> > To develop a board for a laptop is an interesting proposition. It's about > > the same as the challenge of developing a board for a PC, but with > > additional power challenges. > > The QL uses such minimal power that unless we are using Coldfire this > can be ignored. > > > If a QL-replacement board with SVGA output was made in a standard > > form-factor and the same schematic was also laid out for a common > > taiwanese laptop case, this could technically work. > > > > The likely route would be to buy a stack of itentical budget laptops, and > > use the existing PSU/battery, HD, and CD/DVD mechanism, and just replace > > the motherboard. This would be cheaper than designing/buying all those > > items separately. > > This is an interesting idea. > > > Would people be willing to pay a $400-$600 premium for a laptop? That has > > 1/10th the performance of if you'd left it alone and just installed QPC? > > Yes, if they were serious, while the laptop would be much faster than > 1/10th, in fact it will be faster than QPC, while if it uses Coldfire > that will bring it into the next league. Do not forget the sales on > other platforms. > > -- > Tarquin Mills It's certainly an interesting idea, although the price might make it impractical.
Certainly, we don't need all the PC bells and whistles (fastest DVD drives, terabytes of hard disk and so on), so a low end laptop would probably suffice with a fast QL or Q60 type board put into it. Production runs won't be that large, so perhaps buying up cheaper end of line laptops. The idea doesn't appeal to me personally, as QPC2 would be adequate for my needs, but I can see that what might amount to a laptop Q60 (name only used to illustrate the possibilities) might well appeal to some if the price was right. As I mentioned the Q60, if something like a redesigned Q60 was slotted into a cheapish laptop with floppy drive, CD-ROM, ser and par ports and built in screen, it might well fill the kind of machine you envisage. Someone else on this list mentioned that the only really viable hardware route now is for expanding black QLs now that there is no Super Gold Card or anything like that in production. There is a logic to this argument too, especially as Nasta's design work has meant that there may be a viable one already at least partly designed. Keep talking, we may get some viable ideas out of this yet! Dilwyn Jones _______________________________________________ QL-Users Mailing List http://www.q-v-d.demon.co.uk/smsqe.htm
