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ASUS is a brand name that, over the years, has become well known in the highly popular world of motherboards and video cards. ASUS has time and time again produced high quality computer solutions, creating quite a reputation for the ever-growing company. It is therefore no surprise that many major computer and electronics companies turn to ASUS for OEM solutions. They know what AnandTech readers have known for some time now: the ASUS brand name can deliver. It is thanks to this reputation that ASUS is one of the top three motherboard manufacturers in the world.

The question that loomed over ASUS and some other companies a few years ago was what to do next? There is only so much growth a company can do when already at the top producer in their given field. The plants are in place, the engineers present, and the possibilities endless. What the company needed was a market to enter next, a way to continue to grow. The solution that such companies came to: diversify your products and solutions, entering new markets. In the case of ASUS, one area that the company turned to was the IA market.

So what went on behind the scenes at ASUS to expand the company from one of the top three motherboard manufacturers in the world to a company that is also showcasing one of the most innovative and exciting products we saw at Computex 2002? We sat down with the VP of ASUS' mobile division, to discuss the whys and hows of ASUS' growing line of mobile solutions, specifically the future of their PDAs.

ASUS' PDA: MyPal A600

ASUS entered the IA market approximately two years ago. The IA team spun from the multimedia product team that previously had been working on video and sound items and focused on producing new products for ASUS. Primarily, the IA team decided to focus their efforts on laptops, webpads, PDAs and set-top boxes.

Our meeting with the head of the mobile division, a very interesting man who will go unnamed as per his personal preference, focused on discussing ASUS' MyPal A600. You may recall from our Day 2 Computex 2002 coverage, the ASUS MyPal A600 is an Xscale based PDA solution that combines long battery life, a 400MHz processor and PocketPC 2002 in a package only slightly larger than the Palm m515. The product actually ended up winning a "Best Choice" award for Mobile Products from the organizers of Computex and from what we saw they made the right decision: it looks like the MyPal A600 could be the iPaq of tomorrow.

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The MyPal A600 is ASUS' second generation PDA. The first generation ASUS PDA did not take off as the company would have liked; the PDA never made it in the US market. ASUS knew that something had to be changed to make the MyPal A600 successful.

In order to make a successful second generation product, ASUS had to attack the PDA market with the cut throat motherboard mentality: be the first to market with an unique product that distinguishes itself from others. It is the company's experience in the motherboard market that gave them the edge they needed to become a contender.

The design process of the MyPal A600 was unique among PDAs. Rather than create size constraints and design a hardware system to fit in a predetermined package, ASUS began with the hardware and worked from the inside out. The process started with placement of the CPU and evolved from there, at each stage attempting to make the unit as compact and powerful as possible. As the final product shows, the results were impressive. The MyPal A600 measures 4.92 x 2.95 x 0.5 inches and weighs only 5.3oz, making it significantly smaller than the other PocketPC 2002 solutions we have seen with the exception of the impressive Toshiba e310 (a StrongARM solution).

As a result of the "inside-out" mentality, the MyPal A600 is one able-bodied PDA despite its size. We already mentioned the 400MHz PXA250 Xscale processor, but the system also includes 64MB of RAM and 32MB of ROM as well as a 240x320x65K TFT LCD, built-in speaker, built-in microphone, and built-in SD/MMC slot.

Despite all the power that the tiny MyPal A600 contains, the unit is far from power hungry. The unit's internal battery is rated at 1200mA/h, placing it 200mA/h less powerful than the Compaq iPaq 1400mA/h battery. Nonetheless, the MyPal A600 boasts an impressive battery life using Microsoft's own battery benchmarking program. In the test, with the sidelights of both units set to off, the iPaq lasts nine hours while the MyPal A600 lasts sixteen hours. In fact, the sixteen hours of battery life sets a new record for PocketPC 2002 based PDAs. Needless to say, the iPaq and the MyPal are based off of different CPUs, but the battery life is impressive no matter how you look at it.

ASUS also mentioned that according to the Microsoft PocketPC 2002 specifications, battery life in this test must be at least eight hours to be certified by Microsoft. As a result of this, many companies have little incentive to push the eight hour mark much. When designing the MyPal A600, ASUS was not concerned with only meeting the established specifications, but also satisfying the user's needs. This truly is a solution for the masses.

One thing that was stressed during our meeting is the importance of software when it comes to developing a PDA solution. No matter how good a piece of hardware is, without proper software the hardware is about as useful as a paper weight. We could not agree more. This is especially important in the case of a PDA, where every unit sold includes software to make it work properly. Many PDA producers turn to third party companies to provide software solutions, but ASUS is in the unique position of being able to provide an in-house software solution. This drastically increases the frequency of software updates and tweaks that can be applied to a product.

Some of ASUS's software solutions are only enabled by the MyPal A600's hardware. One such item is the ability to dynamically change the clock speed and voltage supplied to the Xscale PXA250. Using a combination of hardware and software, the unit's processor can vary in clock speed from 100MHz to 400MHz with core voltages varying from 0.8v to 1.8v. The current software solution for the clock and voltage throttling is a menu driven one. In its current form, the MyPal's clock speed can be defined by the user in general use as well as on an application by application basis. For example, the unit can be set to run at a maximum battery setting by default, then change to a more aggressive setting when Pocket Word is opened.

The company is also actively working on on the fly automatic clock and voltage throttling. Such a solution would allow the MyPal A600 to vary in voltage and clock speed depending on system demand. In this instance, the processor would use higher clock speed settings while launching applications and performing demanding tasks, but would automatically lower its speed (and hence power consumption) when the system is idle or is performing basic tasks. It looks like the first batch of MyPal 600s will not have this feature quite yet, but the company expects the feature to be properly implemented one or two months after launch. Such a feature would extend the already impressive battery life of the product even further.

Also extending battery life is the unit's LED lit reflective screen. The screen is 3.5 inches and boasts a resolution of 240x320 with 65,536 colors. To compare the light intensity of the MyPal A600 with a similar product like the Compaq iPaq, we can compare the nit ratings (a unit of measure that equals one candela per square meter) that both sidelights produce. In its maximum brightness setting, the Compaq iPaq produces 50 to 60 nit. The MyPal A600's sidelight is fairly similar, producing 45 to 50 nit. Obviously, turning on the sidelight to the maximum brightness setting quickly drains the battery life in any PDA. In the case of the iPaq, battery life drops to about two hours while the sidelight is on at full intensity. The MyPal A600, on the other hand, is able to last about four hours with the sidelight at maximum brightness. The two hour battery life difference is a result of MyPal A600's LED sidelight compared to the iPaq's fluorescent sidelight.

On top of all the interesting stuff we heard about the MyPal A600, we were also told a bit about ASUS' next generation PDA. ASUS promised that the company's third generation PDA will be even more revolutionary than the MyPal A600. The company hopes to continue the trend they seem to be setting with their current PDA solution by making the third generation product a leader for PDAs everywhere. Things were pretty tight lipped about the upcoming product, but it seems that it will be using a transitive reflective screen which should further aid in saving battery life. This is because current reflective screens must be side lit and as a result about 65% of the light produced by the backlight does not hit the screen and instead bleeds into the environment. Implementing a transitive reflective screen would allow ASUS to mount the backlight behind the LCD panel, ensuring that every nit of light used goes directly into lighting the screen.

We were also told that the next generation PDA will include some sort of hardware to aid in video playback. Whether this will be a hardware based MPEG-2 decoder or even an MPEG-4 decoder, we do not know. What we do know is that such as solution has the potential to bring high quality video to PDA devices.

We also heard that the next generation product will include more features in the same form factor. ASUS mentioned the possibility of integrating 802.11b wireless connectivity, although maintaining battery life with integrated wireless is a problem they are still trying to figure out.

Marketing - the key to success

As you may have gathered, we were quite impressed with what we saw from the MyPal A600. Frankly, we have never seen such a full featured PDA in such a small package. We truly feel that, from what we have seen so far, the MyPal A600 has the potential to take quite a bit of market share away from major players in the PDA market such as Compaq, HP, and even Palm. The problem that the MyPal A600 faces comes not from hardware or design limitations but rather from marketing limitations.

As a Taiwan based motherboard manufacturer, ASUS has had little experience with the mass branding and marketing of a consumer electronic device. Ensuring the success of a PDA product in the vicious world of mobile computing is more than a bit different than successfully branding and marketing a motherboard solution. Instead of facing competition from other Taiwanese companies such as MSI and Gigabyte, ASUS is forced to compete with large US based companies like Compaq and Sony; companies with large budgets and advertising dollars to throw around.

We feel that the success of the MyPal A600 will be dictated by what ASUS chooses to do with the product. Introduce the MyPal A600 into the retail channel through a few online stores and the product is likely to draw in a limited number of customers no matter how good it actually is. People will not be able to see and play with the product, an aspect of buying that certainly favors the MyPal A600. If anything demonstrates this, it is what we saw on the floor of Computex. The ASUS booth was constantly buzzing with people waiting in line to play with a few MyPal A600 units mounted under glass.

If instead of selling online ASUS places the MyPal A600 on the store shelves of CompUSA, BestBuy, and Fry's, they have the potential to steal a large potion of the market away from the current players in the PDA arena. If we were to walk into a major retail store looking for a PocketPC solution and see the MyPal A600 placed side by side a Compaq iPaq, we can guarantee that we would walk out the owner of a new MyPal A600.

As one of the largest computer manufactures in the business, ASUS has the money and might to enter the PDA market properly. Let's just hope that the execution of the MyPal A600 goes well, as the company has the potential to shock the industry and spur innovation throughout the PDA market.

Be sure to check back on AnandTech in the coming weeks, as our ASUS MyPal A600 sample should be arriving soon. Look for a detailed review soon in the same fashion as our other mobile reviews.