Both designs are nothing original, as they are both projects of one named Sergey, who is a DIY designer of legacy computer equipment for retro-computing and electronics learning purposes. These include Sergey's XT - a ISA, active-backplane based, Intel 8088 based PC/XT class single board computer (SBC), and the 386SX supposedly also being a Sergey project as well (or someone else's at least, I seem to recall a website on a 386 SBC handheld sometime ago). It's raised a few eyebrows in the community due to the fact that these devices take so much from someone yet give little credit. These devices were being sold via AliExpress for $150-250 e.a., and have since sold out.

The Book 8088 is a CGA Compatible, XT-Class, portable laptop computer with some expandability It features a 8MHz NEC V20 processor, with provisions for an Intel 8087 Math Co-Processor, and an OPL/3 Adlib synthesizer. The BIOS is Sergey's BIOS with all the Sergey "branding" removed. It also includes a 50 pin connector on the side that can connect to a ISA breakout box/board for adding other devices to the Hand 8088 to expand it's capabilities. Data storage is provided via a CF-CARD slot, with a 512MB CF-CARD seeming to be the default storage device these ship with. It comes with a 7.5" widescreen LCD Panel, running as a CGA Monitor for the device. As for external ports, other than power and that 50-pin breakout box port, there's nothing else of note. It does, however, feature 2 stereo speakers on each side of the screen, which are either on or off (no volume control). The casing is a semi-transparent, smoke gray housing, and it sold for $238.63 on AliExpress earlier this year. It is currently sold out, and it is unknown if it's going to be available anytime soon.

The Hand 386 by contrast, is a handheld 386 SX SOC (System on a Chip) Based computer with 4MB of RAM, re-sourced 386SX BIOS (AWARD), 1MB SVGA Graphics via a C&T 65535 Chipset, a very tiny rubber calculator style keyboard, OPL/3 FM Synthesis (Adlib support), a tiny 5" LCD Panel, and comes pre-loaded with FreeDOS or Windows 95 (!?!?), or so I have been told. The device can take a PS/2 Keyboard and PS/2 Mouse from a breakout-box style connector on the side, as well as can be used with a ISA Breakout Box on the side as well via 50 pin ribbon cable. The device sold on AliExpress earlier this year for about $200 ($199.99).

The general concensus on these two devices has been very mixed to say the least, with some people citing that the use and removal of Sergey's branding from the Sergey' sourced 8088 unit and it's BIOS raising quite a few eyebrows, some saying that this is awesome that there's a brand new set of devices aimed at vintage computing that fulfill the needs of a great swath of the user-base, but also critiques on the quality, longevity, expandability, and control of these devices.

Overall, my first impressions is this is precisely the kind of thing we are looking for to cover the early 8088/8086 segment of portable PCs. Having the V20 gets it far enough into 286 territory to do some serious stuff. One thing I think everyone is forgetting when it comes to the PC/XT/AT Class laptops and portables, is that they are VERY restrictive, ie: huge luggables with CRTS that need high voltage repairs, early clamshell laptops that weigh more than a Gibson Les Paul guitar and have eye-destroying Blue/White STN LCD screens with poor ghosting with high speed images - such as those used in games. Almost all of these, either came FLoppy Only or without some form of modern Hard Disk options, either in the form of an XT-IDE Hard Disk, or some kooky Proprietary thing such as NEC's Solid State Discs found in the original UltraLite which hold 1/100th of what a CF Card can. While some had the ability to have expansions done in the form of ISA cards, this just adds to the bulk and the weight of the unit. Also, almost all of these machines are now considered "collector class" and go for almost as much as the Book 8088 does with half the capabilities, but maybe a nicer keyboard.

But on the flip side, you're spending about as much for a Genuine 1980's 8088 product, as you would for a VINTAGE 8088 product that's only going to APPRECIATE in value as quantities become scarce and harder to find.

A real missed opportunity would be Tandy 1000 support. If they were going to pirate a BIOS, why not pirate the Phoenix one from the Tandy 1000 Series, and the PC Jr. derived audio that goes with it. This would allow a higher quality of audio across far more games, especially if combined with the OPL/3, and the enhanced CGA video would allow for much nicer graphics in a lot of games as well. The Tandy 1000 was the real darling of the PC/XT class IMHO. While I get the idea is to emulate a bog-standard IBM PC/XT in handheld form here, in the form of what we'd call a "Palmtop", Tandy 1000 support would be a great addition on a future model.

So would some kind of built in pointing device such as a Trackball, trackpad, or Trackpoint - or at least the external connector to add one. Some of my favorite games on my Tandy 1000 are the Arkanoid Series, Maniac Mansion, and Sim City, and all of those work best with a mouse (and Maniac Mansion can only make use of the PC Jr. 3-voice audio). Having one built in is a much better idea because a lot of people would rather have it in an all-in-one package, rather than have to drag a bunch of hobbyist project objects with them everywhere just to play simple DOS games.

I think the CF-CARD storage is an EXCELLENT move though. And it's obvious it's using the XT-IDE BIOS, so I also approve. I kind of get this is why network connectivity was not a thing for these, because you could just throw a media-bay in your modern computer and copy all the files over that way, negating the need to connect to the internet or the LAN to transfer files. But a flipside of this is that it totally prevents the Book 8088 from enjoying OTHER retrocomputing activities such as BBS Systems, Surfing the Internet In Lynx using Frogfind, or Chatting via IRC. If they could have integrated that RS-232C WiFi Modem board project into this, we could have a battery powered, globally connected, 8088 computer so we can surf the BBSes and download files from the internet using mTCP on a modern WPA/WPA2-PSK network. There's a missed opportunity.

Another one would be the keyboard. Here we have at least three or more keys that are totally unusable. I get that this was likely cobbled by a regular, modern day, Windows netbook/laptop keyboard, but a TSR that could remap the keys would be a a really cool idea on this, that way then some people could reconfigure it.

A big critique is the screen which is said to have poor viewing angles and be somewhat rather dim. Videos on YouTube don't really display this, but I can totally get it. And being one who owns 4 vintage color laptop computers (albeit 486s) I know that graphics quality is everything. When there's a laptop in 2023 that causes more eyestrain than a NanTan FMA3500C with a DSTN LCD by Sanyo from 1992, something's wrong here. When I'm on a brand new, 2023 era device, and I'm able to spend hours on a 1994 NEC Versa M/75 with an Active Matrix NEC NL6448AC30-10 with bad caps, without my vision going blurry and no headache, but this gives me a headache, then there's a problem. I also think the dim-ness is in part due to the power requirements of the device as well. Maybe it's not so bad IRL but I have yet to ever hear of something like this from CLint (LGR) on YouTube and have him be wrong about it, so I'm willing to be the assessment is accurate.

Improvements I would make would be a pointing device (maybe a trackpad for maintenance purposes), at least one PCMCIA Type II 16-bit Slot (for a WiFi Card), and maybe the addition of a Texas Instruments SN76496 sound chip for Tandy 1000/PC Jr. audio capability, and a boost up to TGA/PC Jr. Video as well. But for a first go out, not bad.

The first thing that comes to mind when I look at this is how terrible a user experience you're going to have. It uses a little rubber-dome keyboard where the rubber domes are the actual keys - like a dollar store pocket calculator. There's no built-in pointing device for moving the cursor around in Windows 95 - so there's another strike in the UI side of it. It really has a lot of potential though being a nearly Game-Boy Sized solution to DOS gaming, I almost want to call it the "DOS Boy", hehehe. SO I get what they were going for.

Plus Windows 95 on a 386SX is doable, and it could be tweaked to go fairly well. I also get that they were doing this likely so that people would not have to struggle so much using the tiny keyboard. The problem is, not having a pointing device negates the purpose of putting Windows 95 on it, since Windows 95 is and always was instended to be a 100% MOUSE DRIVEN interface. So either you have to carry a breakout project with you and a mouse, or you will need to really up your hotkey game to use this device effectively. I just question the ability to actually run something FROM Windows 95 on this though, like Diablo, or Postal.

Again, CF-CARD Storage was an excellent move due to the lack of network connectivity. And in the case of Windows 95, I can't blame the potential liability of putting a Windows 95 machine on the internet in 2023, even if it is not a prime target and thoroughly incapable of creaming itself with viruses. But if this ran DOS, I don't understand because it'd be like having a bloody TERMINAL in your pocket for TelNet BBS. Again, limiting the use cases because of limited expansion.

So let's talk about potential improvements...

The first improvement would be to put this in the bloody Book 8088's casing. This would give the motherboard more real-estate for expansion devices, and allow us to make it an all-in-one type solution.

Also, the lack of SoundBlaster, GUS, or WSS audio is limiting in the games you can run on it. You'll have to use internal speaker sound effects in most games like Wolfenstein 3D. But the choice of SVGA widens the pool of games from the Hand 8088 somewhat better. Also, maybe instead of OPL, use a ESS series sound chip like a 688 or 1868 in there for full SOundBlaster support. RS-232C WiFi modem for WPA2-PSK support, even in DOS, maybe with a way to connect up to it and configure via DOS via a utility program. I think this would be an excellent way to improve on this device. Also, a proper volume control, just like the Book 808 (which would be better named the Book XT or Book V20) needs.

The problem is, they kind of fall short of those actual devices both in actual price/value and features. As it stands right now, I own FOUR vintage Laptop computers, and all of them I bought for cheaper than the Hand/Book computers listed here. My NEC Versa M/75 was the most expensive at $75, my NEC Versa P/75 was only $25.00 and only needed some superglue, backing soda, and a trackball to work, my NanTan Notebook FMA3500C was about $50, with most of that being shipping, and the NanTan Notebook FMAK9200D was only $45.00 including shipping. So for all four of these REAL 486 computers from the 1990's, I paid less than half of a $100 bill for them, and they all have built-in trackballs, color screens, adjustable volume, all but one has 2x PCMCIA Type-II Slots, and thusly 2 PCMCIA Type II WifI Cards to be share dbetween them tethered to my Cell Phone's hotspot. They also have bigger screens, 3 of the 4 have built-in audio, though one lacks OPL Support, and one even has a touch screen (!!! Versa M/75CP). Also, none of these need a breakout box to use Serial, Parallel, PS/2, or VGA, I can just plug straight into the back of them. And in the Versa's case, I can just buy another screen (and a spare laptop base with it) to get better graphics. Also, being 486s, they all can run Windows 95 a lot faster, can hold more RAM (my Versa M/75 and P/75 have 40MB), and run actual DirectX Windows 95 programs like Diablo, Postal, or Quake. So a 486 with a real Keyboard, PCMCIA, WiFi, Active Matrix Screen, and at least WSS for $50 vs. a 386 SX with a rubber chiclet keyboard, tiny screen, and OPL/3 for $200? I think I'll take the old gray slab please!

Some people might argue though that the batteries on these old laptops don't work (I'm actually working on ideas to fix that issue using Lithium Ion batteries and BMCs retrofitted to the original BMCs of these NiCad/NiMH Laptops in my free time as I feel like), and that the plastic is brittle, or that there's no guarantee that it will work. This helps narrow down the user base.

First off, we would base it on the Vortex86+, a 486/Pentium based SOC system. The reaosn why, wider game availablility. We would include 32 or 64MB of RAM, maybe even just on regular 72-pin SIMMS, and put it in a NOTEBOOK form factor. Think something roughly the same dimensions as my NEC Versa Laptops or NanTan FMA3500C, but 1/2 or even 1/4th the thickness. Keep the CF-CARD idea but use a controller that allows PIO4.

We would just use a modern keyboard like the Book 8088, because it's a 486, the Windows Keys are not useless. Then move it closer to the screen, and put the Trackpad where the thumbs are, or use a mechanical "trackbar" solution.

For a screen, maybe a 10.5" pin compatible replacement with the Active Matrix NEC NL6448AC30 series would be in order. It would allow for a bigger screen, and then we could add a pair of speakers to each side of the screen.

For integrated features, we would have the RS-232C WiFi Modem with the configuration settable via internal USB interface, with one external port for data storage. This would allow this device to outdo vintage laptops with 802.11b wireless cards by allowing it on a modern home LAN with modern home security. Basically, it's internal modern WiFi for a DOS/Windows 95 computer.

For sound, an ESS 1868 AudioDrive chip, or similar would be used, to give full SoundBlaster support, maybe with an extra port for a new version of the LPTANDY board so you could run your older AGI games with full sound as well (when patched).

One PCMCIA Type II Slot for expansion. Just in case someone wants to use their old hardware for some reason.