I came across an article by Engadget this morning highlighting and announcing ICD’s Tegra 2-powered Gemini and with all the iPad buzz that’s flying around I had to post a quick write up on this.
Now let me say that I am by no means anti-Mac. I love their products and if I had the chunk of change I would own one of their top of the line Mac Book Pros. However, I do understand Mac’s attractiveness and why it’s so popular. With that understanding I can also see thier faults as well.
To me the iPad missed on a great market with some of it’s short comings. Flash support being the biggest. Sure the refined OS of the iPad is amazing and from what I have read about it, it’s flawless and an experience in itself. This is all typical of an Apple product. Having said that, I still wouldn’t throw my money at one of these things. I understand it’s not necessarily a laptop, netbook or phone but there is still some things it could have capitalized on being such a great concept.
For a techie like me I’m not really attracted to cute apps and tricks. I need functionality and compatibility. Yes there is a lot of productivity software type of apps for the iPad but no multitasking you say? I can’t imagine what the developers at Apple were thinking when they didn’t integrate some sort of multitasking capability.
I want something that’ll allow me to to do more than the simple day-to-day stuff. Sometimes I may need to jump onto one of my websites and edit code while I’m on-the-go. In doing so, I have to be able to jump back and forth between my ftp client, a text editor, and a browser and maybe sometimes a graphic editor. With my Lenovo S10 Netbook, this is easy and I carry it around with me for that reason. It’s extremely convenient; so much so that I’ve whipped it out in a bar a few times to make a couple edits to a clients website. Plus it has a fully functional Ubuntu OS so it’s not just small and cute.
The answer to the iPad’s woes: The ICD Gemini.
This thing is chock full of awesomeness. Way too much to be covered here but for starters it has an 11.2″ HD display and will play full resolution High Definition videos. The device runs Google’s Android OS and along with that a web browser that supports Flash.
Further more, you can use this thing as a cellular phone. It supports Cellular Voice, Data, SMS and MMS along with wifi connectivity. Not to fall short of anything it also sports an FM tuner.
I can’t wait to see this thing out in the world and hopefully get my hands on one. I would like to see if this thing can handle a full on Ubuntu install.
For more info check out the Engadget.com review of the ICD Gemini. This has a full listing of specs and a comparison chart to the iPad and another device called the JooJoo.
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3 Comments
I read your article. Thanks for the info. I assume its a book reader as well? Will it have the content (ie content from publishers)
From what I’ve read Pancho, the iPad has a pretty awesome eBook reader app called iBook. As far as the Gemini, I can’t say for sure but I’d doubt they would leave that out.
There’s a pretty good review of the iPad on Engadget with some info on iBook.
http://www.engadget.com/2010/04/03/apple-ipad-review/
Great post as usual!