Thglimited - Heavy Industries

Since the Intel Atom Processor became official in early April, both industry and consumers seem to be eagerly waiting for the technology to hit the market. The Atom package consists mainly of the Intel's smallest chip plus an integrated graphics processor and has has a thermal design power range of below 2.4 watts (versus 35 watts for today's typical laptop), meaning there is much less heat dissipation on Atom-powered products.

In brief, Atom enables PC-like capabilities, an uncompromised Internet experience and long battery life for smaller, pocketable devices. A flood of Intel-hyped MID (Mobile Internet Devices) have surfaced, most of them bound to be released when the Atom platform becomes available in mid-2008. Here's a little video of what Intel envisions Atom-products to be:

BenQ introduced its take on the "MID" at the Intel Developers Conference in Shanghai

Sharp will be starting to sell what might be the smallest QWERTY device capable of running Windows Vista - OEM Manufacturer Willcom's D4 device.

Lenovo's Ideapad U8 does not only look like a solid and mature product, it also features a pretty sweet user interface.

Last but not least, Asus is prepping up its UMPC line with a duo of Atom five and seven inchers and will - inevitably - be releasing an Atom-based Eee PC.

With all this, I am still wondering if the devices will really have that much of an impact. They neither fit into the front pocket of your Levi's nor into a shirt pocket and thus they will not be able to replace a smart phone. On the other hand, the lack of a (full-sized) keyboard decreases the average MID's usability by a large amount, when compared to your everyday notebook...
Then, I am also a bit surprised that the five leading notebook brands have yet to show up to take their share of the market. HP is selling an Eee-type PC , Dell and Acer have announced these kind of products to be released later in 2008, but the three of them plus Fujitsu Siemens and Toshiba are nowhere to be seen on the "pocketable" side of mobile computing.
Are they still evaluating, do they have killer products up their sleeves or is it that they just don't buy into the whole UMPC/MID thing?