Speaking of that $200-$300 Intel price supported Asus Zen phone, have you wondered why it is as thick and bulky as it is?



That is a LOT of extra price supported motherboard componentry that is all built right into a modern ARM/Android phone's main chipset.

..... and folks mention it gets a bit warm in heavy use.   Duh, all that extra componentry does use extra power (converts some of it to heat) you know.

    ..... still, the phone is cheap and it always gets good mid-range phone reviews.
Battery life is so so, but that is true of many mid-range phones right now.

Google is the "new idea" company, and they have dozens of new items under development that we (the public) do not hear about until Google has a partner to bring it into commercial reality.   Google throws in a "prototype stage" on any product that requires the app programmers to modify existing softwares (they need time to do that, right?).

There are LOTS more like this that we do not know about yet.    Google makes an offer to new idea inventors --- come work with us, we will pay you a salary and provide you with lab resources you need to finish your idea and we will fund your initial prototypes, but we will share IP ownership of what you developed while we paid you -- once you break away and go commercial, we can make an agreement or not, depending on circumstances.

Many inventors find they LIKE working at Google and stay on for new projects.


=========================================


Here is an example of Google empowering an inventor, and then when he chose to go it on his own, they let him fly free.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J78C4YOPyE8

So, you can say that Google has already done the docking thing and released it as a commercialized product under the control of the inventor/entrepreneur.

Needless to say Google has already built this stuff into the current released Android versions, using the dock hardware and the app as the deliverable.

http://liliputing.com/2015/06/nextbook-ares-8-is-a-78-android-tablet-thats-no...

Nextbook Ares 8 is a $78 Walmart sold commonly available Android tablet that’s not awful



https://youtu.be/bpSSozC-2IA   it is a YouTube, so click on it.

The tablet features an Intel Atom Z3735G Bay Trail processor, which should offer decent performance, 16GB of eMMC storage and a microSD card slot for removable storage, a micro HDMI port, micro USB 2.0 port, and an 8 inch, 1280 x 800 pixel display.

Other features include GPS, a 3-axis g-sensor, and front and rear cameras. The Nextbook Ares 8 measures 0.34 inches thick, weighs about 0.85 pounds, and comes in three color options: red, blue or black.

Folks, this is a lot cheaper than buying a replacement battery for your existing iPad.   This is an excellent example of Intel price supports ringing through to the American market with a new, price lowering position on a product group.  

And this is a good thing for us consumers.

If my iPad 2 died, I would not get another used iPad nor would I pay $100+ to get the battery replaced ......  not with $79 units sitting on the shelves at Walmart.

Depending on device price, I might've been a customer for that
The reason I ponied up nearly $300n for a Galaxy S3 was I had the idea to use it in place od my desktop
it definitely out performs my old PC, a dinosaur of a Dell Dimension

Microsoft  has finally done it -- Office for Android is REAL and it is for sale as an Office 365 subscription.

MS will survive no matter what happens, as a software supplier to the Android world.


   

https://youtu.be/UudBCuiCAkQ         it is a YouTube video, click on it

Some bold pundits are beginning to predict on the Win 10 success factor.

None of them are predicting Win 10 is going to be a smash hit, because they already know what is in it and how not quite fast it performs on the current hardware.

(remember, Intel failed to bring out the crop of new, cheap superchips to make Win 10 run quick like a bunny on PC hardware).

Win 10 is a more complex, bulkier OS system --- it is the largest PC system Intel has ever put out as an OS product.

So much so that Intel has plans to keep roughly half of it up in the cloud at all times on chromekiller and mobile products, and only bring the other portions of the OS down from the cloud as needed.   In this manner, Intel can claim it "fits" on modern mobile products like chromekillers and  7" tablets and the like.

Can you say "slow, slow, slow, wifi / drive light always flashing" three times fast?

Next cause of concern is that MS is NOT being forthcoming at all about what happens in a year when "free Win 10" ends.   This lack of honest disclosure has many pundits looking at the whole Win 10 deal askance, like it it was some form of Ponzi scheme that pays off well early on but fails miserably when the whole truth becomes known.

Lastly, the "free Win 10" thing keeps getting excluded from this old hardware and that old hardware  ---  based on some old licensing issues that MS is trying to dodge the bullet upon.
   
Easy way to say it is -- Win 10 is free to anybody that has an ACTIVE license agreement that MS wishes to abrogate and to end early, not by defaulting, but by substituting Win 10 in place of the existing agreement.

Business isn't going for this, they have a TREMENDOUS investment in Win 7 and fully intend to stick with it for their full license period.

Bluntly, nothing out there in the consumer desktop/laptop PC arena is going to make Win 10 a runaway success as there is no large pent up demand in that market that is going to burst out into a huge violent success story for MS.   They will get them a sales bump in 2015, make no mistake about it as they will spend 10's of millions in advertising, etc. to get those sales.

Win 10 will not be countable as a real success until the Win 10 Mobile portion comes out and takes large ONGOING large market share chunk away from Android and Apple products.   Mobile is where all future growth will be, and MS must have success there in mobile to grow in any real fashion out into the future.

The best MS can hope for on the desktop right now is to slow or stop the desktop Chromebook bleeding, and this is what is predicted for the next two years --- a slowed to slightly reversed rate of decline to less than 5%, perhaps even up to some single digit positive numbers --- with late 2015 & early 2016 likely running up into positive growth space for a short period of time while the ad dollars and bribe dollars are still flowing freely.  

When the big builder support dollars stop, so does the positive growth.

MS PC has been declining at 4% to 6% year on year which has been a steady decline for 6 years now -- MS will count their Win 10 a real success if two years from now that decline figure is still less than 5% (that means that Win 10 was good enough to maintain MS's current position in the world marketplace).

During this same period of time some completely new disruptive technologies will be invented (the phone/PC is just one known example of these potential disruptors) that will take market share away from PC space  ---  we are talking unknown new stuff that is really independent of what MS does or doesn't do.

And remember, MS is not fast on their feet -- this Win 9 rework dragged on for three years before they had to rename it Win 10 to keep the delay from sounding ridiculous.   And the net result has NOT been a lighter faster better OS product as originally promised.

MS's ugly baby has a new tank top and diaper that matches its blanket, plus a little bit of facial makeup to make the smile prettier.   And since the baby is actually 4+ years old now, it can actually talk some now (and hopefully will become somewhat more mobile sometime soon as well).



It is still Satya's ugly four year old baby.

    Remember, Satya just condensed his management structure to remove the upper management
of an entire division section of his company, so you can see that further MS "condensing" is already planned to take place inside the next two years.

Let me give you a vision .....

Your new Android cell phone comes in, along with its docking station.  You hook it up to your monitor and speakers and keyboard and mouse and sure enough, the big screen lights up and it looks PC-ish and seems to work OK using keyboard and mouse, etc.

All the phone guys do docking stations now that come as a stock in the box accessory with all the good phones, as it is a "key differentiator feature" and they all must do it now or else lose sales accordingly.    And MS is still paying the phone guys to shovelware MS Office on to all their phones still, so guess what you already got on there on the phone.

While you are futzing around with it, your wife calls you from the mall asking if you like Hanes or Jockey, a vital question concerning which one coddles your crods better.   The phone rings and the speakers ring and a caller id pops up on the big screen with an answer button for you to click on.   So you mouse click it and your wife starts talking.  Your phone has a mic already, so you just talk normally and do the call and answer the vital crods question so your wife can buy the right underwear for you.

Then you think a bit and Hey ---who knows,  mebbe it will work ......    

"OK Google, how many 50 grain loads are there in a pound of powder?"

"There are 140 each 50 grain loads available in a pound of powder"

"OK Google, best route to SimpleLife campground from here"

"Hwy 421 to I-40 to Hwy 74/28 is the quickest route" (displays Google map route)

Reach over and pull the phone out of the docking station and say "begin navigation" and it does .....

Put your phone into the bike holder and go.

Sweet, huh

Justin, do you talk to your phone yet?