A new version of the Willcom D4, which is now sitting beside the HTC Shift as my hands-down favorite UMPC, was announced last week and just put on sale yesterday.
The D4 Ver. L, or Sharp WS016SH(B)P, differs from the original D4 in three of the very best ways: software/performance, battery life, and price. It still runs Vista on its 1.33Ghz Atom Z520 CPU and 1GB of RAM, but it no longer comes with the resource-hungry Microsoft Office.
There's no major changes to the device itself, but Microsoft Office is no longer included with the unit. That might be helping to offset the cost a bit because the new package can be had for 97,700 Japanese Yen. Some quick conversion shows that to be around $907 US, which is a vast difference from early pricing. You'll still need to import it outside of the native selling area, but with a longer battery life and a lower price, this might be more appealing than it was a few months ago to some.
In addition to the dramatic difference shown in the screen capture above, Chinese site PCHome.net reports today that the Ver. L sells for 6000 yuan (~$875). Considering that I paid $1500 for my Office-less D4 two months ago and got the extended battery for free, I'd say the early adopter fee was downright astronomical.
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