Well summer is gone, where are the new Efika MX i.MX535 powered devices?
I've seen nothing new on Genesis web site.

off-topic, but i've noticed that arm based devices often get delayed. i recall back in 2008 and 2009 a lot of prototypes of arm tablets and netbooks that never went into production.

Dear jpa256,
I want to help you to be informed about reality. :D

Genesi Smartbook imx51 is already one year that is on sale, and many of us have.
The new imx53 smartbook I think is very near to be on sale.

What's more there are many arm devices in the marked , many tablets and smartphones but even smartbook like devices like Atrix, Eee Pad Transformer and Slate, Toschiba AC-100, ecafe netbook, etc...

_________________
http://deliriotecnologico.blogspot.com

Hi Folks, google 'bbrv flickr' and you will see the presentation system we are using to secure orders for the new imx53 systems. What we are doing differently than we did with the imx51 systems is we are giving our licensees the opportunity to develop/select their own form factor (tablet, smartbook, smarttop, all-in-one, home environment monitoring display, etc.). In this way we build up the board volume and apply the finished board to a variety of form factors that are customer driven. There will be a standard product release, but this will be after we have secured volume orders to lower the per unit cost.

Please email us if you have questions.

Best regards,
R&B :)

_________________
http://bbrv.blogspot.com

Great news!
can't wait for the release, just waiting for the release of the iMX53 to get a smarttop,

nowhere as many as intel/amd, and a number of the arm devices you list were prototyped/showcased long before they became available to the public. i hope you are excluding generic chinese manufactured android devices which are generally nowhere ready for even hobbyist use :-)

Yes, you are right! :D

In fact many arm devices, especially the so called smartbooks take long time before come to production.
In fact Genesi was the pioneer in the smartbook field and have a shorter "time to market" than the others in that field.

_________________
http://deliriotecnologico.blogspot.com

http://www.flickr.com/photos/54643129@N00/

I can see the Efika MX2 (it looks very much like a prototype) but not the "presentation system". What do you mean by that?

Hello Ottavio, the board can be designed into many different form-factors. The board itself must be produced in volume to achieve lower costs. Different customers apply the board to different uses and markets, but they all enjoy the lower cost basis.

R&B :)

_________________
http://bbrv.blogspot.com

Bill & Raquel,

Clearly, you have a lot of fans here, myself included. Perhaps a small run of IMX53 Smarttops, even at a higher-than-final-price, made a available to the developer and early-adopter community, would provide the proof-of-concept and momentum necessary to help sell the platform to a high-volume reseller.

- Bradley Norris

If I understand it correctly, they aren't looking for a single high-volume reseller, but many small to medium specialty variant development/sellers using the card to build unique devices (from normal computers to embedded systems where the user is unaware of the computer inside). Their own products then would take advantage of the extra volume to get a better price break on the basic parts to reduce their prices.

Right?

_________________
--

Science, n. Investigation of natural phenomena.
Engineering, n. Domestication of natural phenomena.
Technology, n. Domesticated natural phenomena.

--

\"It is essential for automatic computation that, instead of containing every single instruction necessary to carry out the program, the coded program include methods for generating instructions which are needed to carry out the program. ... One measure of the extent to which an automatic digital computer is used effectively is given by the ratio of the number of instructions formed in the machine to that of the instructions inserted into the machine initially.\" Mathematical Machines Volume I Digital Computers ©1961 Francis J. Murray

If so, then why is this ratio zero on most modern computer software?

Hi Tim, that is right, but what really drives the volume is the consumer side. This has been a tough road for ARM. Most of the semiconductor vendors are concerned about addressing this market, as they are both afraid of going head-to-head with Intel and they see this as a low margin business. We don't share that view, first because we do not have their overhead or business model, and second because we are in partnership with a broad community of Efika MX users and developers. Finally, all things being equal if the performance is there, ARM costs less and runs cleaner.

We think the advantages to our approach are finally becoming more obvious. We are starting to achieve small, but significant breakthroughs. Thanks to all the work of the Genesi software team and the broader community, we are getting the performance of the Efika MX platform where it needs to be. The current imx51 products are/have been compatible enough to help us do this. We will not suffer from the months (you could say years) that it took to get the platform where it is today.

Bradley, what you have now with the latest software is a solid foundation for what we will make available soon. We will offer the single board with an imx53 before we release the final products (as we did with the imx51). We will have these available next month. The schedule did slip during the second revision (the first version was seen at FTF). The process took longer than expected for a number of reasons, including circumstances outside of our control.

We have been traveling for the last week. Currently, we are in Brazil. We are writing this on a Efika MX smartbook. We traveled with Macs for years, but no more. Our computer is the Smartbook. Also, we have plugged the Smarttop into a variety of large screen televisions on the trip, in hotels and corporate conference rooms. Without exception people have been impressed with the speed and video quality. When they begin to understand the possibilities, the meeting that was scheduled for a hour becomes a meeting that lasts much longer. We are booking solid orders. This is all going on a good direction. We will keep you posted...

Best regards,
R&B :)

_________________
http://bbrv.blogspot.com

I have 4 Mac PPCs: a G3, two G4, and a quad-G5. But last year the hard drives on both my G3 and main G4 died and I discovered that apparently nobody here in Montana knows how to work on Macs! So I had to convert both laptops to desktops by booting from external firewire drives. The other G4 seems to have an intermittent thermal problem, so I can't count 100% on it.

The SmartBook was very helpful to be able to get when I did. I still handle all my e-mail on my main G4, but when I'm on a trip I have the G4 auto-forward the e-mail to another account that my SmartBook checks so I can see if anything important comes in. I turn off the forwarding when I return home.

_________________
--

Science, n. Investigation of natural phenomena.
Engineering, n. Domestication of natural phenomena.
Technology, n. Domesticated natural phenomena.

--

\"It is essential for automatic computation that, instead of containing every single instruction necessary to carry out the program, the coded program include methods for generating instructions which are needed to carry out the program. ... One measure of the extent to which an automatic digital computer is used effectively is given by the ratio of the number of instructions formed in the machine to that of the instructions inserted into the machine initially.\" Mathematical Machines Volume I Digital Computers ©1961 Francis J. Murray

If so, then why is this ratio zero on most modern computer software?

That's good to hear. How about the smartbook and smarttop, though. Do you reckon they'll they be out for Christmas?

^ +1

Will I be disappointed if I ask Santa for an Efika MX2 Smartbook for Christmas?