Laptop Thoughts: Notion Ink Adam: From Prototype to Disappointment

"The saga of the Notion Ink Adam is a tale like many we could name -- it's the story of a tiny company struggling to bring a vision to market, facing friction from investors, factories and the march of time itself. The difference is that the Adam captured the imaginations of gadget fiends like ourselves with ideas that were fantastic from day one and are still novel now that it's finally been released, including a paneled UI, full USB host functionality, and of course that Pixel Qi screen. But does the Adam deliver on the promises of unifying form and function with such technology? In two words: Not really."

From a unique prototype to a disappointment in production, the Notion Ink Adam tries to implement some of the features that techies initially found so cool, but fails on most. The Pixel Qi screen can be used outdoors with the backlight turned off, but it disappoints otherwise. With Android 2.2 (Froyo) and a UI called Eden, the Adam looks cool, but fails to deliver on its promises. Frequent crashes on apps and games, reboots, and hangs are the order of the day. Apps don't behave the same in different modes, and, for instance, the calendar app doesn't import-from or export-to any other calendars, so it's a standalone calendar. Even the battery life is about 1/3 of what was initially anticipated. The Adam really is not ready for the marketplace in this version.