Please note that some of today’s phones already have some of the following features, but they don’t have ALL of them.
* 624 Mhz to 1 GHz CPUs
Intel has already announced the new generation of XScale ARM that will reach 1 GHz soon.
* Bluetooth 2.0 Class 1
* Bluetooth Hands-Free Class 1 (included with device)
With a Class1 bluetooth device you can have access to devices or your music headphones or your included hands-free up to 330 yds (100 m).
* Basic speech recognition
Because the device would be in standby mode in a jacket pocket or bag most of the times, the included Bluetooth handsfree module should be able to support some speech recognition to voice dial or for music playback.
* WiFi and 3G/WCDMA/UMTS
The latest technologies in long range wireless and communication are standard. Hopefully, GPRS/EDGE will become cheaper too.
* SD or miniSD support
* FM radio
FM playback and recording is available.
* GPS
A must have feature in the future. A lot of applications will depend on it.
* Integrated keyboard
This is a major feature that’s needed for such a device to succeed. Because such a device would be like a small handtop laptop in many cases, it must behave like one in terms of input. The device would be smaller than most PocketPC phones today, not like the one that was announced yesterday and apparently it’s even bigger than my current PDAs! If the screen swivels around the keyboard (so it’s not a sliding keyboard) and there’s not a lot of unused space around the screen, there is a good possibility that the overall device won’t be huge.
* 20 to 40 GB hard-disk/Flash
A true multimedia device needs a lot of storage space.
* VGA front camera
Used for 3G video calls. Present today on a few Nokia models only. Hopefully the new generation will use the h.264 codec for better quality and filesize and the multi-IM applications will be able to use the video camera for video chats. It would be so cool to be using your phone to video chat with your friend in the other side of the country sitting in front of his iChat/iSight on a Mac!
* TFT VGA touchscreen 4″
This would be a swivel screen, it would look like a PDA or a laptop depending on the orientation of the screen.
* 4 MP camera with flashlight (on the back)
* 128 MB RAM
* 3D sound and stereo speakers
* microphone, headphone-out
* 32 MB 3D chipset
ATi already has demoed this.
* Wireless USB and USB host
Connect your smartphone to any wireless USB device! For example, burn a CD, wirelessly!
* A/V TV in/out & recording
Like most of Archos video devices, they are able to record in full TV resolution from any A/V source. This should do too.
* Table stand
This plastic stand, part of the device, allows the user to stand the device in a comfortable way to watch video.
* Gaming/functionality buttons
The layout of the main buttons on the device (below the touchscreen) is such that allows gaming in a more natural way. For example, instead of a five-way touch-button that most PocketPCs come with today, a 5-way mini-joystick (like the ones on the Sony Ericsson phones) is used. Around the mini-joystick there are functionality buttons instead of application shortcut buttons. So, instead of having an “address book” button, you get a “close app” button, or a “Start menu” button. This allows you to use the user interface with a single hand. Next to the mini-joystick and its surrounded buttons, you get the 4 Gameboy-like buttons.
* on/off/hold button
This button allows to turn On/Off the device or “Hold” it while listening to music (which turns the LCD off to save battery).
* Enough battery
Maybe 1440 mAh would be needed to run all this for a while.
* Infrared will be absent, Bluetooth has already killed it.
Also, a lower-end device like the one I am describing above, with a 2.8″ QVGA screen and lower feature-set would also be a good option for those who don’t want to carry big gadgets with them.
FAQ
There are five kinds of reactions to these predictions to which I will answer back:
1. “I want my cellphone to only be able to call and receive calls and nothing else.”
Answer: Well, that’s what the original cellphones did too, but the majority of the customers — and especially business users where “the information” is important for them — wanted more, more, more… And as younger people becoming teenagers and soon will attend college, they will want a piece of that mulitmedia action in one device too. Exactly the same way a 30-year old today wanted a Calculator and a Calendar in his cellphone in 1998. These new multi-purpose devices are meant for the next generation of customers.
2. “Too expensive!”
Answer: Yes and no. If a user had to buy a GPS receiver, a phone, a music player and a video player, he would need about $1200. The device I am describing would cost below $600 in 3 years from now.
3. “Such a device will never be as good mp3 or video device as a dedicated one could be.”
Answer: This is true. But they will be good enough to shake away as much as 70% of their current market share. This “good enough” factor is what pushes most products out to shelves. No, they are not mediocre products. But they are definitely ‘good enough’. Especially if you couple the device with a real OS (e.g. PalmOS, Linux or Windows) and the user has a lot of native applications to choose from, the idea can surely work.
4. “Such a device can not replace a laptop”.
Answer: No, but it can compliment it, and it can replace it occassionaly, when the user doesn’t feel like carrying 6lbs with him/her. My good online friend Ian used his Zaurus 5600 exclusively as his personal PC, for almost a year. For IM, notes and web, it worked wonders for him. Of course, the reason it succeeded for him was because of the integrated keyboard of Zaurus. An integrated keyboard that would be even more pleasurable/easy to use with in my proposed device above.
5. “These devices are huge”
The 4″ VGA device I described would be as big as a PDA today. The 2.8″ QVGA would be considerably smaller (and it would do less). But the point is, most young people take with them outdoors their mp3 player, their phone, their PDA, their laptop and sometimes their video player too. Such a convergenced device would take away a lot of that burden. I think most young people would welcome such a product.
Conclusion
But we aren’t yet there in terms of technology. Today, *we can* pack all this functionality in one device, but you end-up with one huge brick that would look hideous. In 2-3 years, it could be done in the same thickness as a Palm or an HP PDA today (or a Nokia or Linux smartphone for the smaller 2.8″ QVGA suggested device).
This direction is so clear in my mind, that it will be the natural way for Apple to move to. Companies like iRiver and Creative would probably license Windows Mobile or will sell these departments to others as they won’t be able to compete with devices that do “more” than their own multimedia-only devices, while Archos will have to stay ahead of curve at all times to guarantee further success. But Apple… Apple will have to follow the trends with a smartphone, sooner or later. The only question is: will they use FreeBSD as a base for their embedded OS, or Linux?
Do i need to say more than im posting this on my “phone” that plays wmv, mp3, age of empires sim city and thousands and thousands of other CE apps…convergance is here in my o2 xda 2 mini… im not waiting for apple..
I suggest you read the whole of the article before posting. The kind of “convergance” you have today even with the best smartphone in the market, it’s not as full as the one I describe on my article.
Today, we HAVE the technology to create the device with all the features I am describing there (especially the A/V recording stuff), but we CAN NOT make it thin enough for public consuption. YET.
Unless there’s a breakthru in battery technology, I don’t want my PDA to be replaced by my mobile phone.
Imagine not being able to make a call because you waisted all your battery life by using the PDA or entertainment features.
No thanks.
I prefer to have my PDA utilize my mobile phone features using bluetooth or wifi if needed.
Which is why I say in the article that the device must have “enough battery”. Yes, there should be a bit of a breakthrough on the battery technology or in the resources management to get good results with a 1440 mAh battery in such a device.
… is already implemented in most Japanese phones.
They…
– Play MP3 (since 2002 if I’m not mistaken)
– Have a hold button (for non-folding units)
– Have FM radio (recent)
– Have TV tuners (recent)
– Have swivel screens that when flipped and held in landscape operate identically to digital cameras.
– Can have the screen/lid stand stable at any viewing angle like a mini laptop.
– Have AV-OUT for playing J2ME games on the TV
– Have 2.7″ QVGA screens
– They cost from 20,000 to 30,000 yen
My V902SH does most of the above except for the FM radio.
Exactly. HALF of what I mentioned.
And other devices are doing the other half, but NOT ALL in ONE device. That’s why I name the killer device being a child of “convergence”.
Today, we don’t have the technology to make a small device out of ALL of these features. But soon enough, we will. That’s the point of my article. It’s just a list of ALL these features to be found in ONE smartphone in the next 3 years.
“But Apple… Apple will have to follow the trends with a smartphone, sooner or later. The only question is: will they use FreeBSD as a base for their embedded OS, or Linux?…”
I am sure none, since Apple likes to do unpredictable. I feel a great possibility of them adopting QNX or somethingelse. Coz they hate common standarts and sharing with others.. Imagine a mp3 player device that you can’t upload from other software, imagine mp3 player that disables the downloaded song to play on other mp3 software,imagine a OS that doesnt work anyother device other than their trademark.. imagine….
Unfortunately QNX is out of the whole stage area atm. They have done nothing in the phone areas. I don’t think they are a good choice, because of this reason alone. And since they got bought, they are doing even less.
WindRiver might be someone to consider though.
QNX has no need to deal with phones themselves: that’s merely an end-user (of QNX’s) application. QNX is a hard real-time operating system with a microkernel, and is very well-suited to the purpose, being small, super modular, and makes it quite convenient with development tools, too.
There’s absolutely nothing (in terms of practical technical reasons: perhaps the per unit licensing costs would be more than Apple would cough up willingly) that would stand in the way of Apple slapping their own GUI level on top of the OS, slapping something in that did the codec for any form of phone, etc. and all of that would be running in userspace without a problem, presuming they wrote it correctly. Heck, QNX is very POSIX compliant, too!
“But the point is, most young people take with them outdoors their mp3 player, their phone, their PDA, their laptop and sometimes their video player too.”
No. No they don’t. most young GEEKS lug that crap around around. Most young NORMAL PEOPLE have a phone and maybe an iPod Shuffle or some other similarly cheapo music player. No video player, no laptop and DEFINITELY no PDA. Young people tend to like tiny phones, even at the cost of functionality. I’m not a sure a big geek-o-phone will appeal.
Adam, there was a time that people were asking the question of “why the heck do I need a computer for?”. But as the times pass by and new blood fills this planet, such a device will be used a lot. People won’t see it as a geeky gimmick, but a way to call, use it as a FULL computer, play games, check directions, information, entertainment etc etc.
In the beginning laptops were not popular because of their flimsy storage and price. But as these two points got fixed (around 1998), every young person now has a laptop.
This “geek” device as you call it, it will be the next step. It will be the next thing to have.
Don’t see this device is as a phone with a lot of other crap in it. It is instead a device of its own right, that happens to also do voice!
Sorry, Eugenia, but your cosy vantage point is, oh, several years further ahead of the curve than you think it is. Step out of the bubble once in a while and see what the ‘young people’ you speak for actually _do_ with their lives and with technology…
(and no, they don’t all have laptops. at least, not on this planet.)
a computer is different from this thing. You can buy a computer, stick it in the corner, and not use it for weeks at a time. (Which a lot of people who buy them do…ask your relatives sometime). You can’t do that with your phone. It’s a very personal possession.
I read your article and really like what that have been described there. Although I think that PDA will end up as a digital swiss army knife… that is it will be able to do all the things … but a dedicated device will do it better. a lot better. Inteface wise that is.
No one in is right mind would like to navigate while driving a car with its cellphone/pda while a dedicated device with 10″ monitor could be used instead. Nintendo DS will be a better *gaming* device as those need to be broad (remeber the n-gage I say). and so on…
Yoni.
I don’t get it, a table stand to watch videos on a 4″ screen? Gaming/functionality buttons?
I happen to agree with one of the other people who posted, most of it’s available now, but most people just don’t want it. I certainly wouldn’t buy this ‘device’ and I know many other youths that wouldn’t either…
Divergence is the reality, be it in nature, or technology.
How did Linux come into being? Why doesn’t everyone use a Media Centre (or Linux) powered PC for their home theatre? (In North America at least) Why can’t Media Centre PCs manipulate HD video? Why would electronics companies all want to sell the same few widgets, with only appearance to distinguish them?
One limiting thing about handhelds is the display. Until there are plug-in bigger screens, or rollable displays, or projectors or whatever, these things aren’t really going to move beyond 640×480. Density for density-sake won’t have any discernable improvement.
What a mass-market device needs is a clean, simple interface (Palm?). Colour and theming is good, as long as it is subtle.
So I am not convinced about the need for big graphics cards. What is needed is predominately 2D accel, if anything. That is the nature of the interface.
If you can play a movie over the network in 3 years time, why not play a game over the network? Remote rendering yah.
And that can be a consideration for storage too. Why have 40GB local when you can have much more remotely? (The remote server could easily ref-count data, as most people will have copies of the same content, typically songs and movie-clips.) Home-movies and recordings is all that would take space, and I rather suspect that those are the kind of thing that new users make one of, and promptly forget and don’t use again..
“If you can play a movie over the network in 3 years time, why not play a game over the network? Remote rendering yah.”
Because the latency stinks.
“And that can be a consideration for storage too. Why have 40GB local when you can have much more remotely?”
What if you’re in an area with no 3G coverage (and yes, there’ll be lots of those, yes, even in three years…) and you want to watch a movie? Not going to happen over GPRS.
And also because most people won’t have unlimited data plans. Where do you think cellphone companies expect to earn their money on 3G systems? Data transfer fees.
Don’t see them ever becoming mainstream(you need to hold the camera at armslenght to get a good picture but than the screen is way to small to see the other person). But a phone needs a camera so why not.
Harddisk need a lot of energy and are not as sturdy as flash so i see the phone of the near future as having 4GB of flash and wireless USB for if you want more (like 400GB of harddisk space)
Speech recognition isn’t exactly new to phones and not a succes. Wonder how many of the Opera users use it. In short it is a tick mark on the data sheet and not much more
1. Fast IR with the ability to remote control devices. My current PPC phone has IR but I have to be less than 5 feet from the TV to control it – not good
2. Jog-wheel – like the SonyEricsson P-series phones – this is something I miss in PPC phones.
3. CDMA – I use GSM in my everyday life, but the world is a a dual standard world. CDMA + UMTS would be optimal
4. QUADBAND GSM +EDGE, please no more triband nastyness
5. Mobile TV/PVR – DBM, NTSC, PAL – it’s all good
Now one comment:
Why a 20GB HD and not 20GB flash memory a-la iPod Nano?
About 7 years ago, my dad predicted that smartphones would become really popular while he worked at Motorola. The company rejected his idea to start making them and laid him off like a year later (economic problems, they closed down the San Diego division). Back then, people couldn’t conceive that it would work out, just lke some of you are saying of OUR future (from now’s standpoint).
Trust me, smartphones will get better. The whole display thing? I beleive that some sort of Holographic display will take over within a couple years (like Star Wars holograms). Many people here are affraid of change. It WILL happen.
Battery technology might get better in the future? You can’t really question if it will or won’t. Power technology has been constantly improving since the beginings of computers. The early computers would take so much power (relative to their standards for a lot), and have very little functionality. Now look at today. My Fx57 Guzzles power with my 500W PSU, and yet PSUs have not changed in size, if fact they have gotten slightly smaller over the years, but more wattage. If you showed an Ipod nano to someone 5-10 years ago and tell them what it does, he’d look at you and laugh, or beleive it is some military gadget. Now it’s being mass produced. Another 2-3 years, and apple will be able to make it smaller and more battery life (if they really wanted). Batteries WILL get better
(another example is hard drive capacity (from like 40 gig being a lot 10 years ago to having 1 terrabyte commercially available at a slightly expensive price today) and how the silicon process has gotten smaller and smaller. just 2-3 years ago 180nm was the norm, now 90nm is becoming the norm, and smaller than that possible)
Please correct me if I’m wrong, but the Future Looks Good
–ZaNkY
No-one’s come up with a significant improvement in battery chemistry since lithium ion, and that was quite a while ago. (lithium polymer isn’t any better as far as power density goes, it just lets you make arbitrarily shaped batteries). Why do you think people are working so hard on fuel cells? But there’s something fundamentally hacky about fuel cells, in my eyes. Put it this way, if the electronics industry had grown up using fuel cells, when batteries came along, they would have looked like a miracle. I’m not counting on major improvements in this area _in the short term_ (though it’s an obvious area to expect a significant breakthrough in the medium / long term).
Convergence is a pretty safe bet,Euginia. I’m almost certain that these things will come to pass. But as you know there will always be veriety. If I were to guess at the future of cell phones this would be my expectation:
Cheap, as in blister pack at the check-out line at Walmart.
Calling card included.
Small, light, and disposable.
Takes AA or AAA batteries.
The unit should be good enough for a one year manufacturer warranty.
Sound quality better than two tin cans and a string
One can only dream.
To me convergence is a red herring argument. We say we want it, but then when we get it we say we want this additional feature! And then we need to wait three more years!
Let me explain why convergence will not happen.
1) Try flying in a plane listening to your MP3’s on your cellphone. Oh yeah, gonna happen REAL soon!
2) When I excercise I don’t want everything. I want an MP3 player only and that can be strapped on my arm. I sweat and my device has to stand up to me sweating.
3) When I travel battery power is essential. If I know something is going to drain my cellphone, well I wont use it!
4) I am not a Borg! These days at conferences I see people wearing their bluetooth head pieces all the time, with their cellphone strapped to their side. Sorry, no Borg here! Small phones in my pocket!
5) Sure 1200 USD is quite a bit of money, but if my cheaper 600 USD piece breaks then I have no camera, no MP3 player, no GPS and no cellphone! The likelihood that all 1200 USD pieces will break at once is pretty darn remote.
6) With separate pieces I can buy what I want, and need and not a lowest common denominator device.
And finally people fail to grasp why Apple does so well. It is not about convergence, but sheer elegance!
“1) Try flying in a plane listening to your MP3’s on your cellphone. Oh yeah, gonna happen REAL soon!”
You already can. Smartphones are starting to include airplane modes, where the wireless transmitter is turned off but all the other features remain usable. (Palm Treo has had this for ages).
I don’t think we’ll move in the direction of the iPod and the LifeDrive. In the near future, solid state storage will increase capacity greatly. We’re already starting to see 8GB chips in small devices. There was an article a few months back about the possibility of 100GB flash ram modules based on nanotech.
I don’t need to tell anyone here that hard drives are prone to failure because of their moving nature. They also use much more battery.
The iPod nano got it right – huge amount of storage, no hard drive, very few worries about data loss and corruption.
People spend entirely too much time talking on the goddamn phone as it is (especially while they’re driving). Cell phones every you go now, going off in the middle of movies and other places, and now with some of the most annoying ring tones a human can conceive of. You want to theorize on some impressive technology? Come up with a cyber-phone implanted in a person’s brain so they can do the electronic version of telepathy and not be bothering everyone around them, and arrange it so that it won’t work on a plane or in a car.
1440 mAH?
Are you serious? My camera has two 2100 mAH AA batteries in it. I think a monster device like this is going to require more juice than a camera.
I would also like to see someone run with a device like this.
Also remember that the more junk you put into a single device, the higher your probability of failure is.
I guess a device like this might be okay for a corporate drone type person that commutes to and from work and sleeps, but for real people like me who don’t want to carry everything with them all the time, it doesn’t make sense.
two 2100mAH batteries _at nominal 1.5V_ is what your camera has, remember.
I don’t claim to be an electrical engineer, but I figured the two batteries are probably in series to provide 2.4 volts.
(I think NiMH batteries are 1.2V)
Are you saying that the 1440 mAH would supply more voltage or what?
I’m wondering where the power discrepancy is.
I am sorry but this article is not meshing with reality. The majority of smartphone sales won’t be PDA-like devices but phone-like devices. PDA-like devices are very specific devices and do not correspond well to the usage patterns of the average user. Communication and entertainment are the main two things here but it cannot trump the portability of the device. If it’s to big people simply won’t bring it with them, if they won’t bring it with them all the time their need for a ‘do-everything-device’ is not as great.
Also it is clear that the author has no idea what goes into a modern smartphone operating system to begin with and the amount of work to actually move this into state of the art hardware, I am not talking about putting some shell on some Windows Mobile reference design here but actually delivering some leading edge device such as the Nokia 668x or the new DoCoMo FOMA phones.
The suggestion that Apple would take Linux or some BSD and port that over to an extremly tight embedded platform, add a full telephony stack, user interface and develop a new line of telephony hardware with no previous experience or knowledge in just a few years with easily breaking their entire R&D budget is not realistic. Apple has no such financial resource. A slick looking MP3 player is nothing like a smartphone. Nothing.
Of course even if they did manage to launch such a device they still have to compete with existing manufacturers like Nokia, Motorola and the rest. Release cycles are tight, the big players launch an insane amount of new phone models each year. Call me sceptic but this sounds like a ‘I wish…’ article and not any realistic analysis of the current state and the future of the market.
624 Mhz to 1 GHz CPUs
… the new intel speeds are 600Mhz or faster and actually run SLOWER than the Xda 416mhz processor.. Why would u want to have a slower cpu with faster mhz? dont u actually mean u want a FASTER cpu.. clock speed is irrelevant being a mac affecionado surly youd understand this.
BTW the 416 Mhz cpu does 600 Mips something similar to a p 2 300.
* Bluetooth 2.0 Class 1
The lastest iMate and o2 XDA minis.. both have this. (i have a slightly older model wich has 1.2)
Basic speech recognition
Possible but it works so badly on desktops nobody really wants it on their pdas.. of course voice command and IBM dragon dictate are avalible for PDA anyway.
* WiFi and 3G/WCDMA/UMTS
The new version of the XDA has both
* SD or miniSD support
Of course my XDA has this… i can get a SD Wifi or adapter or GPS
* FM radio
I can buy a headphone that has a fm radio in it.. or get a different model that has it in it.. its a tiny given u can buy headphones with a fm radio inbuilt.
* GPS …. Its about 250$ for the sdio card for my phone.. fully supports navman etc etc
* Integrated keyboard
Lots of other versions of the XDA have keyboards.. they mini S or imate jasjar have it.
20 to 40 GB hard-disk/Flash
Soon .. or atm i can use my pocketpc to HOST usb and plug in a usb hard drive .. atm i can get up to 4 gig sdio cards… who needs more than 4 gig of mp3s or videos when its such a small screen?.. useful for taking warez to your friends.. not useful for buisness
* VGA front camera
XDA camera is XGA res 1.3 mp.. new cameras are allready over 2 mpixel.. the latest o2 xda can face the camera both ways
* TFT VGA touchscreen 4″
The Xdas screen is 2.8 inches.. if it was much bigger the size of the mini wouldnt be as small as an ipod.. i like its size.. that screen and device would be too bulky
* 4 MP camera with flashlight (on the back)
* 128 MB RAM
* 3D sound and stereo speakers
* microphone, headphone-out
The latest o2 device has 128 meg (64 is rom though which the os runs from .. still the os is always going to take up a fair bit)
My o2 has stereo sound.. and headphones.
I want to get a breakout cord for mic and headphone using a normal cable.. with this .. having extra ports on the phone would just be a waste of space.
ARg im tired of answering each of these items.. u get the drift.. the rest can be left for an excersize for the reader.. in GO AND LOOK IT UP FOR YOURSELF
90% of the things you mentioned are here now.. INCLUDING VIDEO OUT (check out te o2 xda range).
My biggest beef with these convergence tools is that they’re so awkward to carry. Yes, it’s easier to carry than a separate cellphone, MP3 player, GPS unit, etc., but I don’t want/need to carry them all at the same time. Also, I wish more gadgets were ruggedized or semi-ruggedized… If I spend more than $200 on a gadget, I get a little paranoid about carrying it around.
Sorry for my arrogance before.. its just nobody actually bothers to look to see whats out there. This market is huge and has killed of Palm OS.. yet nobody including editors seems to have notice until apple comes along and sells overpriced limited functionality devices? .
Apple isnt ever going to win this market.. a convergence device requires a true OS .. not an ipod or early palmos.. apple dosent have such an OS.. Microsoft does and has thousands of compatible applications now.. and development kits.
MS has already won the convergence market game and half the ppl on the web think they still dont exist.
I have to admit that I was off on my original convergence position. When the original camera phones came out, I really thought it was a terrible idea. Suffice to say that it doesn’t pay to be stubborn, and I’ve switched my viewpoint. When it comes to things that we carry around us, convergence is not just nice, it is necessary.
Battery – as is often the case, we cater our usage to battery limitations. People will learn to have a charger at home as well as at work and in the car. They may also learn to charge every night when the go to bed.
OS – it won’t be QNX. They’re too small, and that goes for the leverage. In good times, they have an enthusiastic team of developers to support them to port over new os software, but for the proprietary stuff and general usage – eg Flash, it’s not happening. Apple also has an issue with ownership – it likes to own everything, if for no other reason – quality.
Unless it’s the size of a credit card, the screen rolls out to extend when watching movies and surfing the web, and it has a built in bottle opener. IF I have to sacrifice some functionality in order to achieve this then we can do without the voice recognition (it sucks anyway) and probably the GPS, Phone, PDA functionality, and movie playback. Actually just make it a small bottle opener and I’ll be happy. Oh, but that would mean no convergence?
Jack of all trades……
And what have Apple got to do with any of this? They are at least 10 years behind already. They don’t do convergence, well unless you count the iPod with Video.
I really like this idea. Now I will only need to steal one device when I rob geeks.