Asus could rewrite the rules for tablet computing too.

Take the EeePC …

1) Take the keyboard off where it is now

2) Put the screen where the keyboard is (make it a touchscreen)

3) Put keyboard where screen was, make it detachable.

In other words, the screen sits over the components, unlike other tablet PCs out there.

It seems horribly backward, but with a keyboard that is simply a screen cover and completely detaches (NO hinge), there’s no real radical engineering being done to turn it into a tablet. No need for a fancy swivel hinge ala the Fujitsu!

Now that Palm Rejection tech Fuji uses — is that hardware or software? I wonder if Asus could even mimic that to prevent vectoring?

Asus TPC has a certain ring to it, no?

Almost forgot: take a look any of James’s ink posts here on the site. I can barely read ‘em but Windows has no problem interpreting his notes.

Jan, I won’t address of all of your scenarios, but a few quick thoughts come to mind. If you’re using the Tablet PC as a tool, you’ll eventually have the tool in an optimal state for use. Meaning: you’ll likely have it on or in Sleep mode when you know you’ll be ready for note-taking. Resuming from Sleep should take five seconds or less.

One thing you didn’t mention, but I think is a VERY valid use-case is: finding notes you’ve written previously. Using OneNote (as an example), your handwritten notes are indexed and searchable without any action on your part. You don’t need to “convert” your handwriting to text and everything is highly searchable. Not so with paper notes, which you then “convert” to text by re-typing.

I’m not trying to convince you either way, I’m simply adding more info to your decision making process. I highly recommend spending some time with a Tablet PC; ideally for a few days. I know that ALLTP.com used to offer 2-day demo deals; you have to pay the for the Tablet in advance, but you can return it within 2 days. Just a thought.

Actually, I am trying to choose between HP Mini and a tablet pc (Fujitsu P1620 or OQO+folding keyboard). Size-wise I don’t want anything bigger than HP Mini. I’ve never used a TPC but I’m tempted, so I’ll appreciate if other people can share their specific usage scenarios.

1. Taking AD HOC notes like phone numbers, brainstorming etc.

Do you really prefer taking notes on the computer to jotting on a piece of paper? For now I use pen-and-paper and later, usually at the end of the day, I copy (type in) all the important information from my scrapbook to the computer (spreadsheets, SuperMemo, MindManager, Addressbook, or simply text files). I can start using a normal pen in no time while before starting inking I’d need to make sure the computer is on, resume it if it’s not, start OneNote, open the file, switch to the appropriate page, is it worth it? It often makes me smile when I see people trying to save my phone number in their PDA, going through the menus, using a stylus in the handwriting recognition mode, correcting mistakes – it often takes ages.

2. RESEARCH notes:

* speed: is your inking really faster than touch typing? (I can type pretty fast)

* readability: I assume the handwriting recognition technology is not very useful unless you ink slowly and very carefully. I take quite a lot of research notes on paper and then copy the contents by typing in a wordprocessor. This takes quite a lot of time but ‘copying’ becomes automatically some sort of ‘revising’ the material so in result I memorize/understand it better. My typed notes are also 100% readable which is not always true about my handwritten notes – it takes me sometimes a while to decipher what I wrote a long time ago.

Several years back I bought C-pen, a portable pen scanner, to scan quotes from books and it worked fine but after using it for a while I realised that each time I scanned a line of text I kept checking on the bult-in lcd whether the text was recongised correctly. It slowed my reading down significantly. And then I needed to transfer files from the scanner to the computer and correct mistakes. I’ve stopped using the scanner although it works as advertised. New technologies are simply not always worth the hassle.

3. Reading E-BOOKS:

It is tempting to use a TPC in the slate mode as an ebook reader, especially in a cramped compartment.

4. MINDMAPS
I think I might use inking in mind maps although I’m not sure if there’s any real advantage here. I’m afraid the readability of my maps would suffer.

5. SUPERMEMO
Memory-aid software. It must be great to use Supermemo in the slate mode for daily repetitions. I could use it anywhere – even while walking, standing in a queue. I can see the advantage of the slate mode here.

6. WEB browsing
I don’t think I’d want to surf the web in the slate mode. I copy-and-paste and comment on what I’m reading on the regular basis. I rarely use a mouse when browsing the web, I have tons of keyboard shortcuts.

7. DRAWING
I don’t draw much. If I do, I can always scan the drawing. I understand it might be great for architects, designers, artists – but not for me.

Are there any other usage scenarios that I might adopt?

Jan

I’m a tablet user (tc4400) and often mobile. However, my true mobility writing / notetaking isn’t with my tablet, rather, it’s with my current “mini”… an old MobilePro 900C. I still find a tablet not “mobile enough” for my needs (I want it handy and unobtrusive throughout the day). I’ve been awaiting a successor for light, portable, and usable touch-typing solutions in a small form factor, and the HP mini just might be it (I ordered one yesterday).

I can’t tell you the number of times people have cooed at my humble MobilePro at use in public (car wash, theater, restaturant, airport, etc.). There’s simply a large number of people desiring something like it for document creation, e-mail, and internet surfing.

Nevertheless, I long for the “instant on” of my MobilePro and it’s long battery life in newer products. I think the EEEs, Minis, et al will largely crush >any< potential of an embedded OS successor to the CE devices of yesterday. SSDs bridge and may eventually shorten the gap considerably on these fronts (boot time and battery life) between highly mobile solutions and their desktop/laptop counterparts.

Analogy: An average consumer buying a small sedan will probably choose a $16k Toyota Corolla over a $40k BMW 335i.

James wrote: “The fact is there is a big premium over these low-cost notebooks coming out now and the average consumer has to do much more soul-searching to decide if they should pay the premium than they used to.”

In my opinion an average consumer will have no trouble deciding between a $500-$750 Mini-Note and a $2000+ ultra-portable. There might be some soul searching if a Sony TZ or Fujitsu P7/P8/P16 were available for $1000-$1200, but even then only a portion of the mass market would be interested. I’ve read some comments that the HP Mini is too expensive!

Very good points. I use a convertible, but use in tablet mode 75% of the time–mainly for notes or research. I have no use for a touch screen (although it is fun to watch my two year old niece write with her finger–and pull her finger back to look at it to see where the ink is coming from:-)).
While I have paid more, I feel up to $400 premium is a fair price to add tablet functionality.

In priority of need:
*long battery life
*Instant on (I can still dream)
*Bright display
*Processor speed is not that important–need to use OneNote, email, web browser, word-processing and IM client.
Touch screen on a tablet doesn’t even register on my radar. My current tablet has that capability and I turned it off.

James,
I agree that TPCs are quite pricy if compared to the Eee PC or the slightly newer HP.
And to add insult to injury, there are actually comparable devices with a touchscreen (NOT an active digitizer) available in the market at a rather small premium (various Cloudbook variants like the Belinea S-Book for example). Obviously, you are not going to use a passive touchscreen for heavy inking like you are doing and an active digitizer might allow for a slightly higher premium.
And while I buy into the “lower market volumne” argument somewhat, I also believe manufacturers just view TPCs as premium products that can be sold at a higher margin.

However, let me voice another opinion on the Eee PC and its very low end / low price brethren:
Many people just buy them because they are soooo cheap without thinking mich about it (some other posters also mentioned this). I believe that a large bunch of buyers will rather quickly realize that what they bought does not really meet their needs. The excietement about the larger screen (8.9″) models seems to support this. So they will buy larger notebooks (and some models from dell and other manufacturers are available for roundabout $800) and the cheap, low spec devices will end up gathering dust (or potentially really as kids’ toys).

You seem a little eager to throw your premium money away.

Wacom digitizers for the PC run at about $100 on Newegg, $40 for a different name. Not sure on the technicalities of screen vs tablet but it sure isn’t $900 difference.

The premium, if you take the P1620 vs HP-Mini is (ballpark) 50% component choice and 50% market pricing. Not to be branded a parrot but the U810 does pretty much everything we’d expect from a UMPC/Notepad for $1000, if it had a bigger screen and keyboard, and shaved off a few hundred bucks by utilising the additional space it’d stomp the HP-Mini into the ground.

None of this is unachievable. Indeed we can see that the 8.9″ screens are not adding a huge cost to the existing systems so it isn’t like we’re reliant on some technology price drop to make it a reality.

At work, a great presentation I saw a few years ago demonstrated (PowerPoint slides) what the speaker paid for computers over the years, and their specs. The point: every couple of years he spent a little over $2,000, and easily doubled speeds and memory sizes every 4 or 5 years.

The point: these ASUS/HP netbooks (would someone tell me what to call these things) are closer competitors to BlackBerrys and iPhones, I’d suggest. No one is taking about them as full computer replacements, merely as extensions of a home PC.

Tablets are an entirely different animal. You are facing a $1,000 price premium for a touch-capable inking interface. Shop for a Wacom – cheapest pen surface accessory for my PC? $1,000.

I want to see what Apple aps will roll out for the iPhone. There is a clear call for some kind of doodling or inking ap for the iPhone. But no one is going to consider inking by finger on a 480×320 screen a replacement for pen inking on 1100×800 (or so) pixels worth of 9″ screen.

Form completion, OneNote taking, drawing: that’s what the tablet premium is for. Web surfing portability has been around for cheap for years. But in work or classroom settings where inking silently on a decent sized surface is needed, the tablet premium of $1,000 makes sense.

What I’m truly curious to see is: iPhone 3rd party applications allowing finger inking -AND- 3rd party applications and hardware allowing iPhone to use BlueTooth folding full sized keyboards. That comes, and any tablet just got threatened by a more portable (iPhone) $400 device.

I have thought about the whole idea of tablet and how much had it assist me in my line of work. I work for a mining company and we do sell mining equipment. Where the ink helps tremendously is when I mark up the drawings for approval. I am primarily involved with sales so I don’t do a great deal of inking. However it is still fairly regular and assist me in taking notes everywhere.

On a personal level, unfortunately I have yet to see the benefits of inking. But it is nice to have flexibility. If I was in a different sector, i.e. not engineering – it may be of little use to me.

Just to correct Mr. Crash from the first post – I am too from Australia and the P1620 is not $4,000 here. We do not have the flexibility of configuring our own P1620 hardware – so all vendors only sell the top model. They range from AUD 2,400 to 2,950. So we are almost as competitive as the prices in the continental US.

My point is that the P1610 is discontinued and discounted, and therefore not a completely fair comparison — even if it’s the best value.

nomo, my p1610 was bought from the fujitsu store on ebay. it’s brand new not a refurbished unit.

Nate,

Agreed and it’s a primary reason why I’ve not sunk cash into a U810 but would love to see the design expanded to a larger screen and keyboard.

However had the U810 released at $400-500 I think the keyboard size issues would have been less important or even perceived as a bonus inclusion. Hell at that price point a $100 BT keyboard with stand for the U810 would have been a great compromise.