Nathan CrauseMusings of a Software Developer

Having an undisputed king of a product generally isn't a good thing. Imagine if there was only Windows. What would be Microsoft's motivation to improve? Imagine if there was only Telus internet in BC. What would be their motivation to lower costs while increasing speed?

The list goes on. Competition is a good thing, hands down. Up until AMD hit the big time with a 64-bit desktop CPU, Intel was known for having the position that there was no need at all for 64-bits on the desktop. How their tune changed when the users didn't agree and bought AMD's instead.

And now, thankfully, it's happening to the "netbook", too. VIA was the king of small form-factor computers for a while, even so far as defining the "standards" of mini, micro, and nano ITX form-factors. Intel hopped into the game with it's Atom CPU and stole VIA's thunder with a super little powerhouse, and birthed the netbook industry.

And herein was the problem - Intel (like they always end up doing) become so dominant suddenly, that they became unreasonable (see the debacle with nVidia). And why would they need to be reasonable? Your only alternative was a little old, and not too great performance wise.

Well, thank goodness VIA has stepped up to the plate again, and released the Nano 3000. By all accounts, it an awesome leap - faster, more power efficient, and most importantly, outperforms the Atom N270. I pretty much suspect this will make Intel work harder, and be more reasonable to death with.

Now if only VIA could get the long awaited Mobile-ITX out the door! A credit-card sized PC? Yeah, I'm thinking wristbooks are in our future here!