TabletPc2.com started to post its 6th annual List for Santa: Holiday Gift Guide. With over 160 products, items will be added to the list over the next several days. Tablet PCs, Entertainment PCs, Mini-Notebooks are already up and Fun & Entertainment and Digital Cameras are going up soon.

Sales of SUVs of the PC world - stationary PCs - are being beaten out by the more energy efficient mobile PCs. Of course, this shift to the rise of mobile PCs has been happening for a while. What is different is the relevance to U.S. college students of a PC being energy efficient, contributing as little to environmental impact as possible from production to degradation, and hopefully from companies that participate in fair trade (or at least those working toward it).

Over the next several weeks entering college students will be introduced to the values of their new communities and enter into an action oriented environment around sustainability.  From contests between dorms to other campuses, many students will stop using trays in the cafeteria on certain days (or at all), counting the minutes they're in the shower to stay under 10 or 6 min, using the common dorm fridge instead of bringing mini-fridges, buying veggies locally (organic) or growing their own, composting, and yes, even counting the energy consumption on their PCs all to contribute to building a more sustainable environment.

Awareness and action by academics has increased from simple "reduce, reuse, recycle" plastic mugs for soda and coffee to signing pledges, like at Duke University and actively helping the campus install solar panels, like at Dickinson College. Tomorrow's New York Times has a great article detailing the movement on campuses across the U.S. and a new rating by Princeton Review.

Students and faculty working together to build more sustainable systems is serious business and not to be scoffed at as an idealistic dream. In order to maintain relevance to these leaders of sustainability and our future political and business leaders, PC and device manufacturers will need to be honest in their approach to the effort. Marketing gimmics won't fly, as this new effort is beyond, "we'll recycle your old PC," euphemism for they'll take it back and either resell it as refurbished or pay the dump fee.

Currently, students are making their PC decisions at a very practical level. I recently had the opportunity to visit well over a dozen colleges and prep schools and repeatedly heard students' comments supporting use of mobile PCs in context of energy, rather than convenience of using around campus. Here is a photo of a poster that I noticed in one hallway, which demonstrates the energy cost differences between average stationary PCs and mobile PCs:

Mobile PCs are a wonderful tool to aid in creating a more sustainable environment. Every school I visited mentioned that the students can now print on two sides of paper from network printers. Students commented on how much this has helped them reduce use of paper and network printer access means they don't have to bring their own printer. Paper is fundamental to many academic processes, even today, and it's good to see that this basic is not overlooked.

Of course, there can be even further efforts with PCs helping schools to be less dependent on paper.

There are also software features like being able to handwrite formulas, equations, and notes directly into Tablet PCs. This can be helpful for lab research, as well as individual course notes.

At an institution level there are Learning Management Systems that can help reduce the need to even print an assignment out. With an efficient LMS in place, students can post work electronically and faculty can access it. I noticed that schools use these at varying levels. Based on anecdotes only, this appeared to be based on training more than on the status of the technology available to the students.

Operationally, institutions can also standardize on hardware to help reuse pieces of PCs that are undergoing maintenance. Reuse a battery from a mobile PC that has a broken keyboard, for example. This is easier to do if the majority of equipment is the same.

I'll go into more detail around these in Part II. Also, we can go over needed improvements for tomorrow, such as battery duration, more eco-friendly plastics, and more energy efficient chipsets and processors.

Had a fun time playing with the homemade multitouch box yesterday. Here's a picture with it hooked up to a Lenovo x60 Tablet PC while I'm playing with Smoke. Loren goes into detail about how built the little multitouch box.

Tips:

1. Use a small box, such as 7"x7"
2. Cover the hole for the cord with duct tape to block extra light
3. Use a picture frame as the "lid" to the box. If you use paper alone press lightly or else your lid will cave in :)

Building environmenally friendly PCs would potentially include reducing chemical byproducts, clean manufacturing, lead-free components, use of rapidly renewable materials, biodegradable plastics, rechargeable batteries with good method for disposal, longer lifetime of the complete product, reduce packaging, reuse - when possible recycle - materials, and the PC would need to be energy efficient.

Energy efforts alone range from reducing consumption by individual components, such as display and CPU, to improving software efficiency. Some PC manufacturers now have Energy Calculators available so you can know the amount of energy consumed by certain models. Here's a list of a few calculators and places to go for information. Please post resources that you use.

• Dell Energy Calculator
• Energy Star Guidelines for Energy Management
• Guide to Greener Electronics by GreenPeace has info on some general corporate policies
• Lenovo Project Big Green for IT 

Don't overlook consumption by specific models too. For example, the Toshiba Portege M700 Tablet PC consumes low power for a powerful mobile PC, and you can save a few trees by using the pen to handwrite quick notes.

So, tell me, are you ready to buy "green" PCs?

Two interesting twists happened today. First, CES organizers express dissatisfication with Las Vegas as a location for the trade show. Second, Apple introduces a new Mac Pro.

MSNBC is reporting CES organizers are in talks for a better deal. Any visitor to the trade show can attest that hotel prices during the week of CES are expensive. Some organizers claim hotel prices are typically five times a normal price.

The Samsung Q1 Ultra Premium UMPC was named a 2008 CES Innovations Honoree.

Costco.com is offering a $100 coupon for Fujtisu Lifebook U810 with Windows Vista Home Premium. The coupon is valid for orders placed before December 10, 2007.

Have you played with Crayon Physics yet?

Mobile Connections is a conference within DevConnections conference on November 5 - 8 in Las Vegas, NV. The mobile PC session list is posted as:

MPC304: Adding Location-Awareness to Mobile PC Applications with MapPoint and Virtual Earth
Frank LaVigne

KForce is advertising a role for C# developer for enterprise apps, including mobility and Tablet PC.