Or, per 7Dec98 PR, "Xybernaut has committed to purchase 25,000 copies of IBM's ViaVoice software in the first year", which suggested an expected $100,000,000 in 1999. They seem to say things with NOTHING but dead silence to back it up. The concept of 'actual backlogs' apparently mean nothing when arriving at these numbers.
I really appreciated your report, Crusader. It was good and technical. Three hours battery life is a bit on the lean side. This spec should definitely have been advertised harder by Xybernaut. By 'denying' it's reality, they probably have been able to 'put-off' the fact that it needs improving.
When do the 300MHz PIIs come out? Granted, battery life might drop to 2-1/2 hours with the faster processor, but 200/233MHz is starting to sound weak, especially in light of it's limited capacity to handle speech recognition. Oh, well, Intel's 600MHz 'Coppermine' laptop chips due (at last check) this summer should theoretically solve that problem. I say theoretically, because I don't know whether Xybernaut intends to use them.
Filtering out all the Xybernaut/FAB hype, I just don't see the MA-IV being the tool which will break the wearables market open. The MA-5 and MA-6 had better be special (spelled 'Coppermine') if they expect real interest to develop, though I still only see industrial interest. Consumers just want cheaper and less thirsty cellular/email/internet access, not full-function wearable PC power.
Seeing 3-3/16 on the chart is not pretty, but this level has been due since 1Q99 was released.
Not as optimistic as I used to be,
Shoe. |
