In a comment yesterday, James Avery pointed out that the Dell Inspiron 700M notebook would make a good Tablet. And that’s got me thinking…
What if there were Tablet upgrade kits? What if you could take a stock notebook and swap out the built-in display and replace it with one that has a digitizer? I know I’ve read articles sprinkled across the Inkernet where people have tried converting non-Tablets into Tablets–so there probably is some interest in this.
Now somehow the digitizer has to get controlled, so maybe an internal wire has to run to a USB port. Maybe someone can even figure out how to do this without replacing the display–although I’m guessing that a good screen cover would be in order.
So what about the OS? Well, the mod Tablet wouldn’t necessarily have to run the Tablet OS, but for MSDN folks I imagine they could install the Tablet OS. Everyone else would have to do without.
Hmmm. Maybe a better idea is to figure out how to provide a mod-Tablet iBook. There’s InkWell already for it. And based on the FAQ from this company (Troll Touch) that provides touch screen upgrade kits for iBooks (among others), I’m guessing there’s a good bit of interest in a Tablet iBook mod kit.
Either way, a Tablet mod kit might encourage some interesting Tablet experimentation.
I think the easiest upgrade would be a small/thin/lite USB/LCD digitizing tablet that could work with any PC running WinXP TE.
I would be happy to pay $500 for a 10 to 12 inch LCD digitizing tablet (plus TE upgrade)! I am sure the enterprising folks in Taiwan and China could do it for a lot less.
You don’t need a tablet screen. Think of that as “high end”. How about just a clip on digitizer pad (a la 6″ Wacom) that flips out to the right or left? As you know, the Tablet PC OS works pretty well with an attached digitizer tablet. The current Wacom tablets come with some pen enabling software already. Wouldn’t take much to bridge the gap, I’m thinking 🙂
A pop-up digitzing pad would be clever. On the smaller side, would a digitizing pad that replaces the touchpad in front of the keyboard be big enough? Probably not. Hmmm.
The trick is to make the “upgrade” integrate with the notebook so I could carry around just one device.
Just out of curiosity, does a Wacom tablet connected to a Tablet PC allow you to add “ink” from the Wacom?
Otto, yep. I use a desktop running the Tablet PC OS (from an MSDN subscription) that has a Wacom tablet connected to it as a test machine. The one drawback is that you don’t get to write on the screen. But other than that, it’s a great way as a developer to experiment with Tablet programming without investing in a Tablet PC.