Later this year, we should see the emergence of the Ultra Personal Computer or UPC. Basically, a UPC is a small mobile computer much like a PDA, except that it runs a full Operating System like Windows XP. Over the next few weeks, we'll be looking at some of these handhelds of the future, starting this week with the OQO.

Before we get started, it's important to understand that, as a whole, UPCs have already become infamous because of their extreme slowness to market and massive amount of hype from the manufacturers. In fact, OQO is one of the biggest offenders, being hyped in several press releases and prototypes being shown at various trade shows for over two years. You can read some of my speculations of why the OQO has been slow to come to the consumer in Will the OQO be a viable PDA replacement? These delays have made a temporary mockery of the OQO, but we expect to see the OQO on the market this year. OQO has announced that 40 corporate clients will be testing the handheld device in July. OQO expects to offer the product to consumers by the fall of 2004.

While the OQO is slightly larger than the typical PDA, the unique feature is that this device runs a full-fledged version of Windows XP. For users who want true mobility the OQO is a dream. For some PDA purists removing the "instant on" features they're accustomed to with typical PDAs makes the OQO less desirable. Here are the specifications and pictures for OQO:

Highlights

• 1GHz Transmeta Crusoe
• 20GB hard drive
• 256MB RAM
• Microsoft Windows XP
• 800x480 Wide-VGA 5-inch transflective screen
• Thumb keyboard with mouse buttons and
• TrackStik
• Thumbwheel
• 802.11b wireless
• Bluetooth
• FireWire (1394)
• USB 1.1
• 3.5 mm stereo headphone jack
• Digital pen
• Removable lithium polymer battery

And via the OQO docking cable you have access to:

• 3D accelerated 1280x1024 video VGA output
• Additional USB
• Additional FireWire
• RJ-45 10Base-T Ethernet
• DC power
• Audio out

As you can see from the specs and the pictures, the OQO is quite a beauty and extremely loaded. If you want to get a real feel for how small and unique this computer is, watch this 4 minute interview with OQO's CTO on News.com. If you're looking for more resources on OQO, Steve Barr has a great OQO section on his site.

It's estimated that the street price of OQO will be about $2000. While that's expensive, the ability to meld a PDA and computer with 2 types of wireless will be invaluable to many road warriors. The thing to remember is that once the OQO is in its docking station, you can use it as your desktop computer. Of course, the big drawback with a computer this small and expensive is that it's easily droppable and won't be really hard to lose or misplace.

Overall, the OQO will definitely be a trendsetter and I (and many other geeks) anxiously await its arrival. Next week we'll talk about the Flipstart PC by Microsoft Co-Founder Paul Allen.