1UP for my tx2
Thank you HP, thank you. Despite your being a total-a.hole as far as not granting me an OS refund is concerned (more on that later), you have partially redeemed yourself today. You see, dear readers, Engadget Spanish found a marketing newsletter sent by HP that has a few important details among new product announcements.
Namely, my HP TouchSmart tx2 convertible tablet that I bought this July is now really going to earn that moniker. To-date, its place in HP’s ecosystem was half-assed at best. Despite being called a Touchsmart, it did not have the same software as the desktops with that branding. Instead it came with the crippled MediaSmart software. And no one at HP support had a effing clue that this product gets premier-U.S. support as a Touchsmart. Not any more though!
In the newsletter, HP lists the TouchSmart 3.0 software (as yet unreleased) as a feature of the tx2. And the tx2’s specs are entirely unchanged. Other than adding a touchscreen option to the dv3 laptop (not a convertible and no stylus input), HP did not announce any other tablet PC models. And it included the tx2 in its catalog, unchanged except for TouchSmart 3.0 (compatible with Windows 7) addition. Which means, for the time being, the tx2 remains the best 4-finger multi-touch tablet available on the market and will be well-supported by HP for at least a couple more years. Also in the newsletter was a page outlining the differences between MediaSmart and TouchSmart 3.0. Here is the evidence:
Now, kinda related to that, I read this article by Wired today: www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2009/09/tablet-taxonomy. The reason for not linking to it is because it is written by an RDF-ed editor there. I’m okay with including thew Newton in there, but why is the effing Modbook (nothing against Axiotron or any consumer who wishes to use an altered Macbook as a OS X tablet PC) supposed to be featured as the example of a slate form-factor? Especially since stylus-input is officially not supported by Apple and this is an aftermarket mod? Also, why does the whole section on smartphones and PDAs entail three sentences of which two are about the iPhone? And isn’t the idiotic ranting against resistive digitizers supposed to be only an Engadget thing? Digitizers do not only have to recognize finger-touch, and resistive and capacitive technologies each have their own benefits. Also, what’s with this convoluted idea that somehow the mythical Apple tablet envy is behind the Windows 7-linked push for tablet PCs? I’m disappointed Wired. This is just bad, bad writing.
Especially when Apple pulls off stunts like this one (also a Wired story). It leads me to believe that Nokia (Symbian/Maemo), RIM (Blackberry OS) and Microsoft (Windows Mobile) have the only mobile platforms out there that allow true consumer choice (among which Blackberry is the clear leader right now, imo) Android may get there some day, but it is currently having growing pains. And the new Palm keeps bouncing between being an open and closed platforms
