Still waiting for the tablet revolution
A new touch-screen tablet PC with Windows 7 from Archos, a newcomer to the category.
(Credit: Donald Bell/CNET)A lot of people are betting that 2010 will be the year of the tablet computer.
Of course, we've heard such predictions about tablets before. This time, the reasoning goes, is different, because the devices will have more sophisticated touch screens and consumers are more used to virtual keyboards. Most importantly, Apple just might be jumping into the fray.
Tablets, you may recall, are either laptops with a screen that twists and folds flat and uses a stylus or fingertip for input, or something more like an oversize iPod Touch that's used for tasks like checking e-mail, getting on the Web, and watching videos.
True, market researchers at DisplaySearch predict sales for all touch-screen devices will be growing from $3.5 billion this year to more than $6 billion by 2012. But if 2010 is going be the year of the tablet--meaning regular folks start buying these en masse--someone has to get it right.
So far, we're still waiting.
Toshiba, Archos, Fujitsu, and Lenovo have touch-screen tablets coming our way in the next few months, none of which should revolutionize our already established expectations of tablet PCs.
That hasn't stopped people like Toshiba executive Marco Perino from declaring that "home multimedia tablets will be one of the fastest-growing products in the consumer electronics space." Fujitsu's Troy Nakamura said it's the right time for tablets this time around because "people (are) using touch in their daily lives with smartphones, airport kiosks, ATMs...we're becoming more conditioned to use hands and fingers on certain machines. The tablet fits nicely into that."
But do we really need yet another mobile form factor for accessing the Web and watching videos? The hottest computing category at the moment is Netbooks, which grew 40 percent during the second quarter of this year compared with the same quarter a year earlier. That's almost twice as fast as the rate of traditional notebooks, which grew 22 percent.
As these more traditional types of mobile computers continue to fly off the shelves, it begs the question: Why do we need tablets?
An Apple touch-screen tablet--discussed ad nausem by the tech press, including at CNET--may or may not appear at the beginning of early 2010. CEO Steve Jobs himself is said to be overseeing the project, but there's no concrete evidence it actually exists.
Apple does have an established reputation of thinking thoroughly through any prospective market and coming up with a product that ties hardware and software together in a simple way that often becomes a personal fashion statement, as with the iPhone and iPod.
Toshiba's touch-screen tablet, the JournE Touch.
(Credit: Erica Ogg/CNET)But whether Cupertino is targeting this niche of computing or not, it takes more than one competitor to make a trend. In fact, the old saying in newsrooms is that if you have three of something, you have a trend.
Tablet fans can at least say they've got a trend. Toshiba and Archos, among others, are jumping into the fray with touch-screen tablets coming this fall. Plus, there's a rumor that Dell and Intel are collaborating on a similar device. And in the commercial PC sector, Hewlett-Packard, and now Lenovo and Fujitsu, are taking advantage of the gesture support in Windows 7 to offer their convertible PCs with touch-screen capability.
While it's certainly easier to manufacture touch-screen devices cheaper now, and people are showing a distinct taste for being online everywhere and always, execution is key. And for consumers to really embrace this, there needs to be a compelling reason to spend money on yet another computing device.
Toshiba's effort is a smaller media tablet, called the JournE Touch and introduced at IFA in Berlin last week, and on the outside it looks nice enough. It has a 7-inch screen with large touchable icons for quick access to media, photos, Internet, and more, and it's very thin and light.
It has integrated Wi-Fi and can be used to connect to a TV to watch Web content on a larger screen. It's kind of like a giant iPod Touch. But it uses Windows CE, not exactly the bleeding edge of mobile operatings systems. And even besides that, there's nothing really buzzworthy or interesting about it, certainly nothing that's going to set the category on fire.
Archos, known mostly for its media players, is also doing its first PC tablet. But theirs comes with the shiny new Windows 7 Starter Edition installed. Though the version we saw isn't yet a finished product, the device feels heavy and the onscreen keyboard isn't the easiest to manipulate. Otherwise it feels very much like an ultramobile PC (UMPC) or mobile Internet device (MID) we would have seen a few years back, with the exception of the touch screen and the price. At $499 it is a relative bargain when compared with what Apple is rumored to be charging for its tablet (between $800 and $1,000, reportedly).
But who will use it?
But the bigger problem comes to light when it comes to who will use a touch-screen tablet. Fred Balay, Archos vice president of marketing, brings out the same old user demographics that seem to get referenced whenever there's a new, not-so-focused category of computing to be sold: so-called "road warriors"--wealthy execs who travel often or employees whose companies can buy these for them--and people with enough disposable income to buy a fun new "entertainment device."
While that's certainly a fat-cat crowd, that's not a mainstream audience.
Archos is new to this particular category, it's not a good sign that its fortunes here could depend on another company. Balay said last week that "We'd love Apple to be in this...they will create a market."
So will next year be the year of the tablet? Don't bet on it. Even Apple could see some apathy from the vast majority of folks that don't likely need a third device beyond their iPhone or BlackBerry and a laptop.
Erica Ogg is a CNET News reporter who covers Apple, HP, Dell, and other PC makers, as well as the consumer electronics industry. She's also one of the hosts of CNET News' Daily Podcast. In her non-work life, she's a history geek, a loyal Dodgers fan, and a mac-and-cheese connoisseur. E-mail Erica. 
The thing is, the desktop suddenly feels clunky in a way that it didn't even a couple of years ago. You look at the stuff you can do with an iPhone and suddenly the mouse/cursor/keyboard metaphor seems horribly limited.
A laptop just doesn't cut it I'm afraid as I don't want to sit in a fixed and hunched position. I like to sit leaning against cushions to my left with my legs drawn up onto the sofa whilst holding the device in my left hand and perform the actions with my right. As for a keyboard and mouse, well don't even go there ;)
So hurry up Apple, my wallet is waiting if you get it right.
With Apple entering the game it might help tablets become more accepted. The tablets I have seen were bulky only because they flipped and turned into notebooks. A device with a touch screen and USB ports might be more useful so one could plug in a mouse and keyboard. A full fledged OS (Windows 7, Ubuntu or Mac OS) would be even better.
The Apple tablet might appeal to me if Adobe could make Photoshop and Lightroom for it.
See, i dont get the whole tablet craze. Why would you want a good sized device like a tablet. You either can only use one hand to type, or move around on it(using other hand to hold it), or you go back and forth between the two hands(and on a good size device, thatll take forever).
To send an email on it, youd more than likely have to set it on a desk, and then the viewing angle is terrible as its not facing you at all.
In order for a tablet to be really legit, it needs to have a portable keyboard, and a portable stand for the tablet.
Oh, dont forget about battery life. A big screen getting input like a comp will die in a couple of hours.
Ill stick with my laptop which I can use sitting however I want. I will also use my phone for one handed work on the go. Itll be a shame to see these companies come out with a product to fail.
Keep in mind, I use a self built PC and haven't thought of switching to Apple computers. I might switch to Ubuntu, once I get a chance to try out WINE to make sure my software works with it.
Think Different evolved into "I'm cooler than you....and you should buy all your music from iTunes and overpay for hardware"
Apple is no longer an innovator...
Maybe a decade ago when laptop were tanks, tablets seemed cool. But they're so thin these days, why not have a clam-shell with a real keyboard? A flip screen would make more sense since you could use it in a tablet form; although I still don't see the appeal.
WHERE'S THE ONE DEVICE THAT DOES IT ALL? Phone, Music, PIM, Take decent photos & Video, GOOD Web browser, WiFi, GPS, Portable but large screen (JournE is the right size) with a REAL keyboard, *AND* can run simple _desktop_ applications? Something not tied to one carrier (ATT) or one app store or one media program (iTunes).
Sorry, I don't see how a mouse/kb can be limiting. By all means, have touchscreen, but I want more options, not less.
Yes, that JournE does look about right sized, the iPod Touch is a little small for comfortable, long term reading, or a lot of typing. The touch works well otherwise, just with aging eyes I often go to my iMac to do a lot of surfing.
But there are lots of times where I'll just sit in my recliner where I use my Touch, even though the iMac is two steps away... A small BlueTooth keyboard would be welcome, tho.
With over 75,000 apps to choose from, being locked into iTunes isn't really limiting. Keeping up with them all is tough, but there are a lot of interesting apps available. And some not all that interesting, too. And of course, there is no carrier to worry about. Pics, Vids and GPS would be a bonus, maybe next September...
Prices will be a bit higher, but a lot of the legwork and development has already taken place. We should see tablets become more and more common.
For example, the iPod touch is really a HPC/PDA, but they introduced it as a PMP. Consumers who would not have otherwise been in the market for a HPC/PDA bought it because they wanted a PMP.
Another example is the PS3. People who didn't care and probably never heard of Blu-ray bought the PS3 to play next gen video games and ended up with a top of the line BD player in the bargain.
Imagine situations where you must sit in a tight space - a car, airplane subway etc... - where there is no solid surface to place a laptop. Here is keyboard/mouse is almost useless but a touch screen would work fine.
The final key to success with a tablet is a sunlight viewable display. That opens up the outdoors. Imagine a scientist doing a field survey. You can't use a keyboard while walking but if a tablet screen is viewable in direct sunlight, it's the perfect computing device.
First, the right price for a tablet-like device should be $250.
Second, don't call it a tablet, call it a MID, call it anything but a tablet.
If it is called a tablet then have all the features found on an expensive Wacom Cintiq plus all the features in a MID-like or netbook device for only $250.
The hardware technology and designs are good enough.
The software technology and designs are also good enough for mass consumption.
If these devices were given away fro free with no strings attached then there would be a revolution.
What's really missing and missing from every other computing devices is people in the industry showing consumers what really cool stuff they can do on these devices.
There are about a million cool things you can do on these devices, certainly a good salesperson could come up with a few really cool demos to convince a consumer to buy one of these devices within 5 minutes.
We need better to have better experiences in retail stores, we need more really cool Internet Cafes, we need real CTO or Configure-To-Order.
Despite all the complaints re the ATT network, there is no guarantee that Verizon wd not be overwhelmed by iPhone call traffic and the load of other things an iPhone offers or the Tablet will offer.
It wd be nice if u cd fold the Tablet in half. It looks naked to me.
I think the tech industry is stuck between the mobile phone and laptop paradigms and I think there is room for a **portable** Internet device. It's ironic since this same industry, circa 1999/2000, was peddling the Internet connected home with non-PC internet devices. I could see a giant iPod Touch in the kitchen where one could check the weather, sports scores, etc without booting up the home computer or having to pay the telcos for a data plan. It could be just be casual use accessing the home DSL/Cable.
CNet wants the revolution to look like it was a "trend" and not Apple's merit, so the others can imitate without looking like copycats.
I foresee computers soon being tablet devices, which we can use limitedly while on the road (such as a large ipod touch) but when we get to work or home we plug it into a dock and use it as a monitor with bluetooth keyboards and mouse on the desk. Perhaps even a larger monitor could be used in conjunction with them.
Who knows. All I know is that all the tablets on the market that I have seen have no potential for future growth beyond cluncky, difficult to use touch screen laptops.
As for the Internet, web design must also improve. There's just too many web interfaces I've seen that have these tiny pull-down windows when trying to select an option. I can forsee a need for designs specifically for tablet PCs - much like what we already see for portable devices like iPhone or Android. And, the web sites should be able to detect when a user is using a tablet OS - and switch to the appropriate interface.
This is why we can't just say out loud that we want tablet PCs. Human interface must heavily improve on all levels: the operating system, the application, web pages, etc. I'd rather have NO tablet PC than one that is not usable.
As for groink's comments. You have to start somewhere if you wait for perfection you will never release anything.
What I want out of a tablet is the ability to draw and write notes in OneNote, along with typing. Plus I hate trackpads, so a touchscreen would be great for opening web browsers and selecting the address bar when I don't have a mouse handy (like in a classroom).
I don't really see the use of 'just screen' tablets.
- by Gabey8 September 16, 2009 3:54 PM PDT
- My version of a "tablet" is a convertible laptop. As a device tbat can be used as either a regujlar laptop or a touchscreen tablet, to methat would encompass the best of both worlds.
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Showing 1 of 2 pages (51 Comments)I already have a miniature version of such a device with the Fujitsu U810, which does all of the above and has a 5.6" screen. If I didn't already own a regular, full-sized laptop, I'd be very interested in what's out there in the convertible category. for devices that are larger than ultra-portable machines.