ClamBook is the Foleo reborn and done right 13
Palm has done some things that in retrospect were way ahead of their time. The original Palm Pilot was groundbreaking, putting technology in your pocket like nothing else before it. webOS utilized web technologies three years ago in a manner other companies - web companies - were only daydreaming about at the time. And then there was the Palm Foleo, a short-lived smartphone companion pseudo-lapotop introduced by Palm back in 2007. The Foleo was meant to wirelessly hook up with your Palm OS smartphone and serve up a set of companion apps so you could reply to emails, compose documents, browse the web, and more, all through your Treo or Centro but with a big ten-inch screen and a full-size keyboard.
The Foleo was an interesting concept, but one that turns out to have been a few years ahead of its time and the technology needed to pull it off. While Motorola has been struggling with uptake of their Lapdock accessories for plug-and-play smartphones, iPad keyboard dock maker ClamCase this week revealed their newest product: the ClamBook Laptop Dock. ClamBook is like a modern version of the Foleo, except for iOS and Android devices. The quasi thin client notebook packs a big widescreen with better speakers, battery, and keyboard than you can put in a smartphone. Unlike the Foleo, the ClamBook isn't a companion type product - it's simply an accessory, serving as a dumb screen and keyboard and letting the smartphone do all of the heavy lifting. It takes advantage of the video-out capabilities of modern Android and iOS smartphones.
This week has been a bit of a blast-from-the-past week in more ways than one, and though not a product of Palm, HP, or even webOS compatible, we can't help but have mixed emotions about it. It's a cool concept, and if priced appropriately could very well be competitive (unlike the ridiculous $600 Palm wanted to charge for the Foleo). The Foleo was cancelled three months after unveiling (with its unlongevity record beaten four years later by the TouchPad), we expect the ClamBook to be around for at least a little while longer.
Source: ClamCase; Via; Android Central
13 Comments
I don't see how the TouchPad had less longevity than the Folio. The Folio was never released at all while the TouchPad was at least publically available for about 2 months before it was cancelled.
Derek, did you read Josh Marinacci's response to the Verge's article? In it he mentions other hw in development: "There was other hardware in the works beyond the TouchPad Go. I saw prototypes of many products including a transforming tablet / netbook combo with an ingenious sliding hinge and super thin keyboard. I really hope someone makes it one day."
Its funny how similar that sounds to what you mentioned above!
Transforming tablet/netbook combo sounds like a standalone device, not a companion like the Foleo and ClamBook.
it was probably something like the eee pad slider
Sounds like the Celio Redfly mobile companion all over again.
The Foleo was also supposed to couple with Windows Mobile devices, I was going to purchase one for my HTC Touch. Unlike the article suggests, the Foleo was purely a slave device, it had no processor of its own. I was disappointed when the device was cancelled,. I remember the reason given at the time was that they were working on "Bigger things", which apparently I bought 2 years later.
Didn't Deiter Bohn get his hands on one of the Foleos?
yeah the Redfly was pretty good. And totally outclassed by netbooks and tablets. Shame. I still have mine somewhere. Wish they'd released android drivers for it ...
as for the clamshell, there's already bunches of other similar cases, some better than others.eg zagg has a nice but less cool keyboard folio case.
Isn't the Zagg case for the iPad, not the iPhone, providing just a keyboard built in to a case for the tablet? I'd love to have, instead of my TouchPad, a thin device that I could carry in my handbag that would connect via bluetooth to my Pre2 and provide the bigger screen and easier keyboard. I've quit carrying my Touchpad with me, even though it does fit in my handbag, because I can do Ok with just the phone most of the time. The tablet is just too bulky to carry for the "just-in-case" times. For a while I used the Splashtop remote app to monitor my shut-in mother-in-law but she's no longer living with me and I can't justify the extra cost of the Mobile Hotspot on my phone to guarantee wifi availablity any more. What I'd love to see is a flexible screen like was previewed somewhere made into a contraption that could be carried around in a pocket and pulled out, set up with some kind of frame that would also fold out, with a keypad that is very thin but still has keys distinguishable by touch and not just sight. Call it the FOLDeo!
I am sitting here typing this comment on my Palm Foleo here in the UK, which was indeed very much ahead of its time. Five years on from its near-birth, and the device serves me very well. Instant on, works like a charm. If this new clamshell works as well for its purchasers as my Foleo does for me, there will be some very happy punters indeed.
Derek, check this out. WebOS team is hiring. Maybe it is because too many folks had left.
https://hp.taleo.net/careersection/2/jobsearch.ftl?lang=en
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