“Bill Gates yesterday unveiled two new technologies, Freestyle and Mira, designed to beef up the capabilities of the PC – and hence, Windows XP – in the home. Both are intended to let users wander around the room or house while controlling their PC; Freestyle is categorised as a set of extensions to XP, while Mira is to all intents and purposes a CE-based thin client. […]Freestyle seems essentially to be a mechanism for extending the consumer PC into a combo media centre, jukebox and TV, so is being supported by consumer PC manufacturers such as HP, NEC and Samsung. […]Mira is somewhat more ambitious, and appears to slot in between Freestyle and the Tablet PC. It’s described as a “new set of Windows CE.NET-based technologies,” and the bottom line is that it enables smart flat panel displays which you can carry around and use for browsing and control purposes.” Read the rest of the report at TheRegister, or at C|Net News.
Gates Pitches Mira & FreestyleXP Extensions in Home
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Eugenia Loli
Ex-programmer, ex-editor in chief at OSNews.com, now a visual artist/filmmaker.
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A pretty expensive remote control? Whatta Microsoft think up next. I think Jobs is right. Converging the PC and TV is a bad idea. The only action I would like to occur is to send messages to my TIVO to record a program.
Dave Mira should sue for infringing on his carrer and his name. ;9
When I get home from work, I am very frazzled, tired and hungry. Before I dare put any food in my mouth, I have to walk the dogs, feed them if they haven’t eaten already, read the mail and maybe put away some laundry and take out the garbage. I usually like to eat and unwind in front of the History Channel. After all that, there’s about 30 minutes or less available to check my email and read/post on Slashdot & OSNews. Who, other than little kids and those with housekeepers will have the time to play with yet another piece of hardware?
The only thing I ever watch on TV anymore is the news. I just wish there was a way to watch the news exactly when I want to, without having to worry about recording beforehand. Every time I sit down with something to eat and turn on CNN (or whatever), I always seem to tune in right in the middle of Larry King or something.
Well, at least the news comes on at the same time everyday. You could set your VCR using a Monday-Friday recurring program.
tv? bah! it’s dated. i like watching movies, though, and i like downloading tv shows from the internet… but that’s about it. i don’t want somebody to be telling me when i’m going to watch what.
Most people cant even set thier vcr’s or maintain thier own computers. What are they going to with this premature technology. Call onsite support? I can hear it now, 200 bucks to get my PC and TV running $@#!$@##!. No Thanks its going back! The only way this will work is one cable between the pc and tv and the good tooth fairy to configure and maintain it.
What I would like to see would be a portable wireless monitor. No built-in logic other than some kind of pointing device (touch screen). Then you could play 3D games in your bed, while the noisy computer can stay in your work room. But I guess the bandwith required for something like that is just too high.
There is nothing to worry about, history has shown us time and time again that Microsoft fail as often as they succeed.
Who remembers MSN and BOB and about a million other “new technologies” (ok, propriety technologies”) that MS have born and seen the grave?
Even .NET the current MS money sink is not assured of success! Ideas such as another type of computer for the home is silly and apealing only to those people with more money than sense (ie: Microsoft Certified Engineers).