How Low Can You Go?

Boing Boing Gadgets features the Umid M1, a tiny, little Windows XP laptop which measures 6.2"x3.7"x0.7" and weighs in at just 0.69 lbs (11.04 onces). I hesitate to call it a "netbook" because even though this little guy has the classic netbook package—an Atom processor 512MB of RAM and a 16 or 32GB solid state drive and a 1024x600 screen—it is a bit more expensive than the average netbook at $600-$750.

It's still an amazing little device which packs a full fledged PC into a package only slightly larger than my cell phone. And I'm not kidding about that last part. When its slider is open to reveal its keyboard, my T-Mobile G1 is roughly 4.6"x3.9"x0.7" and it weighs 5.6 ounces a little more than half the weight of of this tiny PC. Judging from the pictures on the website and doing a quick comparison with my G1 and a tape measure, I think that a person with reasonably big hands should be able to thumb type on this device. This is important because while the keyboard is almost certainly too tiny for conventional touch typing, being able to thumb type would make it a lot more usable—particularly to people—used to using cell phones with QWERTY keyboards. This is a very intriguing little machine.