I just got some mitts-on time with Lenovo’s new notebook, the X1 Hybrid. What’s interesting about it is that it can boot into a battery-doubling, low-power mode that runs off a snapdragon processor and custom software based on a certain kernel we all know.
They’re calling it Instant Media Mode (IMM). They won’t say it’s running Android, because it’s not officially Android. But don’t kid a kidder, kid, I know Android when I see it. It’s based off the Android 2.3 (Gingerbread) kernel. It’ll never have Android Market or official Gmail apps or anything, but if you’re the crafty type I’m sure you can find a way to download Android apps from the interwebs.
Does this thing make any sense? A laptop that turns into an outdated Android tablet? Uhh, not really. I guess one could argue that if you wanted your battery to last forever so you could just watch movies on a flight around the world, but I’m not buying it, and I’m betting you won’t either unless you’ve always wanted to run Gingerbread on a ThinkPad for some reason. It’ll be available later this year starting at $US1600.