Handheld computing devices have been around for the longest time, even though they didn’t become mainstream until the later part of the 1990s. Remember the Apple Newton, which was supposed to recognize your own handwriting and substitute for a personal assistant? Remember the Windows CE computers of the early 90s that were advertised as tiny computers that you can actually put in your pocket, despite the fact the battery life was awful and they hardly contained any memory?

In the late 1990s, the PDA (personal digital assistant) was mainstreamed and they were developed enough to the point where they actually became helpful. Then, in 2000, the groundbreaking Ipaq Pocket PC was released, with a Windows like operating system and wireless capabilities that made communication a lot easier. Although these devices were useful, they were, in no way, a substitute for a real pocket sized computer that you can have access to whenever you need it.

In 2004, Sony released its U Series paperback book sized computers that were eye candy for geeks and love at first site for mobile professionals. This stylus enabled Windows XP computer ran on either a Celeron 900 MHz (U50) or Pentium M 1GHz Centrino processor (U70), a 20 gig hard drive and 256 or 512 megs of RAM. I used it as a portable video player, which was great because you can run almost any type of video file in Windows XP. However, it wasn’t perfect. As with other mobile devices, battery life was less than optimal and the passive digitizer certainly wasn’t made for note taking.

In the past year, several new UMPC (Ultra Mobile Portable Computer) devices have been introduced. The first one to come to the market was the Samsung Q1 which seemed like the dream device when initially looking at it and listening to the excellent portable speakers, but ultimately failed its target audience. Not only is the battery life on this device about as long as William Hung’s musical career, but it screams for a thumboard since the tablet pc input is pretty much useless. Luckily, Samsung is addressing these issues on their new device, which should be available in the next month.

In mid-2006, Sony released its UX series, which had an absolutely beautiful screen, decent Intel Core Solo processor, and came with an excellent docking station that actually made the computer useful as a desktop replacement. During my brief affair with the UX380 (the one with Windows Vista), I was able to capture video and edit it with no major problems. Pretty impressive computer, right? Unfortunately, Sony forgot that people might want to actually type on this thing and included a non-tactile feedback thumboard that is not only useless, but also painful to use. One would think that Sony would be the first manufacturer to get the ultra mobile computer completely right, but they completely jumped the shark on this one.