touch-screen

Judging by the user reviews for the Coolpix S70, people either loved it or wanted to find a Nikon executive nearby so they could personally smash them in the face with it. Its update, the Coolpix S80, hopefully inspires more of the former and less of the latter with a new touch-screen display and interface and some extra shooting features.

The camera body is redesigned and slightly slimmer, but still packs a 3.5-inch OLED touch screen, though this time around it has an 819K-dot resolution. To minimize screen clutter while shooting, Nikon uses a tabbed interface, which is good … Read more

There's been plenty of buzz for the high-concept Toshiba Libretto W105 since it was first announced in June of 2010. This dual-touch-screen minilaptop is a limited-release showpiece designed by Toshiba to celebrate the company's 25th anniversary in the mobile computing business, and is certainly an experiment that pushes the boundaries between laptops, tablets, and portable media players.

Despite the far-out thinking behind it, and the underpowered components, the Libretto W105 worked in practice far better than we expected in some areas, including certain kinds of media playback and general Web surfing. That was especially surprising, as the system is running Windows 7 Home Premium over two simultaneous displays, all from a 1.2GHz Intel Pentium U5400 CPU and 2GB of RAM. Our configuration (the only one currently available, according to Toshiba's Web site) is called the W105-L251 and sells for $1,099.

Looking a little like an oversize Nintendo DS, the libretto has two 7-inch multitouch displays, with the second taking the place of the traditional keyboard one would expect to find in this kind of clamshell design. By tapping a button on the side of the chassis, a virtual keyboard (similar to what you'd find on an iPhone or iPad) pops up to fill the bottom screen. Tap the same button twice and you get a virtual onscreen touch pad instead.

Our first struggle came with figuring out how to juggle these two virtual input devices, as the bottom screen isn't large enough to display both the keyboard and the touch pad fully at once (and, in our tests, the onscreen keyboard and touch pad couldn't register inputs simultaneously). Eventually, we got into a nice rhythm of single- and double-tapping to switch from keyboard to touch pad on the fly, although it's a little counterintuitive.

Pressing the button on the right side of the bottom display switches between the standard Windows OS desktop and a series of Toshiba's proprietary Bulletin Board screens, which allow you to arrange photos and notes on a touch-friendly surface. It looks snazzy, but we can't say it's particularly useful, especially as it (like almost any proprietary app) has its own learning curve.

Actually navigating around the Windows interface was mostly lag-free, which is something even many Netbooks can't say. At the same time, a 7-inch touch screen, no matter how many navigational tricks you include, simply isn't optimal for touch, and we spent plenty of time hunting and pecking, trying to center the tiny cursor on buttons and tabs. … Read more

Flip Video may have been the first out of gate with a touch-screen pocket video camera, but Kodak, Samsung, JVC, and now Sony have followed--all with more compelling packages than Flip's offering. Sony's new Bloggie Touch features a snappy 3-inch touch-screen LCD, an f2.8 lens with auto macro, and full hd 1080p-resolution recording at 30 frames per second.

Sony's past minicamcorders have had "youthful" designs, came in multiple color options, and the devices and packaging were typical of mass-produced electronics--loaded up with stickers, bits of paper, and software discs. The Bloggie Touch, however, has … Read more

September 1 has become a circled date on every Mac nerd's calendar following Apple's announcement of a music-related media event to be held in San Francisco. One of the big announcements, according to analysts, could be an overhauled iPod Nano, sans click wheel.

The click wheel has been one of the most iconic pieces of industrial engineering in technology since its release, but may be relegated to science museums sooner than later. Kaufman analyst Shawn Wu claims via sources that a "significant redesign" of the iPod Nano may also be part of Apple's media event … Read more

Kodak's Zi8 has been one of the best mini camcorders available since it launched in 2009. It isn't perfect, but it has a lot of features the competition doesn't have, such as a switch for shooting in macro and an external mic jack. The PlayTouch (secretly called the Zi10, and seriously, Kodak, try googling product names before you go to production with them) is the update to the Zi8, and while it keeps many of the core features of its predecessor, it's a significant upgrade in design. This includes the use of a 3-inch capacitive touch … Read more

Available on Best Buy's Insignia label, the Infocast ($169) is a surprisingly unique product based around the same Chumby apps platform as the Sony Dash and Chumby One. It works as a photo frame, video player, news reader, game console, Internet radio, alarm clock, and weather forecaster, along with hundreds of extra features provided through free, Flash-based apps.

Best of all, unlike any previous Chumby spin-offs, the Infocast uses an extra-large screen that measures 8 inches diagonally, putting it in league with digital photo frames.

Do you need one? Well... no. As with all of these Chumby-based products, the … Read more

We all know how annoying fingerprints on touch screens can be, but now researchers believe they can actually leave your mobile phone susceptible to hacking.

University of Pennsylvania researchers tested the Google Nexus One and HTC G1, both of which use a graphical password system to unlock the phone that works by swiping a set pattern on the touch screen.

Unlocking your phone in this way leaves oily residues on the screen that can remain even if you wipe it. "Latent smudges may be usable to infer recently and frequently touched areas of the screen--a form of information leakage,&… Read more

Does an Android device with a 3.2-inch screen still qualify as a "tablet"? That was the first question that popped into my head when I saw images of the Archos 32 Android tablet that were published Tuesday by the FCC.

Maybe I'm still feeling the effects of my time with the Dell Streak, but aren't tablets supposed to stretch beyond the confines of the pocket? Maybe not. It seems manufacturers have decided anything with a smartphone OS and a touch screen is a tablet--a tactic that may come back to bite them if Apple starts … Read more

As I mentioned back at the end of June, camera manufacturers are beginning to announce models for the second half of 2010. Sony, Fujifilm, Panasonic, and Samsung have made their announcements, three of them doing so early Wednesday morning.

Sony and Panasonic are launching mostly high-end models as well as a couple updates to older, popular models. Samsung refreshed its flagship DualView cameras and introduced a 7x zoom ultracompact for $180. And Fujifilm announced replacements to three models that were barely six months old as well as a significant update to its groundbreaking F200EXR.

Here are links to all the … Read more