This is a nice shot of the harddrive (Toshiba 3.2gig shown) and some of the chipset. The volume slider is on the top right, various misc. ports to the left. You'll see a lot of "Digital" chips because this is an older Netwinder, back when Digital made the StrongARM processor. The processor is actually underneath the harddrive (which is elevated on metal pegs).

Here's a cleaner top-shot. You can see the telecom interface to your top-right, the parallel/video interface to your top-left, the volume slider to your bottom-right, and of course, the harddrive.

Another shot from the top. Ports are explained below.

Here's a port picture. (Top, from the left) Telecom line, 9pin serial, telecom phone, 10/100 Base RJ45, Parallel (Bottom, from the left) Power, Stereo in, telcom handset, stereo out, PS2 keyboard, PS2 mouse, 10 Base RJ45, RCA Video in, RCA Video out, SVGA video out

This is a look at what is underneath the harddrive of a Netwinder. You'll note the 'Winbond' PCI I/O controller (Top-right chip), the 'StrongARM' processor (right-most) which is shown closer in a pic later on, the CyberPro 2000 Video Controller, and the Digital 21143 Tulip Ethernet chip (left-centerish) among other chips of interest.

Here's a zoom shot (with harddrive removed) of the Winbond I/O (top-right), CyberPro Video (bottom-2nd from left), the StrongARM processor (rightmost), the Digital 21143 Ethernet controller, the Philips Video Transformer Chip (for video in) (left-center), along with other chlips.

The Netwinder was manufactured most recently by Rebel.com (formerly Hardware Canada Computing... and Corel Computer before that), and is an Intel StrongARM-based RISC computer, that generally runs Linux. The Netwinder comes in serveral different flavors, targeted towards different end users.

I used the Netwinder for lots of different things, including:

• a StrongARM development box, so I could test embedded application that would eventually go into microsystems that didn't offer the flexibility of a full-blown Linux install
• production HTTP server
• webcam server
• car-audio MP3 jukebox
• Point-of-Sale boxes (via a client)
• strapped one to a battery and used it as a mobile (backpack) GPS mapping unit while hiking

I wish these boxes were still developed. It wasn nice having a fully-functional, low-wattage SBC to use for this or that.

Netwinder.org has the following to say:

The NetWinder is a small, low power computing platform originally designed by Corel Computer, and later aquired by Rebel.com. The NetWinder measures 10H x 6D x 2W inches (25 x 15 x 5 cm) and packs all of the features of an ordinary PC, including video, sound, hard disk, dual ethernet and more. It runs off a 12V power supply and consumes about 15 watts.

The original NetWinder was designed around the StrongARM 110 processor. For more details please see the ARM info page. In the fall of 2000, Rebel.com developed the second-generation NetWinder, this time based on the Transmeta 5400 processor. Details available on the Crusoe info page. Due to the bankruptcy of Rebel in mid-2001, relatively few of the second-generation units exist.