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Google’s Android mobile phone software worked well on mini-laptops at the Computex Taipei 2009 electronics show and, backed by the strong Google brand, may be headed for prime time, two Gartner analysts said Monday.

The researchers noted that PC manufacturers believe Android is not quite ready for netbooks or similar devices yet, but that it will inevitably get there. The mobile operating system was developed for smartphones, but a number of initiatives have put the operating system in devices such as mini-laptops, netbooks and smartbooks.

Netbooks and smartbooks are two kinds of mini-laptops with screens 10-inches or smaller and full keyboards, but differ in that netbooks are designed to work on PC microchips such as Intel’s Atom microprocessors, while smartbooks run on mobile phone chips with processing cores from Arm Holdings.

“When Android did work, we found that the user interface was very snappy on relatively low-performance ARM processors, more so than Windows 7 on Atom,” Christian Heidarson and Ben Lee wrote in Gartner’s Semiconductor DQ Monday Report.

Android has put momentum behind the move to use ARM processors in the PC industry, including with support from critical software vendors, the researchers said.

Microsoft has said it will not port Windows 7 to ARM nor modify Windows Mobile to work on smartbooks because the devices are untested in the market. That leaves the field open for Google, which has so far remained mum on its plans to support Android outside mobile phones.

Computex served as a coming out party for Android in devices beyond smartphones and in gadgets running on two other kinds of processor technologies, the PC industry’s x86 processors and MIPs processors.

Several Android-based smartbooks were on display at Computex, including a version of Asustek Computer’s Eee PC based on Qualcomm’s Snapdragon processor, which contain ARM processing cores. Asustek pioneered netbooks and has used other Linux OSes in past netbooks, but prior to Computex it had almost completely migrated to Microsoft Windows XP, which is the most popular OS for netbooks.

Elitegroup Computer Systems (ECS) showed off an Android smartbook powered by ARM-based chips from Texas Instruments at Computex, while chip maker Freescale Semiconductor displayed Android smartbooks from Pegatron, the contract manufacturing subsidiary of Asustek, and Wistron, Acer’s former contract manufacturing arm.

The Android Eee PC was thinner and lighter than current members of Asustek’s Eee PC netbook lineup due to the 1GHz ARM processing core. The chips use less electricity and give off less heat than Intel Atom chips, so the mini-laptops they’re in do not require cooling systems such as heat sinks or fans. The smartbooks on display at Computex looked a lot like netbooks, with 10-inch screens and full keyboards, but they can run for eight hours on a three-cell battery, compared to two or three hours for a netbook with a three-cell battery.

Acer, the world’s third-largest PC vendor, unveiled an Android Aspire One netbook, unique because it runs Android on an Intel Atom processor, not an ARM-based chip. Acer worked with a Taiwanese Linux distributor to port Android over to x86 processors, a first for the OS. The device is due out in the third quarter, the company said.

Not to be left out, MIPS Technologies worked with software developer Embedded Alley to port Android to the MIPS chip architecture, which the companies also showed on devices at Computex.

Several other companies displayed their first-ever Android-based gadgets, including Inventec Appliances, which showed a smartphone and handheld computer, and Kinpo, which displayed a handheld computer. Other vendors such as BenQ, Micro-Star International (MSI) and Garmin-Asus vowed to catch up with Android-based products of their own.

Computers, copiers and printers sold the European Union and the U.S. will have to become more energy-efficient from next month in order to gain Energy Star approval, following an agreement signed Wednesday by the European Commission and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

The energy savings from the new specifications for home and office equipment are expected to total 22TWh (terawatt hour) over the four- to six-year lifetime of the products — roughly equivalent to Ireland’s total annual energy consumption, the Commission said in a statement.

The list of machines currently approved under the E.U.-U.S. Energy Star scheme includes 70 desktop PC brands, 43 laptops and tablet PCs, 18 copiers, 32 printers, 19 scanners and 14 fax machines.

“The new criteria are an important contribution to reach the E.U.’s energy efficiency targets,” said the European energy commissioner Andris Pielbags.

Computers are expected to account for most of the savings: 18 TWh out of the 22 TWh target, the Commission said.The E.U.-U.S. Energy Star scheme will in future be extended to cover other product categories including servers, data storage equipment and video games consoles.

When Apple quietly updated the 13-inch MacBook a couple weeks ago, giving the company’s least-expensive–and previous-generation-design–laptop better performance than the more-expensive aluminum unibody models, it was a good hint that the aluminum models were due for a refresh. After all, what company wants to undercut its “premium” models by selling a better-performing product for less money?

Sure enough, just 12 days later, Apple announced updates to nearly the entire MacBook line. The MacBook Air gains faster processors; the 17-inch MacBook Pro gets a faster processor and a larger hard drive; and the 15-inch MacBook Pro sports faster processors, higher RAM capacity, a solid-state drive option, a longer-life battery, an improved display, and an SD memory-card slot (in lieu of the ExpressCard slot found on the previous version). All of these changes are accompanied by lower prices.

These are notable upgrades, but it’s the changes to the 13-inch MacBook that are generating the most buzz. Keep in mind that Apple’s consumer laptop line got a dramatic overhaul just last October, when the company switched all but the entry-level model to a new aluminum unibody enclosure, converted to LED displays, added a multi-touch trackpad, upgraded the graphics and processor performance, and even added the “pro”-level backlit-keyboard feature (albeit only to the most-expensive model).

As I pointed out at the time, these upgrades brought the MacBook models enticingly close to the 15-inch Pro line. For people who didn’t need the large screen, the less-expensive 13-inch MacBook was mighty tempting. In fact, it appeared that Apple omitted FireWire from the MacBook models solely to differentiate them from the Pro line.

So it was interesting to hear, during Monday’s WWDC keynote, Phil Schiller ask rhetorically, “What can we add to just make [the MacBook] a MacBook Pro?” Indeed, the 13-inch member of Apple’s laptop line now includes most of the same features and technologies as its larger siblings: a longer-life, integrated (read: non-swappable) battery, improved display technology, 8GB RAM capacity, a 500GB hard drive or 256GB SSD, a backlit keyboard on all models, and an SD memory-card slot. It even includes…wait for it…FireWire 800.

The 13-inch model still can’t match the 15-inch MacBook Pro when it comes to screen real estate and processing power–the 15-inch models start at 2.53GHz and can reach 3.06GHz, while the new 13-inch models start at 2.26GHz and max out at 2.53GHz. The 15-inch MacBook Pro is also available in a dual-video-card configuration. But the two lines are otherwise nearly identical. In fact, they’re similar enough that Apple has officially bestowed “Pro” status upon the unibody 13-inch models–welcome, 13-inch MacBook Pro.

In the past, a change this dramatic would have surprised me. Apple has traditionally reserved the best features–SuperDrives, FireWire 800, you name it–for its most-expensive models, only later trickling those features down to the consumer line. This feature segregation, if you will, often seemed to be little more than a mechanism for propping up the sales of higher-end systems and their larger profit margins.

But as Macs have become more and more popular, especially in the consumer market, we’ve been seeing more and more “pro” features finding their way into “consumer” models, and much earlier. Whether it’s FireWire 800 on iMacs or aluminum bodies for MacBooks, Apple has gradually been moving to a model where you pay more for raw performance, rather than useful features.

Part of this is likely due to competition from other computer makers: when everyone else is offering particular features for less money, there’s pressure to improve your own products to stay competitive. But I suspect it’s also because of the growing popularity of Macs in general–the more computers you sell, the less profit you need to make on each to generate healthy balance sheets. Apple no longer seems afraid that 13-inch-laptop sales will cannibalize sales of the larger, more expensive models, instead aiming to sell more laptops overall.

Whatever the reason, from a consumer’s point of view Apple’s new laptop line sports the company’s most aggresive pricing, and provides the best value, to date. While budget shoppers may be disappointed that there’s no $500 or $600 model, the just-updated white MacBook is the best laptop Apple has ever sold for less than $1,000. The 17-inch model is a killer large-screen computer at $2,499. The MacBook Air, though still demanding a premium for being small and light, has dropped in price dramatically since its 2008 introduction, while providing better performance and more storage. And the new heart of Apple’s laptop line is a collection of 13- and 15-inch laptops with a common–and impressive–set of features ranging in price from $1,199 to $2,299. Across this range, lower prices don’t require you to give up useful features; for each $200 to $300 jump in price, you simply get better “basics”–faster processors, more RAM, larger hard drives, and, when jumping from $1,499 to $1,699, a larger screen.

(This neat set of price intervals also has a marketing benefit for Apple: with such relatively small jumps in price between the models, no matter which MacBook Pro you choose, it’s tempting to spend “only $200 more” for an even better machine.)

Personally, I’m hoping this new approach eventually finds its way to Apple’s desktop computers. There’s quite a hole there between the consumer and pro machines.

Monday saw the annual Worldwide Developer’s Conference (WWDC) kick off with a keynote address by various Apple executives. In this edition of Macworld Video, Roman Loyola looks back at some of the highlights from the opening day.

The star of the keynote may very well have been the brand-new iPhone 3G S–boasting higher speeds and added features such as voice control, video capture and a compass. But several other products had their moment in the spotlight as well.

Download Macworld Video #112

* Format: MPEG-4/H.264

* Resolution: 480 x 272 (iPhone & iPod compatible)

* Size: 11.6MB

* Length: 8 minutes

Some of the other products mentioned in the keynote address include:

* A revamped family of laptops. Apple updated almost its entire laptop line, promoting its 13-inch Aluminum unibody Macbooks into the MacBook Pro line, upgrading the existing 15- and 17-inch MacBook Pros, and slashing MacBook Air prices while boosting speeds.

* iPhone 3.0 coming soon. The new iPhone 3.0 OS will be released on June 17, 2009. iPhone 3.0 will be a free release for all iPhone customers–both original iPhone users and iPhone 3G users will be able to download it at no charge once it’s released.

* Snow Leopard slated for release. The next major update to OS X will be available in September. However, OS X 10.6 will only work on Intel-based Macs, leaving the owners of aging PowerPC-based hardware without the ability to upgrade.

* Plus you can read more about the iPhone 3G S in our detailed report.

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French site HardMac discovered a newly-published Apple Knowledge Base article which noted that the new MacBook Pros can boot off Secure Digital cards, as well as answering other questions regarding the just-released models’ SD card slot.

Is this a further sign of Apple moving away from optical discs or is it just providing a convenient way for MacBook Pro owners to deal with situations that might require support or maintenance in the absence of an Install DVD?

The article also mentioned that the Mac will recognize an SD card as a USB storage device. You can, of course, boot Intel-based Macs via USB drives, which means this may just be a side effect of the way the hardware is treated. Given that USB thumb drives–and USB hard drives–are generally more affordable in larger capacities than SD cards, using an SD card as a startup device might be a less attractive solution, though it certainly will save you one USB port.

In the wake of the MacBook Air, leaving optical discs off of more notebooks is possibility in the future, especially now that people are getting used to regularly downloading relatively large files, such as the latest Mac OS X software update and iTunes Store movies. However, bypassing DVD for software distribution is not quite practical for the time being, at least until it becomes economically viable for both the developers and the consumers to distribute full install versions of Mac OS X or larger software such as pro applications.

Other good news on the SD front is that Apple supports the Secure Digital High Capacity (SDHC) format for cards with capacities greater than 32GB. On the other hand, the SD Input Output (SDIO) format, which is used by devices such as barcode readers, GPS cards, and Bluetooth adapters, is unfortunately not supported. Had it been, the loss of functionality from the removal of ExpressCard slot might have been slightly less pronounced.

A new SD card format was released at CES this year called SD Extended Capacity (SDXC) which uses Microsoft’s exFAT file system. Apple does not support exFAT although it remains to be seen if it can recognize SDXC cards bearing FAT32 or other supported formats.

Apple also warned that the SD slot should not be used for cards that are thicker than 2.1 mm which can damage the slot, but it can accept MultiMedia Cards (MMC) because those are thin enough.

Eye-Fi today added to its popular line of wireless and geo tagging-capable memory cards. Called the Eye-Fi Pro, the newest SDHC wireless memory card has 4GB of storage and is geared toward professional photographers and serious photo hobbyists. The Eye-Fi Pro has the widest functionality in Eye-Fi’s lineup, with automatic uploads to a wide variety of Web sites; support for jpeg, RAW, and video formats; and the capability to create an ad hoc connection between your camera and computer for wireless photo transfer. The Eye-Fi pro retails for $149.

For an additional $9.99 per year, you can automatically upload your photos or videos from the Eye-Fi Pro over a Wi-Fi connection to 25 photo and video sharing sites including Facebook, Flickr, Picasa, Photobucket, Snapfish, and YouTube. The direct upload service, called WebShare, also works with Eye-Fi Share and Eye-Fi Explore memory cards. As with other Eye-Fi products, the Pro provides geotagging via Skyhook Wireless’ positioning system for an extra $14.99 per year.

In addition to the Pro SDHC card, Eye-Fi has announced that all Eye-Fi users will now have access to a new free service called Selective Transfer. As the name implies, Selective Transfer lets you pick and choose which photos you’d like to upload from you camera by using the “protect” or “lock” feature found on most cameras. Any photos you mark under “protect” or “lock” will be automatically uploaded, and all photos will remain on the camera until you manually delete them.

With the popularlity of Eye-Fi memory cards, some camera manufacturers are now producing Eye-Fi optimized cameras. These cameras can notify you when uploads are finished, optimize the camera’s power consumption, and automatically recognize Eye-Fi cards. Recent optimized cameras include the Nikon D5000, and all Casio cameras slated for spring 2009 release including the Casio EX-S12, Casio EX-S5, Casio EX-FS10, Casio EX-FC100 and Casio EX-Z29. Eye-Fi wireless memory cards are compatible with many, but not all cameras. Visit Eye-Fi to see if your camera is Eye-Fi compatible.