Pioneering gadget site-turned-blog The Gadgeteer reports that — following in the footsteps of such tech products as the TomTom One, the Gateway One, and the Acer Aspire One — Chumby Industries will release the second generation of its hacker toy-turned-widget playback device, the Chumby One. Selling for about $100, the revamped device has a far more modern appearance, albeit one that says more “kitchen” to me than bedroom.” In fact, I had been thinking of duplicating my iPod touch kitchen setup on my nightstand.
It will be interesting to see what changes Chumby makes in the name of role optimization. For example, the protuberance on its right side may be some kind of knob, and perhaps the top can be outfitted with a proper snooze button. As a long-time Chumby user, the main change I’d make is an easier way to manually move among a few multiple widgets (a la Exposé or HTC Sense) versus continuously cycling through hem slide show-style. The quest for a proper MP3 alarm clock may be at its end.
That’s the best they could do? It’s ugly.