Lenovo demos mini laptop with slip-out screen Can't see the video? Download Flash Player from Adobe.com Lenovo IdeaPad U1
The "PC" is in the keyboard part, the slate part is ARM based (runs Linux). So that keyboard won't be as light as you're thinking - so it'll probably be quite stable.
It's an interesting idea - essentially two quite separate computers that share a screen. I'm not sure how customers will take to it, as it is totally different when docked and undocked. I like the colour though. I guess there is a way to transfer files between the two systems - so you can view email/documents and listen to music when it is undocked (I'd put the user's home directory on the flash drive in the slate part ... but that's just me, who knows what they've done).
that's quite cunning - put all the processing stuff in the lid (disks, cpus memory and stuff) then make the clamshell a kind of docking station...
I like that, although it might need some ballast in the base to stop it falling over when the lid is opened.
I guess the base could hold an extra battery pack and DVD drive as well as the keyboard...
One word: LAG.
When he demonstrates the UI it is laughably laggy and slow.
Watch the machine desperately trying to catch up with his actions; first, when he goes to the photos and even more when he changes the screen orientation. He even slows his talking right down to let the screen catch up.
Truly pathetic.
When he talked about it being an "optimised interface" I actually laughed out loud.
(I also note that a couple of months ago, these things were called tablet PCs. Then, as soon as it's leaked that Apple has registered iSlate.com, every one switches from calling them tablets to slates)
Lenovo: FAIL
Next..........
Oh look, there's Steve Ballmer, wonder what he's got? (CLUE: another device jumping on the slate bandwagon)
I thought the touch book from always innovating already had this idea. Yes their's is an ARM based Linux machine, but the detachable screen idea has already been done. And, as Sebastian Brosig pointed out, with all the gubbings in the screen section, it's very top heavy and unbalanced. The touch book topples over quite easily.
Looks cool, hope it runs a bit "snappier" than that!
However, there has been an entire range of these kind of machines out in the Far East in the 7inch form factor over the last two years, that just haven't made it over to these shores. I don't get the US-centric skew of tech when the true innovators are over in Tokyo, Shanghai, Taipei and Seoul...
PS. Agree with Gary - stop calling them Slates... they are fecking TABLET PCs and have been for the last decade!!
Apple aren't doing anything original with their iSlate as far as I can see. You mention that they were called tablets before apple jumped in, but to my mind a tablet PC is a laptop with a rotatable screen which folds back on its self. A slate is a machine which is wholly contained within a solid piece with a screen mounted directly... That's how I see it anyway.
As for bitching saying Apple is going to have th best interface ever... blah blah blah. You haven't even seen it?
Lots of people have had slate concepts, unfortunately one of the most promising looking ones (CrunchPad) seems to be dead in the water due to ownership issues. The iSlate is nothing new, it's just new for apple.
Whilst I'm not sure, it's probably a safe bet to assume apple are aiming at a different market as many slates are aiming at the low end, netbook style slate, whereas Apple haven't really targeted this area of the market, so I'd assume theirs is going to be more powerful and more expensive, so I'd be very upset if the interface didn't run smoothly.
Just think before you post. (I'm also an apple fan, but I don't feel the need to spout some bull everytime a competing product comes up)
there were lots of tablets without keyboards... Ive had a couple since 2002! just a 10" screen, ULV centrino, biometric logon and a digitiser screen for input....
incredibly fiddly to use with XP Tablet, better with SP2, then Vista handwriting recognition was excellent, but you still cant beat a real keyboard to type on...
Once the wow factor had faded, people stopped using them... i think the same will happen here, except the Apple connection may keep them alive and inspire more clones for a while...
Tablet is the original term for the form factor used by the iSlate, amongst others. Laptops with rotating displays came about, and were called tablets also, mostly because it was too hard to fit all the necessary bits into the keyboardless form and because the IT industry, when presented with two markets, always tries to pick both.
At one point around that time, Microsoft had a RDP like protocol which would let a user detach the touch or digitizer enabled display from the rest of the system, so you could wander around with the tablet and then come back to the base for sync and recharge.
Watching the video I am pretty sure that this device is not what people seem to think it is!
I don't think that this is a laptop with all the "works" in the lid. I think that it is a laptop as per usual with all the main bits under the keyboard, but there is a small low-power CPU in the screen section. I would also assume that the batteries in the screen are small compared to those in the base. Notice that the UI and running applications are totally different when the screen is detached than when docked. This explains why it is so slow when detached!
This has been available for quite a while now:
http://www.alwaysinnovating.com/touchbook/
Not exactly the same thing (the keyboard being only a battery pack in the TouchBook) but sufficiently similar (and prior) to know where Lenovo snatched the idea from... and messed it up (poor battery life, laggy tablet).
Honestly guys who cares what they're called, and who invented those names first?
Does it really matter?
As much as I'm impressed with the tech side of the lenovo Tabslate (hoping I've coined this 1st) I can't see any real use for it. Maybe my imagination is a bit limited yeah I know...
Still, pretty cool. Well done Lenovo, might want to sort out the lag before launch though
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