Smart Devices SmartQ5a MID... now with Android!
By Joseph L. Flatley 
posted September 30th 2009 2:09PM
posted September 30th 2009 2:09PM
If you're a MID fan that's curious about this crazy "Android" you've been hearing about, it looks like the realms are colliding in many new and interesting ways as of late. E World, which seems to be owned by China Mobile, is selling the SmartQ5a touchscreen device pre-installed with Android 1.5 for $199.99. We know some of the more hardcore have been taking it upon yourself to install the open source OS on Smart Devices' 4.3-inch wonder for a while, but now the whole affair appears to have the stamp of approval of the People's Republic itself. We're just wondering who you'd contact if you have to take advantage of the one year warranty.
I still dont know how about feel about MID's. I think once I get a new cell phone and laptop ill have no use for this. Thoughs?
I have similar feelings toward this device family: Is it really going to serve a purpose that will justify spending the money?
I'm not sure if i need a device such as this either. I already have an android phone and a netbook that serves most of my mobile needs. When i'm at home i have my computer so I'm not sure where I would use a mid. If it could control my entire entertainment center, i could see playing around with one when laying around on the couch, watching TV or a movie, and lightly browsing the internet.
That's precisely why I'm on the market for one. Just want a small, keyboard-less tablet to keep in the living room. Both for TV browsing and for visitor use. Hopefully something with quicker boot time than a netbook and good screen response.
We use an Archos PMP right now but the system is very sluggish for browsing.
I'm stuck with winmo phones due to work, but I've been very curious about Android and am a MID fan. The price is very good. What I need to know is if it has multitouch. If it does, then I'm sold.
@regionto
If it has stock android 1.5 then it doesn't support multitouch yet. 1.6 (donut) is going to fix this.
@legendary1022: Unless they wrote the multitouch drivers/handling themselves. It is android, after all.
@Mark
Thats true, but honestly, do you really think they did that? We've only seen HTC do so as of yet and they have a pretty good development department.
Report him, then reload and down rank.
@Dafrety: Decided to follow your advice, coming from a happy owner of a new green 32GB zune hd.
How does it look? I was very tempted to get a colored one, but I just went with a black 16 GB.
It's pretty sweet, got one of the designs on the back. The back looks freaking awesome. The front is REALLY green, so not good if you don't like such things. I love the color green though so it was an obvious choice for me.
Cool. I think I'm going to wait until I can get a true red. The current one is a bit too pink for me.
So what is the benefit of Android? I would hope that it is smaller footprint and snappier response.
Oh, and being able to say "IN YOUR FACE, MICROSOFT!!!!!" but that would be further down on the list for me.
But really, does it have an advantage over WinMo or is it just to make sure MS has enough competition to make sure they keep up with their portable OS?
I haven't seen any MIDs running Windows Mobile, so that's one reason I'm looking for an Android MID or PMP. Android seems to have a vibrant app development environment which seems more active than what I'm seeing for Windows Mobile, as well. I'm very interested in a small portable device that has WiFi that I can keep in sync with my Google account. I had a smart phone but quickly got tired of the extra $35 a month to Verizon.
Pfft, would be better with Android.
;-) I see what you did there
Get a room guys.
Can it run flash?
Why not get the same thing with Ubuntu??? It is 20 dollars cheaper ($179 on mp4nation) after all and has a real full featured OS.
Yes, I don't get why this is better than the version running Ubuntu MID, a more full fledged version of linux, which I take has better software support no?
I had one of these SmartQ 5's and can honestly say it was great with Ubuntu, but slow. It just does not have the horsepower to run with Ubuntu to a point that makes browsing comfortable. I believe the hope is that the browser installed with Android will work more snappily, probably as a result of the OS having a smaller footprint as suggested in another post.
I sold the SmartQ 5 less than a week after buying it...
Its probably because of GNOME, I am sure you can change the window manager to XFCE, that thing takes minimal resources.
Also, firefox is a bit of a resource hog. Opera does MUCH better.
The default install on the SmartQ 5 includes only Midori as the web browser. Other people have tried Firefox without much luck - it uses too much memory...I also believe it runs LXDE window manager to keep things minimal, not GNOME, which would probably kill it...
LOL I am still waiting for my Pandora then :-)
can I use it to take notes in class? If so then I'm sold. If not then funk it.
re: notes, maybe...your choices would be pecking at the tiny onscreen keyboard with the tiny stylus or installing a Linux handwriting recognition program. I'm not so sure what the options are in that scenario. Final choice would be to pair it with a portable Bluetooth keyboard - If you don't mind taking those two pieces of kit in to class, then it would work well...
It kinda looks pink on the Zune Originals site, but it looks much less so in pictures of the device itself. The site seems to have extremely inaccurate renders.
Why is this called an MID and not a tablet?
Where can i buy it? I live in Guangzhou China.
Sam
sam@asiamena.com