FCC Pics of the IBM ThinkPad X41 Tablet PC

jkendrick writes "jkOnTheRun has posted pics of the rumored IBM ThinkPad X41 Tablet PC pulled from the FCC filing. It looks as expected, a nice black ThinkPad with a major exception, the swivel screen and the Tablet OS."

Comments

what about this tablet pc

[grumpyman]

Excuse me but what is the significance of this tablet PC? There're tons of these similar thingie out there...

Re:what about this tablet pc

[daviddennis]

There are a lot of them, but none of them have the build quality or design integrity of a ThinkPad. I've seen the Toshibas up close and personal and they just reek of mediocre design and build quality.

I used to think the Tablet idea was just stupid until I met a professor at a major university who uses his to scribble notes on while projecting them on the screen in his large lecture class. He uses Camtasia to record what he's doing and posts the capture files on the class web site for his students to review. It's an extraordinarily effective mode of teaching.

I wish Apple made one of these things so I could enjoy using it more, but a ThinkPad would definitely be the next best thing.

D

Still not a Slate

[VoidEngineer]

It humours me how people are unwilling to go the final step and just make a freakin slate tablet. These swivel setups always remind me of someone dipping a toe into cold water, not sure if they want to jump in or not. I bet that IBM could make an amazing slate which would rock the competition (with an exception of the Electrovaya Scribbler, perhaps). At any rate, it seems to me that this is still a laptop, albeit with a 'Tablet configuration'. It's still not a slate, and I personally still group it in the 'laptop' abstract class rather than the 'tablet' abstract class.

Re:Looks as expected

[rossifer]

Black, ugly, heavy, and still using that nipple joystick in the middle of the keyboard.

Black? The black color will be attractive to some, unappealing to others. I like the way they look, but I'm not all that picky on color.

Ugly? Again, that's a matter of opinion and I happen to like the way they look. No swoopy plastic, just well-engineered function. The keyboard is especially functional and well-constructed.

Heavy? Not sure what scale you're using, but you should get it checked. The Thinkpad line ranges in weight from 7lbs (including power brick) to 3.5lbs (including power brick). Only a few of the Sony laptops (and all ultraportables) are lighter and only if you leave the DVD drive at home. When comparing apple-to-apple functionally, the IBM has always come out lighter. It's one of the reasons I'm willing to pay more for them.

"nipple joystick"? All but the lightest of the Thinkpads have both trackpoint and touchpad controllers. Personally, I love the trackpoint and I have never managed to get the hang of a touchpad. The ability to leave my fingers near the home keys while moving the cursor is wonderful. I won't buy a laptop that doesn't have a trackpoint controller.

The screen looks underwhelming as well.

You should look at a Thinkpad screen in person. They tend to be the brightest and clearest displays I've ever seen. Few/no dead/hot pixels either. The resolution of this particular tablet is underwhelming, but I have two Thinkpads with 1600x1200 displays (a21p r50p) and I've never had a more comfortable display than those laptop displays. With subpixel antialiasing turned on, I've noted that I don't mind reading documents in electronic form. Normally, I find reading documents on a computer screen annoying and I print stuff pretty quickly to avoid it. Not if I'm at home using either of our Thinkpads.

I'm not sure what the attraction is to these Thinkpads.

IBM made the best designed and built laptop on the market, bar none. Like many others, I'm very interested to see whether Lenovo continues the trend or whether they drop the ball and drop the design standard down to the quality of the Dells, Toshibas and Gateways...

Regards,
Ross