The Apple Tablet is real???

There were lots of disappointed faces when at the recent MacWorld 08 Keynote address, when Steve Jobs presented yet another skinny notebook to the market, and not a stylish, functional, tablet PC. I was also disappointed.

It seems, though, that Asus are actually working with Apple to build one.

Is the Tablet PC market too small for Apple to actually release this any time soon? I’d buy one, but that’s only because I have a Tablet (a Toshiba R400) and don’t ever see that I would go back to normal computing again. Tablet PCs are only worth about 1.4% of the global computer market, which is probably why Apple is standing back for the moment. But when projections in mid 2005 suggested that Tablets PCs could be worth $5 USD billion by 2009, I wonder why Apple doesn’t give it the same good ol’ try they did with their iPod and iPhone products?

M

Apple flavoured tablet?

I’ve blogged previously on my search for the ultimate tablet PC. I was hoping that, in its typical design brilliance, that Apple would come up with something better than what I’ve seen so far — and soon.

There have been a few nice prototype pics out there, ones with wireless ultra flat keyboards and the like. But these, of course, are pure speculation.

Unfortunately, it seems that while an Apple tablet may indeed be in the wind, but of the micro variety, like the Samsung Q1.

Richard Koman of newsfactor.com discovered an Apple rumour site claiming that:

“the Apple tablet has been under development for the past 18 months. Although engineers had been pulled off the project to work on the iPhone, they have now returned full-force to developing a handheld computer — a machine would be one and a half times the size of an iPhone, with a 720 x 480 display that covers almost the entire surface of the device. The device would leverage multitouch features for drag-and-drop and copy-and-paste”

Sources expected Jobs to announce the device at Macworld in January with availability in mid-2008.

I guess I need to look elsewhere now for my magic all-conquering tablet PC.

M

Toshiba R400 and tablet PC ergonomics

Recently, I blogged about wanting to buy a tablet PC. Last Friday I actually got to play with the Toshiba R400 tablet PC.

Andrew Boyd made a few calls, talked to a few people, and before I knew it, Andrew, Maria and I were over at Harris Technology in Fyshwick (Canberra) having a little play with the Toshiba R400.

It became very clear that the person who was showing us the R400 knew very little about it, other than its specs and general capabilities. While the tablet was horribly devoid of any real software other thanVista Business edition and didn’t have its battery (so I couldn’t tell exactly how light it really was) it was good to actually be able to hold one and finally feel the erganomics of it. With Vista installed, I could at least see how good its handwriting recognition was and the ease by which I could write (even though I was only using Wordpad).

Another colleague of mine arrived after everyone else did. He’s left-handed and I couldn’t help but notice how he was holding the tablet and how it was different to how I hold a tablet.

I’m right handed, so the tablet goes in my left hand. I hold onto the spine where the hinge of the screen is and write with my right hand.

Stephen, however, is left-handed. When he holds a tablet, he ends up holding the left-edge of the screen and not the spine. It means he gets his fingers all over the screen - which is probably not the best, most rugged place to hold the tablet.

Stephen didn’t seem to mind so much, but I couldn’t help but wonder whether you could flip the screen around so it was good for righters and lefters.

Anyhow - I liked the tablet, and the R400 is certainly very sexy. If I buy one I will need to wait til Q3 so that I can buy one that will be compatible with the wireless docking station. That’s a lot of money (even if I salary sacrifice it). I’m wondering (again) whether the ASUS is actually going to be a better buy in the long run. There are a few good reviews emerging with the ASUS at 2GB of ram running Windows Vista very well indeed.

For now, though, we’ve got a contact who uses tablet PCs lots and will have some real software. Hopefully this will mean I can see how it’s being used in the wild and whether or not its a good idea to make the step to inking rather than typing.

M