Touch screens that consumers didn't touch

When Windows 7 is unleashed this fall with more gesture-recognition built directly into the operating system, more PC makers are planning on taking advantage.

While touch-screen desktops are gaining popularity, there haven't been many consumer-friendly touch-screen notebooks yet. But that will change soon. Last week Sony said it plans to release a touch-screen Vaio notebook this fall, and Hewlett-Packard and Asus did so earlier this year.

But the question is whether there's a need for touch screens when it comes to portables like notebooks. Adding touch to desktops, like HP, Dell, Asus, and others have done, appears to be gaining some momentum and boosting the faltering desktop market.

The first time
If a Vaio touch-screen notebook were to strike a chord with consumers, it would be the first time. There have been plenty of touch-screen notebooks that convert into tablets released over the years, and almost all of them have been purchased by the IT departments of large companies, police departments, the military, and more recently, hospitals.

There are several reasons they haven't really taken off with consumers: they're very expensive, heavy, and there's a dearth of good consumer software with touch applications.

Last year, according to IDC, just 1 percent of the notebook market, or 1.4 million units, were touch-screen notebooks. By the end of this year it will actually shrink to .6 percent, and by 2010, be at .7 percent. That means IDC isn't expecting Windows 7 to drastically alter the landscape of the touch-screen notebook market.

So why is this idea being revived? History doesn't suggest consumers will flock to this, though touch screens are far more popular in smaller devices like smartphones and portable media players now. It's feasible that the success of the iPhone and the G1 could translate to a computing experience that requires two hands and a physical keyboard.

'Toe-dipping'
What could be going on is just some experimentation, or "toe-dipping," as IDC analyst Richard Shim put it. And while it could be handy for some applications, like just pressing a play button on screen for music or video, there's just not a lot of software out there yet to make it worth the extra cost.

"You can see some apps that could be convenient, but I think right now there isn't enough software to really create a flourishing touch-screen market, let alone touch-screen notebooks," Shim said. Desktops make sense because they're much larger and stationary, and are being used more as communal PCs. "With notebooks it's a more personal device...and if you have a touch pad sitting there (near they keyboard), why wouldn't you use it?" Plus, there's that pesky habit you have to break yourself of: the instinct not to touch your screen.

So, herewith are some of the variations that PC makers have already come up with, with varying degrees of success.

(Credit: CNET)

NEC Versa LitePad
The first crop of slate-style tablet PCs released in 2002 from Fujitsu, Motion Computing, and ViewSonic--despite being truly flat--were too big and heavy to represent any real break from the tried-and-true notebook design. But the NEC Versa LitePad really looked like a pad of paper with PC functionality. In fact, the LitePad is almost identical in size to a small spiral-bound notebook and weighed only 2.2 pounds, but it cost $2,399 when it was released in 2003.

HP Compaq Tablet PC TC1000
The HP Compaq Tablet PC TC1000 squeezed three computers into one back in 2002. It was a small, light, slate-style tablet PC, with a great stylus, but it also had a snap-on keyboard to make it a thin-and-light notebook. Unfortunately, the battery life was just three hours. But it also came with a dock so it could transform into a desktop as well. It started at $1,699, but was mostly meant for enterprise customers.

(Credit: Panasonic)

Panasonic Toughbook 29
Another twist on the touch screen in a notebook came from with the idea of a detachable touch screen. The Panasonic Toughbook 29 came with the option of a separate, portable touch screen that could be used up to 300 feet away. Panasonic's fully rugged line of Toughbooks are designed to take some spectacular abuse at the hands of military, construction foremen, public utility employees, and even consumers. But they never gained a foothold with regular folks.

(Credit: Hewlett-Packard)

HP Touchsmart TX2
HP released the first made-for-consumers multitouch notebook late last year, but it hasn't made any sort of dent in the popularity of touch screens. It's a 12.1-inch convertible tablet that has the iPhone-like ability to scroll, zoom, flick, and drag and drop by using your fingers on the screen. It does have a more reasonable price tag below $1,200.

Asus Eee PC T91
A Netbook and convertible tablet, the touch-screen Eee PC could be the future of touch-screen PCs.

(Credit: Asus)

Just recently released, the T91 has a custom interface, which offers big finger-friendly icons for launching apps. And, despite the new hardware and software, Asus kept the price low at $499. The price--and easy portability--will be key in convincing consumers to buy into touch screens.

We've so far left out the biggest X-factor when it comes to consumer computing: Apple. The company has been rumored to be launching a touch-screen tablet computer either this September or early next year. With a sharp focus on consumer appeal and trends, Apple has a history of creating market share where it was mostly nonexistent before, such as with the iPod. A full-size Apple tablet, if done well, could stimulate a lot of interest in this category.

[getwired]

I have to disagree that the first generation of slate style tablets were too big or too heavy, and that precluded adoption. Instead, 1) they were too expensive (some at more than twice the cost of a normal laptop, well over $3000 at the time), 2) they _required_ a stylus - not true touch - and 3) couldn't easily operate as a normal machine (some, like the Motion systems - which I had two of - were gorgeous, but charged even for a normal keyboard to attach to it. Try typing EVERYTHING just with a stylus. Not worth the hassle.

[mudphud]

I have plenty of Apple products but to say that Apple created a market where there was none before with the iPod is a bit much. Dominated and expanded a market, yes, created, not so much. I've tried various tablets and it always just seem the touch screen is an after thought that doesn't enhance anything. On handhelds, I like the interface on my iPod touch much better than my old palm, so I hope that they can make a better tablet, but I'm not holding my breath. It may just be that these devices don't really fill any particular need very well and I wont be happy with any of them.

[1idman]

How about the HP-150 from 1983?

[Random_Walk]

"But that will change soon. "

We'll see. Any article that contains this sentence tends to be more hopeful than predictive. ;)

"but to say that Apple created a market where there was none before with the iPod is a bit much."

The best way to put it is that they took an infant market and grew it up. The portable digital music player market was tiny and not going anywhere fast before the iPod showed up... I remember modifying a Compaq PDA to listen to music (using a CF card to hold the tunes), and folks at the health club going nuts over the idea... but being disappointed when the PMP they ran out and bought had no storage or battery life to speak of. (my little PDA lash-up was the same way - I got maybe three hours at most if I was careful).

The iPod changed all that - with a metric ton of storage and an obscenely long battery life, it got and kept everyone's attention at the right time, creating a market where there was practically none.

"I have to disagree that the first generation of slate style tablets were too big or too heavy, and that precluded adoption."

Agreed - and I'd like to add a third: they were woefully underpowered and prone to failures, both in hardware (when compared to laptops of similar cost), and in software (the Windows touch-screen lash-on was buggy as Hell, and using Linux to do it wasn't much better).

Unless this and getwired's suggestions are heeded and exceeded, even Apple won't get far if they make one.

[make_or_break]

Obscenely long battery life? That came later on with the 5G/5.5G iPod. Both my 3G and 4G iPods were HORRIBLE on charge life, and ultimately battery longevity as well, both units having to have their batteries be replaced within a year for the worst one, and about a year and a half for the other. Ironically my 3rd-party aftermarket batteries were A LOT better in their useful lives. And my wife's 1st gen iPod Mini is still the butt of jokes around our household, courtesy of its extremely lame battery, which we never bothered to replace.

The iPod changed the MP3 game due to TWO factors: the click wheel hierarchical interface, and iTunes For Windows (before the bloat and resource hogging came along). Those are what made Apple into the 800-lb gorilla that they currently are in the PMP marketplace.

[Random_Walk]

Dunno about you, but six hours of battery was a whole lot nicer than two. ;)

I do agree on the interface, though - very intuitive.

(incidentally, iTunes is a bit of a bother on Windows, becuase Windows still hasn't figured out how to do pre-emptive multitasking worth a damn. See also the infernal, enigmatic, and very popular "svchost.exe" ).

[ddesy]

If IDC doesn't think that Windows 7 could make a difference in touch screen adoption, they aren't looking at technology very closely.

Prior to Windows 7, touch screens were not something Windows was designed for. The lack of a strong backing by the maker of the OS can keep developers from getting behind it. After all, if a company as big as Microsoft doesn't feel the need to push it very far, why should smaller companies take the chance that the rug won't be pulled out from underneath them?

Since Windows 7 has more emphasis on touch screens than any previous version of Windows, developers might be more interested in adding support. If they do, that will probably drive sales of the devices.

[Random_Walk]

"If IDC doesn't think that Windows 7 could make a difference in touch screen adoption, they aren't looking at technology very closely."

Here's the thing, though... a touch screen is just an I/O device. That's it. Any OS can (and looking around, does) support one. There doesn't have to be a "strong backing by the maker of the OS", just a decent driver for the thing, and apps designed for its use (which is not the OS maker's particular responsibility). Perhaps some UI modification APIs would be nice (and in some cases necessary), but for large screen computers with more than one I/O device, it's not a technical deal-breaker to keep the same UI structure.

I mean, let's look at a successful touch-screen setup - the iPhone. When you boil it down, Apple just happened to write some real solid drivers for OSX. They stripped it down and re-rigged the UI for it because it's a phone (tiny form-factor, tiny environment, no other I/O options...) The gear pictured above have keyboards and mice, have ample-sized screens, and have plenty of horsepower to run an OS with...

[jbstrmd]

When I type I rest my wrists on the laptop. I can imagine my arms getting pretty tired if I had to continuously reach up to a touch screen. It might be useful for highlighting or going to links or apps quickly. Would I buy a touch screen computer? That remains to be seen.

The reason touch screens haven't caught on is... a keyboard and mouse/touchpad is a BETTER interface than touching the screen. A touchscreen may be nice on a cellphone, where space is at a premium, but its a lousy interface for a lot of things. The proliferation of those small keyboards should be enough proof of that. If touch-screens cannot dominate the smartphone realm, there is little hope they will have much more impact on larger devices.

[Mergatroid Mania]

I agree 100%.
I just don't need a touchscreen on my PC. There is no killer app for it, and keyboard/mouse combo has worked better than any other human interface device available so far.

They would be better off trying for something like the Wii does with wireless controllers than wasting time and money on touchscreen PCs.

Tablets might be a fine place for them, but the regular PC just doesn't need touch.

[make_or_break]

I disagree; just because you don't need a touchscreen that doesn't mean that the rest of the world has to follow.

Now that I've gotten quite used to touchscreen interfaces, I think they certainly have earned their place, and not just on handhelds. On portable devices I actually have gotten so used to touchscreens that I'm to a point where I now have great disdain for devices that DON'T have a touchscreen.

Keyboards and mice certainly have their places on PCs, but considering the real estate of actual surface area of the modern-day LCD, a touchscreen interface is actually quite feasible for all manner of applications, from browsers to productivity apps. Even though I've gotten quite used to it, for instance it's infinitely more intuitive and logical for me to be working directly on the display screen when I edit within Photoshop, instead of working around the visual disconnect of my Intuos tablet surface and the pointer icon on the screen. Surface computing isn't stillborn yet.

[Renegade Knight]

Right and wrong. The mouse and keyboard is a better interface for some things. Just as a touch screen would be a better interface for other things.

It's not about what touchscreens are bad at. It's about what they would be good at. Many of which you obvoiusly havent' thought up yet. Have no fear others have.

[b_baggins]

The things a touchscreen are good for are far and few between, especially on a desktop. Touchscreens are special-purpose input devices. Keyboards and mice are general purpose input devices. Putting a special-purpose input device on a product designed for general purpose use is stupid.

[Eric_Moseman]

I have to disagree as well.

Touchscreens now are at the point that the mouse was when the first Macintosh computers came about.

Old farts (like me) scoffed at the mouse - just google "John Dvorak" and "mouse" to see some good ripping on the then "new-fangled" mouse.

I think that this is familiar territory to Apple; taking a new, fledgling, or floundering market (see GUIs, MP3 players, smartphones, or all-in-one computers) and mainstreaming it.

Touchscreens did not seem intuitive to me at all, but my five year old sure picked them up almost instantaneously.

Eric

With the design flair they have, Apple seems to take underwhelming markets and making them everyday.

[johnqh]

Keyboard and mouse are better input for DATA ENTRY. Touch is a better input for browsing.

Apple's use of touch on iPhone and iPod Touch is right-on. They are browsing device. People won't do a lot of data entry on them.

However, if you want to write a report, keyboard and mouse are essential.

[dmm]

Before I will spend the extra money on a touchscreen computer, they need to:
1) Allow me to take notes on it just like I can on notepaper; and
2) have it do something useful with those notes that a regular old spiral-bound notebook can't do.

Explanatory Notes:
For 1), the writing area has to be reasonably large, similar to 8.5" x 11", and it has to show up as I'm writing so I'm not writing blind, and the writing that shows up can't lag or be a quarter-inch below the tip of the stylus. In other words, NOT like those horrid credit card signers at the store,
For 1), I should also be able to change ink colors.
For 2), I mean stuff like converting my (really bad) handwriting into text, while keeping my emphasis marks (underlining, changing from cursive to print, etc.) and intelligently making lists.
For 2), it also has to take any drawings I've made and include them in the final document.

However! All of the stuff above that I want could be done just by using regular old pen and paper to take notes, then scanning it and putting it through the appropriate software. So, even if the software I want existed (which I think it does not), I still wouldn't have a compelling reason to buy a touch-screen laptop. Unless the laptop price < (normal laptop price + price of software described + value of my time saved by not having to scan anything).

Really, for only $150, I could already get a lot of what I want by buying a Pulse Smart Pen, plus it would record sound for me also. So touchscreen laptops have to do significantly better than that.

[Super2online]

It does exist, for quite a while in fact. It's called Microsoft OneNote and it offers everything you listed. Very popular with college students which is the market it was originally designed for using slate PC's.

[steeleblue_cactus]

Microsoft OneNote does this and very well. I have had 3 tablets and must say that I love touch screens. I also have a netbook without a touch screen and really miss it when I use the netbook. My job requires a lot of meetings, note taking, etc. Since I circulate the notes I must transcribe them to a doc to circulate. Before OneNote I spent hours every night transcribing my notes for the several meetings I attended each day. Now I use OneNote and spend no more than 10 mins or so on each. It has been a life saver. Just for every day surfing etc touch is great too.

If you have never used a touch screen on a PC I suggest you try one before you belittle the experience. You might be surprised how easy it makes life.

[Peter N. Glaskowsky]

Yes, OneNote can be great. I used it and loved it at my last job. But I think most people don't need it, so I can't see OneNote as a killer app for the mainstream market.

Also, it's important to distinguish between touch and stylus input. Touch is great for selecting icon-sized things. It's better than a stylus for operating a virtual keyboard, but virtual keyboards aren't very good either way. A convertible notebook sounds like a great solution, but most of them are much too big and heavy to be practical as tablets. The IBM X61 tablet was a reasonable compromise, but not great. The Asus Eee PC T91 could be good, except I think it's touch but NOT stylus, which means handwriting recognition in OneNote is hopeless.

So I'm still looking. I designed a great little convertible mini-tablet in prototype form at my last job, but we never got to the point where I could have had it made.

. png

[Norseman]

Touch on a handheld device makes sense.
Touch on a desktop or laptop makes no sense.
Apple or not.
The Apple mystery device? Who knows???

[hitmouse]

Pen/Touch on a laptop/tablet is eminently useful - all of my laptops for the last 7 years have been tablets. Working with images, taking notes, drawing, working with music are all significantly enhanced.

On a desktop I'm not so sure. Raising your hand constantly to a screen in front of you is very tiring. Most people's experience of a touch-screen is tapping away at a few buttons on an ATM. Sitting at a desk and raising your hand constantly is very tiring. A mouse is a movement multiplier that allows you to access the entire screen with very economical hand movements. It does not have the power of a pen when working on a device held in your hand or worked at on an angled surface like a notebook or sheet of paper.

Screen/keyboard ergonomics have to be completely rethought before a touch screen on a desktop becomes useful.

[inachu1]

Not enough games use the touch screens ability.

[The_happy_switcher]

Oops. Sounds like Win 7 is DOA even before it's shipped. XP anyone?

[monkeyfun14]

*** are you even talking about?

Damn if your gonna troll atleast be somewhat intelligent.

[Super2online]

You could only hope, but then, I'm sure you will be extolling your love affair for XP for the next 10 years. Good luck!

[Renegade Knight]

Oops. Snow Leopard must also be dead....

[nathandw]

One of the challenges to touch screen design is form factor. When working with a touchscreen notebook in hand you are either taking notes or sketching, you are probably not editing video or performing other multi touch gesture operations where touch screens can shine. When designing, editing photos or video, composing music, etc. you are going to want a desktop configuration. In the context of the desktop screens usually sit perpendicular to the work surface an arms length away at eye level, forcing you to hold your arm out and lean forward to interact (try that for a few hours). You also loose quick access to the keyboard which is often used for shortcut key combos. For touch screens to really take off the ergonomics and layout of the desktop needs to be changed, the screen should be positioned more as a work surface than a display. And if I am going to drop the $$$ for a "desk" that is designed to facilitate this display the interaction improvement better be significant. The screen needs to support a high-accuracy pressure sensitive stylus as well as multi-touch. And the applications have to be designed around touch interaction, not just "support" it (eg. Autodesk's Sketchbook control pallet).

[pepperpup]

I've had a Fujitsu T4215 for a couple of years at work. Being a road warrior interacting many different clients, I can say that the OneNote system is great for keeping a file on all my calls a meetings. The WOW-factor, however, is the pen-based commenting. I've used this feature for corroborating markups on documents and presentations with clients using an LCD projector, as well as for interactive brainstorming on a virtual "white-board" (simply a blank Word page or PP slide). Too bad I had to work so hard and long with my mgt to justify the 500% price difference against a normal laptop.

[voyager529]

I remember eyeballing a Toshiba tablet back in 2004. The specs were only marginally better than the lowest end machine at the time, but at $2,300, it was the most expensive machine they sold. With something like that, there was a decisive chicken-and-egg problem of the only app worth using on it being Onenote and inkball.

The day they release a 17" tablet with a discrete GPU, zippy processor, ample RAM, and possibly two hard drive bays, I'll buy it. Put whatever sticker you like on it, I'm getting one. Why? Because I spend a significant amount of time in Photoshop. Wacom has made quite the business off of the niche market of media designers selling external tablets. Ask any graphic designer if being able to draw directly within Photoshop would be a desirable feature, and you'll be hard pressed to find a naysayer.

Unfortunately, desktop replacement tablets have traditionally been an oxymoron, normally relegating themselves to the ultraportable segment where smaller, lighter, and longer battery life are the things to look for. Here's to hoping that changes sometime soon.

[mike.gw]

I remember 17 years ago in my IT career, equipping my DC office with Compaq Concerto laptops. They came with Windows for Pen Computing. The keyboards were detachable so that in an office, it was like using an iMac. It had a dock for ethernet and other required ports. When it was travel time, you reconnected the keyboard and used it like a convetional laptop again. But Microsoft allowed Pen Windows to wither and die, and so Compaq eventuallu gave up on the Concerto line. Ever since, I've not had much faith in pen/touch interfaces on full size desktops or laptops.

http://pc-museum.com/031-compaq/rcm-031.jpg

[alegr]

Tapping your finger on a small handheld screen is OK. Poking your finger into a big monitor in front of you is awkward and tiring.

[buckskincowboy]

I bought the NEC litepad, I never got good use and the battery died in no time and is too much to replace. I have the HP Touchsmart 25 inch, I LOVE it. don't use the touchscreen much, escept for prod demo. but just an overall good PC for me.

[dmm]

Thanks, super2online, for suggesting OneNote. I checked it out, and on tablet PCs it does do a lot of what I'd like. It still doesn't recognize cursive handwriting, which is how I normally write -- quickly but illegibly. My "handprinting" is very legible but slow, so I only use it for emphasis when I'm taking notes. (This is no insult to OneNote, because a web search shows that OCR software ranges from bad to nonfunctional on cursive handwriting. The OCR available for the Pulse, which I mentioned above, is no exception to this rule.)

Really, I find it amazing that there isn't an OCR program for cursive writing. It wouldn't have to be fast like text-to-speech, and they can do that pretty reliably now. Anybody know what's the holdup? Is it simply lack of demand?

[steeleblue_cactus]

wow, really, I have been using OneNote for about 5 years and it recognizes my chicken scratching (Def: REALLY poor cursive handwriting) pretty well. It's not perfect but gets it right about 95% of the time. Even my husband was surprised because my handwriting is so bad. But you are right about using OneNote for emphasis and drawing diagrams along with the notes. So much better notes when you can do this in addition to just writing.

[relayman51]

My problem with touch screens is the touching.
Fingers leave oils, dirt, scratches.
Styli leave scratches and indentions.
These all detract from the image quality, often to the point of distraction.

[Lerianis3]

That's more a problem with your body chemistry than these touchpads. Yes, those things do detract from the image quality, but most people do not have oily enough fingers to make it a real 'issue' if the thing has a matte finish on it.

[dmm]

Thanks, steeleblue_cactus! How in the world I got incorrect info from the web is beyond me! ;-)