Digital Home Thoughts: Sony Recovers and Offers Killer New Hardware Designs

"Sony is the closest thing the Windows world has to an Apple Computer. It is also the company that should be the natural winner when it comes to the upcoming convergence in the consumer electronics space. Unfortunately, Sony has had execution issues that have made me doubt it will ever step up to its potential. That may have changed. The other day, when I sat down with Sony to look at their new fall laptop and desktop lines, I saw a new Sony—one that should keep Steve Jobs up at night. It probably won't, but I'll get to this later. Now, until Sony announces the new products, I can't give you any details, no matter how much you beg. I will say that what I saw indicates that Sony is coming back, and I can chat a bit on the why behind this."

There's no doubt about it - I love the way Apple designs their hardware. In fact, I'm amazed that there aren't more companies who are developing hardware "the Apple way". Or did Apple buy up every talented industrial designer on the market? Apparently not as eWeek's Rob Enderle found out - he can't say much about what he saw, but he seems to be excited about it. Still, I find myself hard-pressed to think about seriously buying a Sony computer...