Qualcomm Shows Off Snapdragon Smartbooks

Qualcomm said Sunday night that it has persuaded a number of Taiwan ODMs to at least show off netbooks, which it calls "smartbooks," that use its Snapdragon microprocessor.

ASUS, Compal, Foxconn, High Tech Computer (HTC), Inventec, Toshiba and Wistron are among the ODMs showing off wares at the Computex Taipei show, the company said. More than 15 manufacturers are developing more than 30 Snapdragon products, according to the company.

Qualcomm has claimed that its smartbooks run all day on a single charge (with a weeklong "standby time"), and contain GPS, Wi-Fi and 3G connectivity. But the company hasn't really articulated its argument for why OEMs and customers should buy a smartbook, versus a traditional netbook powered by a competing processor, like an Intel Atom.

A drawback is that the Windows operating systems do not run on either of the two Snapragon processors: the 1-GHz QSD8x50, a new, upgraded 1.3-GHz QSD8650A, and the 1.5-GHz, dual-core QSD8672. That means that any smartbooks produced using the chip must run Linux, which consumers have seemed to shy away from, at least where netbooks are concerned.

"Consumers are looking for devices that offer more instantaneous connectivity, greater mobile performance and intuitive usability than ever before," said Luis Pineda, senior vice president of marketing and product management at Qualcomm CDMA Technologies, in a statement. "Qualcomm's Snapdragon platform is addressing those needs by enabling smartphones that break new ground in mobile capability, and establishing this new category of smartbooks - devices which deliver a unique mobile user experience different from anything else on the market today."

The first Qualcomm smartbooks, which will include "larger, sub-notebook designs to compact, touch-screen tablets and beyond" will begin shipping by the fourth quarter, according to Qualcomm's smartbook Web site.