w100

Hands-on with the Toshiba Libretto W105-L251

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

Immersion unveils new touch-screen haptics processor

Most onscreen keyboards, like those in the iPhone or other smartphones, have no tactile feedback, so you need to look at the screen and the virtual keyboard to make sure of the correct input. However, this might soon change, thanks to haptic technology, a mechanism that allows the screen to "touch" you back.

One of the major developers of this technology, the Immersion Corporation, announced Tuesday a new product that powers touch-feedback effects in touch-screen computers, the TouchSense 2500. The company claims that this product enables drop-in integrated circuit solutions to drive haptic effects that bring the user … Read more

Toshiba dual-screen Libretto: A tablet? Laptop?

A new video shows the dual-screen Toshiba Libretto W100 strutting its stuff in uncharted territory somewhere between a tablet and a traditional clamshell laptop.

What is the Libretto W100? It's a small 1.5-pound, 7-inch Windows 7 clamshell device that sports two capacitive LCD screens: one for viewing, one for typing. The typing screen is much like the virtual keyboard on the Apple iPad. Of course, the W100 can also function as a dual-screen tablet, which--in this respect at least--trumps the iPad.

That said, it needs to be stated up front that the Libretto W100 won't be cheap, roughly twice the cost of the cheaper iPad models. You do get two screens, however, and two batteries and a dual-core processor. (More specs are provided on the Libretto W100 Web page.)

The haptic keyboard provides decent feedback (a slight vibration), according to the review. One of the advantages of a virtual keyboard is the ability to switch keyboard styles as needed. For example, it can also be converted into a thumb keyboard when you're on the move, which the reviewer states is one of its handiest features.

The video reviewer also seems to reveal his preference for Intel processors over those from the ARM camp. "They canned the ARM processor and went to a full, real CPU. It's an Intel dual-core 1.2GHz processor," he says. That comment may raise some eyebrows (or some hairs on the neck) at the ARM camp of processor suppliers like Texas Instruments, Qualcomm, and Nvidia. (And it should be noted that Toshiba also lists a dynabook AZ on its Japanese Web site that uses an Nvidia Tegra 250 processor.)

Generally speaking, the W100 can do pretty much what any Windows laptop can do… Read more

Toshiba celebrates 25 years of laptops with new Portege, Libretto models

The very first laptops started turning up about a quarter of a century ago, so it's natural that we'd start seeing some nostalgic looks back (we've seen some vintage models recently from the Hewlett-Packard and Toshiba archives). Toshiba is taking it one step further by releasing a pair of 25th-anniversary laptops.

The first is the Portege R700, a follow-up to one of our favorite laptops, the Portege R500. While that 2007 model had a 12-inch display and was one of the last vestiges of the $2,000-plus ultraportable category (before Netbooks came in and provided a less … Read more

Hyundai to market Chinese phone watch

One of the few decent-looking Dick Tracy watches we've seen is reportedly a step closer to reality. Hyundai will be marketing the Chinese-made "CECT W100" Bluetooth phone watch that came out this summer, Gizmodo says.

The Hyundai model appears to have a slightly different finish but will still feature its LCD touch screen, 1.3-megapixel camera and 1GB of memory while playing MP3 and video files. But like the earlier version, this steroidal wristwatch apparently will be confined to the Asian market for now.