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Pacebook Tablet PC
IAmBlakeM writes "Looks like a new PC design has been released by the guys at PaceBlade. Reviewed at Anandtech, the new PaceBlade, touted as a 3in1 PC, features a Transmeta Crusoe TM5600 CPU at 600Mhz, up to 256MB of RAM, a 12.1" XGA LCD that can do 1024x768, and an "any key". Always nice to see some new designs and technology throwing curves at the norms."
Actually; the Pacebook has been announced 1 1/2 years ago and released at the last Cebit. I have been trying to get my hands on one for all this time, but unfortunately they still don't sell to us Euros :(
Which OS is supported on the PaceBook?
:-)
All Windows OS' are supported including Windows Me, 2000 and XP. We will emphasize Windows XP since the functionality is much more suitable for the PaceBook than Windows Me and 2000. Also, we read Jerry Kaplan's book and didn't want to make the same mistake of pissing off Bill so he'd dust off Pen Windows and crush us under his boot heel like GO Corp-- so no proprietary, better-suited, pen-based OSes here. Just the same old bloat you've come to love from Microsoft.
Okay, those last two sentences aren't really in there...
~Philly
PaceBlade gave it the name "any key" because it solved the problem of having to hit a key during a blue screen. The screen, which sometimes reads "Hit any key to continue" can only be removed by hitting a key on a keyboard, which is difficult to do on a keyboard-less tablet PC. The "any key" button solves that problem.
I thought the "any key" was going to be a gimmicky conversation piece, but after reading the article it appears to simply be in anticipation of Win XP.
Great looking design, but...
It seems they are missing the boat with some of the design decisions they made (ie, no Wi-Fi, no handwriting or voice recognition software). The product's usefulness is seriously limited without these two capabilities. Where's the advantage of having a tablet in your hand if you can't use handwriting or if you can't access your data?
I think they left these things out to make a more affordable product. It also made the product less desirable.
Remember... ZG9uJ3QgZm9yZ2V0IHRvIGRyaW5rIHlvdXIgb3ZhbHRpbmU=
I was all excited when I saw this article yesterday. Then, I started reading it, and my mood just got worse and worse. The lack of native handwriting SW was a major insult. What exactly is a tablet PC for if you can't use pen based input? That, coupled with little possibility for RAM upgrade, a relatively slow processor, proprietary USB and VGA ports, supercheapo integrated video, and having menu and pivot functionality tied to WinXP sw only kinda ruined it for me. The "powered' 4-pin firewire was also a compromise in my opinion. Why use two cables to do the job of one? Especially on a laptop where cableclutter is not only frustrating and unsightly, but dangerous to the light hardware it's attached to, and the ports which tend to break easily on portables. Personally, I thought the "any key" was another slap in the face. Integrating a hardware element to deal with BSOD's (i.e. a sucky OS) is like putting a reset button on your mouse. It's not PaceBlade's fault that windows is so full of holes, but it hurts when their HW reflects that, too.
As a really minor last note, they talked about using this down the road as an LCD display/TV, but neglected to put either a TV tuner or video in onboard.
Go ahead and flame away. But in my defense, I was really excited and wanted to be blown away by this product, but couldn't find any reason this was better than one of those slim Viao offerings
This is where I get my recommended daily allowance of "Foot in Mouth."
There are some other options out there:
The AquaPAD from FICA starts at $650.
You can get it running Midori Linux or WinCE. I've played with both and support for WiFi cards is good with either version.
The SonicBLUE ProGear can also be ordered with Linux as the OS, but it's WAY pricey - like over $3000. And the version running Windows98 runs hot. Burn your lap off and runs sluggish. But it has a built in 802.11b card. No drivers to load for this one.
I don't have a solution, but I certainly admire the problem.