Dell announced that they will release a line of laptop computers this fall with an instant on technology called Latitude On. Early indications are that it will closely mimic the Splashtop technology I wrote about last year and during CES 2008. And like Splashtop, the Dell technology involves using a light version of Linux to produce an extremely fast boot up (30 seconds or less) time and can access the Internet through Firefox and a wireless signal.
What is the appeal or advantage of these instant on technologies? Think about how you use your computer. What percentage of time are you using email and Internet versus editing digital photos or creating complex word processing documents or spreadsheets? If you are like many computer users, much of your time is spent online browsing the web and answering email. Having the ability to turn on your computer quickly to get to these activities is a huge convenience. And above that, the instant on environments are almost completely devoid of the security problems that plague Windows.
