If you’ve been wondering how HP plans to make an operating system designed for smartphones usable on a laptop, the answers are now here. Kind of. While the Compaq Airlife 100 smartbook isn’t actually shipping yet, you can download the user manual, FAQ, Quick Start guide, and a few other documents from HP’s support site. There’s also information on how to import songs to the device from iTunes on your PC.
Here are a few things I learned:
- The smartbook runs Adobe FlashLite 3.1.7 out of the box — it’s not clear if Flash Player 10.1 support will come later.
- Like a smartphone, you can connect the Compaq Airlife 100 to a PC using a USB cable.
- You can print photos to a “compatible HP printer connected to a WiFi network” using the photo app.
- There’s a file manager app — something noticeably missing from most Android smartphones (although third party apps are available from the Android Market).
- The Airlife features 3G, WiFi, Bluetooth, and GPS connectivity, and you can even send text messages over 3G.
- The device ships with RoadSync Mail for syncing email and calendar information with corporate accounts using Microsoft Exchange Server.
- When you close the lid the Compaq Airlife 100 goes into sleep mode, but you’ll receive audio notifications for alerts and new messages.
- The computer ships with QuickOffice for reading Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and PDF files.
While the Compaq Airlife 100 has a touchpad, it doesn’t work like a typical laptop touchpad — because there’s no mouse cursor. Instead you use the touchpad to scroll through screen items. You can tap the touchpad to click/select. The buttons on the side of the touchpad let you open menus, go to the Home Screen, and go back to the previous screen.
via myHPmini
FAQ?
How can you have Frequently Asked Questions about something not yet even shipping?
Who is asking?
Investors? Shareholders? Board members?
Without having touched it and reading this. . . it just sounds a little odd.