Category: Windows

I’m on the BBC (on YouTube)

Posted by – March 13, 2012

Rory Cellan-Jones from the BBC interviewed me at Mobile World Congress last week about my Motorola Kopin Golden-i Augmented Video-blogging system. By the end of the year, thanks to the fast moving world of Technology, we’ll all be walking around with compact wearable computers, augmenting our reality, it’s going to be awesome!

ZTE Tania and ZTE Orbit

Posted by – March 12, 2012

These are probably some of the cheapest Windows Phone devices to be released on the market. They are waiting for the Tango version of the Windows Phone software before releasing these.

Appear, Kopin Golden-i Software provider, won 2nd price at CeBIT


Based at the Kista Science City, Mobile City in Stockholm Sweden, Appear talks about integrating their industrial systems software into the Motorola Kopin Golden-i headmounted computer. Here at CeBIT they talk about how people working in the railway, airports etc industries can use the Golden-i in the next level of their augmented reality system.

Midte Digital Touch Pen at CeBIT 2012

Posted by – March 6, 2012

This touch pen works when the receiver is attached to the top of the side of any laptop or desktop screen.

VisualOn video playback at Mobile World Congress 2012

Posted by – March 3, 2012

VisualOn provides software solutions to ensure smooth video playback accross all ARM Powered devices. For example Netflix uses VisualOn to smoothly work accross all Android devices, all other OS etc.

Windows 8 on ARM Consumer Preview Mobile World Congress 2012 keynote presentation highlights

Posted by – February 29, 2012

Here’s my 21-minute highlights video of the Windows 8 on ARM “Consumer Preview” event keynote at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.

After the presentation, I was able to ask a few questions to Steven Synofsky and Michael Anguilo, here are some of those replies that I got:

– Desktop apps on Windows Store and Windows Store for ARM: They’ll clarify it to my email later. Steve Synofsky says it’s clear in the blog post. Windows Store is for Metro apps but there is a “parallel thing” (paraphrasing) for Desktop apps, the whole Third Party Desktop Apps for Windows 8 are not to be previewed on the Consumer Preview release yet.

– Multi-booting other OS when secure boot is in use. Steve Synofsky says that is up to the OEM. Secure Boot is a feature Microsoft provides as an option. The whole point of Secure Boot is that people cannot just “boot stuff from their garage”. But he did not seem to dismiss that OEMs can dual-boot for example Android or Ubuntu on the same device.

He didn’t say if Microsoft plans to do backroom deals with manufacturers to force them only to load Windows 8 and nothing else on devices or not, I guess not, but you never know… Maybe they do not apply “rebates” for OEMs that make things a bit “too open”, does that make any sense?

– Windows 8 remains just TI, Qualcomm, Nvidia business for now on ARM, as with Windows Phone, Microsoft limits the number of ARM Partners that can fully hardware accelerate their software platform for now. I think a lot of the other ARM chip providers are in discussions with Microsoft to see when they can also support their software. My guess is Microsoft wants a very high performance for the first supported ARM SoCs, that is why it only is being demonstrated on TI OMAP4470, Nvidia Tegra3 and Qualcomm Krait MSM8960 for now.

If I do get in contact with someone from Microsoft over email to get clarifications for Windows on ARM, please let me know in the comments what type of questions remain to be answered.

Live from the Windows 8 on ARM Preview event!

Posted by – February 29, 2012
Category: MWC, Windows

I’m at the Windows 8 Preview event here in Barcelona. It’s probably live streaming somewhere at http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows-8/preview

I’m going to try to ask them about third party Desktop Apps for ARM, let me know which questions you would like me to try to ask Microsoft representatives about Windows 8.

Here are some answers:

– Desktop apps on Windows Store and Windows Store for ARM: They’ll clarify it to my email later. Steve Synofsky says it’s clear in the blog post. Windows Store is for Metro apps but there is a “parallel thing” (paraphrasing) for Desktop apps, the whole Third Party Desktop Apps for Windows 8 are not to be previewed on the Consumer Preview release yet.

– Multi-booting other OS when secure boot is in use. Steve Synofsky says that is up to the OEM. Secure Boot is a feature Microsoft provides as an option. The whole point of Secure Boot is that people cannot just “boot stuff from their garage”. But he did not seem to dismiss that OEMs can dual-boot for example Android or Ubuntu on the same device.

He didn’t say if Microsoft plans to do backroom deals with manufacturers to force them only to load Windows 8 and nothing else on devices or not, I guess not, but you never know… Maybe they do not apply “rebates” for OEMs that make things a bit “too open”, does that make any sense?

– Windows 8 remains just TI, Qualcomm, Nvidia business for now on ARM, as with Windows Phone, Microsoft limits the number of ARM Partners that can fully hardware accelerate their software platform for now. I think a lot of the other ARM chip providers are in discussions with Microsoft to see when they can also support their software. My guess is Microsoft wants a very high performance for the first supported ARM SoCs, that is why it only is being demonstrated on TI OMAP4470, Nvidia Tegra3 and Qualcomm Krait MSM8960 for now.

If I do get in contact with someone from Microsoft over email to get clarifications for Windows on ARM, please let me know in the comments what type of questions remain to be answered.

I filmed about 15 minutes of the highlights of the keynote and I will upload that video in a couple hours so check back.

Some of my expectations for Mobile World Congress

Posted by – February 17, 2012
Category: Opinions, MWC, Android, Windows

The MWC is the ARM conference, all the latest fastest newest ARM Processors are unveiled, all the biggest Smartphones of the year are demonstrated, the Smartphone and Carrier industry generating Trillions of dollars of yearly economic activity converges in Barcelona between February 26th and March 1st, expect the best video coverage to be posted right here on ARMdevices.net!

Please help me in getting well prepared for this event, send me an email with any tips for awesome things to be shown at MWC that you think that I should video-blog. You can also post here in the comments what your expectations are for MWC, interesting leaks and prediction articles to check out, please let me know what you think I should film in priority.

Here are some of the topics which I am looking forward to see:

– ARM Cortex-A15 demonstrated by Texas Instruments, Samsung. Maybe Nvidia shows Project Denver for the first time. ST-Ericsson may show it also. Does Qualcomm have an equivalent Mega-Krait on demo?

– Single-core ARM Cortex-A9 becomes a huge deal. I expect sub-$100 Cortex-A9 smartphones based on MediaTek MT6575 and ST-Ericsson U4500. It’s a big deal it brings performance to the sub-$100 unlocked smartphones market which can be hundreds of millions of phones per year.

– Samsung upgrades Galaxy Nexus up to OMAP4470 1.8Ghz. Samsung upgrades Galaxy S2 to Plus with latest Exynos4 at 32nm (Dual 1.5-1.8Ghz or Quad 1.2-1.5Ghz?). Samsung upgrades tablets with 1200p screens, newest Exynos, TI OMAP4470 and/or Nvidia Tegra3?

– Sony goes crazy on Android. Expect powerful and good looking Sony Xperia phones with latest screen and processor technology. Sony needs Android for its economic recovery. Expect a new range of Sony branded phones.

Panasonic launches its ARM Cortex-A9 processor for other than Set-top-box/HDTV use? Maybe they use their dual-core for a Lumix phone. For people who care about the smartphone camera this is going to be good. Real point-and-shoot optics with a full Android smartphone integrated.

– Google acquires Motorola. Motorola announces new OMAP4460 1.5Ghz and OMAP4470 1.8Ghz phones and tablets with ICS. Makes Lapdock hardware system an open standard. Lapdock devices are now more powerful at Laptop productivity use than the Intel Atom netbook. Does Google use MWC to launch its Google Entertainment System for cheap Android@Home Hubbing, ARM Powered Google TV platform upgrade, new level of support for ARM Powered Native Code video-games and advanced ARM Powered Google Desktop software.

– LG aims very high, showing stuff even better looking than their LG Spectrum phone. Using fastest processors and latest IPS LCD HD screen technology. There is talk of Optimus 3D2 and X3.

– Huawei positions themselves as potential top challenger for smartphone volume of sales throughout the world. Launches the awesome OMAP4460 super slim P1S at (I guess sub-$300 unlocked) and shows their new Diamond series with even faster processor and even larger screen (I guess at sub-$400 unlocked). Also, launches range of low-cost sub-$100 Android phones with up to approx 4″ screen sizes and single-core ARM Cortex-A9 processing, thus near Galaxy S2 performance at sub-$100 unlocked pricing. Huawei wants to be one of the best value for price makers worldwide.

– ZTE does it like Huawei, cheap, good value, innondates the market with mid-range sub-$200 unlocked and sub-$100 low-cost.

– Microsoft shows off Windows 8 on ARM Tablets/Laptops convertibles, for the first time, journalists are allowed to actually play with it. They probably are going to give a thousand Windows 8 on ARM Tablets to developers at the conference. Expect Samsung, HTC, ZTE, Nokia to show Windows 8 on ARM Tablets/Laptops Convertibles. Microsoft announces plan to acquire Nokia.

Toshiba ramps up their tablets. Toshiba shows a successor to the AC100 ARM Powered Laptop, this time OMAP4470 1.8Ghz or Tegra3, ICS with an awesome Chrome for Android support.

– HTC shows Tegra3 and Qualcomm Krait stuff. May expand Wildfire to approx 4″ screen sizes and Single-core ARM Cortex-A9 level of performance for the sub-$200 unlocked smartphones market.

– Fujitsu joins the Android market with a new slim Tegra3 smartphone.

– For expensive high-end, 720p is the new standard for smartphones and 1200p is the new standard for tablets.

What do you expect from MWC?

Windows 8 on ARM comes with Desktop (of course..)

Posted by – February 9, 2012

There has been false rumors going around the web for the past 2-3 months, spread by Mary-Jo Foley of ZDnet and Paul Thurrot of winsupersite.com, that somehow Windows 8 on ARM wouldn’t be getting Desktop mode and full Desktop apps. Those rumors are wrong. In the following video, Microsoft demonstrates (again) how Windows 8 on ARM is going to come with a full Desktop mode with full Desktop apps such as Internet Explorer and Office.

The question of course is how does Microsoft plan to support more Desktop apps on ARM. For example, can we install a full Chrome browser on Windows 8 on ARM, how about apps like Photoshop and Ulead video studio? I expect Microsoft to have support for some recompiled desktop ARM apps in Windows store and support for PC over IP remote desktop for some x86 apps that can work smoothly over remote desktop which I expect Windows Azure to host as a cloud service.

To simplify compatibility, Microsoft is promoting the new Metro style HTML5 based apps system. Sure enough, Metro style apps all work on ARM and x86. But I am also sure that Microsoft carefully plans to also allow recompiled desktop apps on Windows 8 on ARM, they will for sure provide recompilation tools, specifications for use on PCoIP protocols, even partly use some parts of emulation and an ARM based Virtualization hypervisor.

Teradici PCoIP, optimized remote desktop on TI’s OMAP4460

Posted by – February 1, 2012

Teradici is doing software optimization using the PCoIP (PC-over-IP) protocol to run a full x86 desktop remotely over the Internet onto an OMAP4460 device. Here in this demo remotely using an x86 desktop that is over 2000 miles away (and considering that Internet connections at trade shows can be unreliable).

Tobii eye tracking demo

Posted by – January 24, 2012

Tobii shows their latest eye tracking technology in the form of a thick bunch of cameras and detectors to be placed under a screen, after calibration, it can detect where you are looking on the screen, providing a new type of user interface for computing. Do you think we’ll soon have this technology automatically-calibrated and into all computer screens, into all smartphones and tablets also?

Nokia Lumia 900 Windows Phone 7.5 at CES 2012

Posted by – January 21, 2012

The Nokia Lumia 900 has a 4.3″ 800×480 Clearblack AMOLED screen, runs on a single core Qualcomm Snapdragon processor and runs on the 4G/LTE network. This is the new big marketing push at CES from Nokia and Microsoft, the Nokia Lumia 900 is already the third Nokia Windows Phone device after the 710 and 800.

Windows RT on OMAP4470 Texas Instruments 1.5Ghz ARM Cortex-A9 Tablet

Posted by – January 20, 2012

Here’s Windows 8 on an ARM Powered Tablet, running on the Texas Instruments OMAP4470 1.8Ghz processor with the SGX544 GPU. This is the first time that I saw the OMAP4470 in a tablet and it’s the first time that I briefly touched Windows 8 on an ARM Powered tablet (as you can hear in the video, I wasn’t supposed to be allowed to touch it). Look forward to much more on OMAP4470 and Windows 8 on ARM in the months to come.

Pixel Qi at CES 2012

Posted by – January 17, 2012

The 1280×800 10.1″ Pixel Qi screen is ready, here it is demonstrated under a bright spotlight simulating the sun as well as in some prototypes of upcoming Android tablets. Founder, CEO and inventor Mary Lou Jepsen talks about the latest news from Pixel Qi, where they are going, what they are up to.

Augmented Video-blogging Hangout featuring the Kopin Golden-i at CES 2012

Posted by – January 16, 2012

Here’s a Google+ Hangout recorded while at the Kopin Golden-i reception held at the Bellagio Hotel in Las Vegas during CES 2012. Demonstrating and talking about my Augmented Video-blogging using their device, and other uses of this headmounted display device and other news from the CES. You can fast forward to about 34 minutes 40 seconds in for the demo by Motorola Solutions’s Product Lead on the Golden-i, Nicole Tricoukes, explaining how the Golden-i headmounted computer works and what Motorola Solutions plans to target it for when they plan to mass produce it and release it in the second half of the year (you can watch her TEDx presentation)

Lenovo ThinkPad Edge E130

Posted by – January 15, 2012

Here’s the next generation entry level ultraportable Lenovo ThinkPad laptop to be sold in the USA at $449 using the second generation Intel Core i processors and AMD’s quad core processor.

Motorola Kopin Golden-i at the Verizon booth at CES 2012


The Motorola Kopin Golden-i is being showcased at the Verizon booth at CES 2012, demonstrating hands-free wearable computing user interfaces for Industrial uses such as Construction, Medical, Public safety, Utilities and more. I’ve been using this for the past 2 months to attempt to have a wearable computing augmented video-blogging system, using Google+ Hangouts On Air with the headmounted display showing a live chat and live status updates from Google+, Twitter, Email alerts and more.

Always Innovating OMAP4 HDMI Dongle


Always Innovating fits the Texas Instruments OMAP4 motherboard with all the needed features for a Desktop, Set-top-box and 3D home console into a USB stick sized device that connects to the HDMI port of your HDTV and gets power from USB. It has Bluetooth for Bluetooth keyboards and game controllers. Its USB can do USB host.

Intel Ultrabook performance explained

Posted by – January 9, 2012

Intel is pushing the Ultrabook concept, thinner, lighter, lower power x86 laptops, yet the performance might stay as high as their maximum. I interview an Intel representative about the performance and power consumption of the Ultrabook platform.

Texas Instruments to showcase OMAP4470 Powered Tablet running Windows 8 at CES 2012

Posted by – January 9, 2012

Check back here for videos comming up of the 1.8Ghz OMAP4470 in a Tablet running a preview version of Windows 8. Here’s the press release:

LAS VEGAS, Jan. 9, 2012 /PRNewswire/ — Texas Instruments Incorporated (TI) (NASDAQ: TXN) hosts an OMAP4470 processor-based tablet running on a pre-release version of Windows 8 at the 2012 Consumer Electronics Show, demonstrating how the latest OMAP™ 4 platform distinctly supports Microsoft’s new computing experience, Windows 8, that reimagines Windows. Designed specifically to enable the ultimate tablet experience, the OMAP4470 processor’s rich multimedia, end-to-end security and powerful multitasking capabilities prove the ideal match for Windows 8 key features including a fast & fluid touch-first user interface, a rich user experience with hardware accelerated graphics, an always-on-always-connected experience, and multiple security enhancements.

Secure, visually-immersive computing in HD

The OMAP4470 platform’s smart multicore architecture pairs its main CPUs with several differentiated features including programmable accelerators, hardware composition engines and a dedicated ISP. Imagination Technologies’ super-fast PowerVR SGX544 GPU and enhanced memory architecture add still more functionality while an OMAP-specific distributed composition architecture enables advanced image and video layering for crisp, HD visuals. These elements and more are the force behind the OMAP4470 processor’s ability to enable fast and fluid multitasking in Windows 8 while maintaining ultra-low power consumption.

As tablets become more prominent in household and enterprise environments, the increased need for rich graphics and imaging is mirrored by the increased need for complete security. Tablets used for cloud-based applications, access to work documents or streaming premium content benefit from the TI’s system-level M-Shield™ mobile security technology—providing the highest level of terminal and content security available today. The M-Shield solution also operates a hardware-protected, trusted execution environment (TEE), which does not require a dedicated chip or extra CPU cycles, freeing the CPUs for critical Windows 8 computing functions.

“The always on, always connected experience requires the sophistication of a processing architecture best offered by OMAP technology,” said Deepu Talla, general manager, OMAP mobile computing, wireless business unit, TI. “The OMAP4470 processor makes expert use of its smart multicore architecture to enable enhanced PC and mobile computing experiences. Combining the OMAP 4 platform’s unique capabilities with Microsoft’s seamless interaction of touch, mouse and keyboard via Windows 8 will deliver a streamlined, fast and fluid experience.”

“Reimagined, Windows 8 is a fast and fluid, touch-first OS that brings a new range of capabilities without compromise,” said Aidan Marcuss, senior director of Windows Core Marketing & Ecosystem, Microsoft Corp. “Our partnership with platform leaders such as TI help take full advantage of ARM architecture, with new capabilities that enable compelling new PCs and user scenarios.”

For more information, visit http://www.ti.com/windowsonomap.