Reply With QuoteI fell for the concept of a tablet PC around the first time saw an XP powered Archos back around 05-06. The reason no one bought them was because, quite frankly, they sucked. Good idea though they were, the initial tablets were cramped, halfassed, and awkward machines to use. Beyond the novelty of it, being able to hold the teasing hint of things to come, there was absolutely no compelling reason to grab a tablet over a proper laptop.Originally Posted by Briareos H
See, I think of tablets as being better laptops than laptops. No, they're not perfect for every conceivable situation that might arise. No one type of computer is. Nor do I believe them to be the entire future of PCs in general. But they are more portable machines than clamshell laptops. Having a tablet you can hold in one hand and manipulate with the other is (at least in my opinion) preferable to having something you have to sit down with, pop open, then lay on your lap or open on a desk to use. I can work with one quicker than the other, in a wider variety of situations.
Think about it. If you were a photographer out doing, I dunno, taking pictures of ironic crap and douchy hipster shit, and you wanted to edit your douchy hipster shots, would you rather have a laptop you have to sit in your lap and hunch over, manipulating a cursor with a mouse nub or touchpad, or something that's basically a single slab you can hold in the crook of your arm while standing up, editing your photos directly onscreen with a couple of finger and a stylus?
Also it's more likely to make you look cooler and get you laid.
The iPad isn't the revelation some people make it out to be, and didn't change everything like all the Apple advertisements claim. But it did do one thing right. It showed the potential of the form factor when someone plays to its strengths. How good it could be, given enough power and flexibility.
Depends on if you think that the progress of a portable CPU is measured solely in performance. These days, CPUs are considerably faster than what most people need. Hell, there's absolutely no reason for most people to upgrade past a Core2Duo and 2GB ram. That's not to say that there's no room for improvement on the performance front, because there will always be people who need that extra oomph. We videogame geek hobbyist types and the always nebulously defined and mysterious high end professional can use all the cores and gigahertz they can get on.If an only slightly bulkier computer from 2007 (my Thinkpad X61 Tablet -- which is one of the best ultraportable laptops ever made) still outperforms CPU-wise the Microsoft Surface "pro", then it means that progress in portable x86 computing has been almost nil and that people are buying into the hype more than the actual thing. Accessibility my arse, only market-criers who manage to shout the loudest when people are most vulnerable.
But instead of focusing solely on performance, why not also work on efficiency as well? That benefits us all just as well. Is a new processor generation that only performs 2.3514% better than the previous model, but consumes only half the power and resources any less of an upgrade than a new CPU generation that performs 50% faster? Guess it depends on if you're on a desktop or laptop really. But hey, we'd all love gaming laptops that last 15 hours on a charge, wouldn't we?
