
Apparently iDola, one of the tablet PC developed by MIMOS under Makcik PC (remember anyone) is still alive! Surprisingly it is now in it’s second version according to this news on last Jan 26th, when the first version is not even seen in market, well, actually is not going to, forever.
The first version is said not met the minimum requirement set by government, so basically it end up in ‘garbage’. So who was tasked to take the requirement at the first place??
Idola V2 is running on Jemapoh software (the OS i think) developed by Mimos. It has full fledge PC features such as 1GB Ram, 802.11 b/g/n WLAN, Bluetooth and IPv6. The price is in the range of Rm900 to RM1000 depends on the number of orders.
Now the question is, who gonna use this tablet and for what purpose? There are varieties of netbook model on the market from different manufactures with very competitive price. Soon, the tablet market is going to be flooded with new model, as showcased by HP Slate, MSI and Apple iPad.
Call me skeptical, but I doubt that this tablet gonna be a better alternative to netbook/tablet when the price different is small.
How about warranty and parts? How can we guarantee that the ecosystem of this product will remain for a long time? How much cost required to use iDola, and after sometime that iDola deem not suitable for running an operation or not long lasting, how much cost required to replace it?
I may sound bashing our very own product, but don’t get me wrong. Yes, I do support it, if it is justifiable. I have written about Mak Cik PC couple of times before, posted images about iDola, Jen-II in the past, before ordered to take it down later on due to P&C (private & confidential). You have paraded this product around the world, and now you call it P&C??
Makcik PC project where iDola is based on, has been established since 2007. That’s 3 years back. An announcement about his project made news headlines at that time. But sadly, the product is nowhere to be seen until now.
In contrast, Apple which had just released it’s own tablet called iPad (2 days after iDola V2 release, coincident right?) is so secretive about iPad. The result is an awesome product, even without telling the world what you’re doing.
Apple, backed with bilion dollars of capital and research grant, thousands of engineers and scientist is not without doubt can build the killer product meant for everyone. Not to doubt MIMOS ability to develop consumer product that can compete with these long established big players, but I feel that MIMOS should just focus what it is best… R&D.
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