Windows 8 Hybrid Laptop-Tablets Take Center Stage at Computex - clementwrapprand

Windows 8 Hybrid Laptop-Tablets Take the Stage at Computex

The Computex engineering show in Capital of Taiwan–one of Asia's largest–started Sunday with a bang, showcasing hybrid laptop/tablets running Microsoft's upcoming Windows 8 OS. The first laptops out of the gate are Windows 8 tablets with detachable docks from Asus and Acer and a sliding tablet PC from MSI.

Hybrid laptop-tablets are designed to tender the best of both laptops and tablets. You can use the devices in a slate tablet mode when all you want to do is tap the touchscreen…or access a physical keyboard for long-standing laptop computer usance. Thither are two kinds of hybrids to choose from: Those with built-in keyboards that pivot, slide, or fold into place or tablets with removable keyboard docks.

Upcoming hybrids wish purchase the touch-optimized Metro interface in Windows 8. They'll cost more than a slating tablet without physical keyboards (e.g., the iPad) but, in return, you get Thomas More versatile unsettled computation devices running a full screen background operating system.

Here are the first of these innovative touch screen laptop computer-tablet hybrids:

Acer Iconia W510

Genus Acer Iconia W510

Acer announced two Windows 8 tablets at Computex, the Iconia W510 and Iconia W700. The Ionia W700 comes with a cradle for multiple viewing angles, but it's the 10-inch Iconia W510 that features a productivity-enhancing detachable keyboard dock, which extends the battery life of the tablet PC to up to 18 hours. The W5110 can be rotated 295 degrees into "presentation musical mode" for streamlined PowerPoint presentations and picture viewing.

Asus Taichi and Asus Transformer Book

Asus Taichichuan hybrid laptop

Asus undraped the Taichi, a dual-screen Ultrabook, and the Asus Transformer Quran, a tablet with clastic keyboard sour grass.

Not to be outdone by other touch screen Ultrabook makers, Asus has packed the Taichi with not one but two chock-full HD In-Plane Switching (IPS) screens that can be used independently. The covert on the outside is a touchscreen. This eerie purpose allows two people to use the laptop concurrently. Envisage this: You could be typewriting up meeting notes while your kid taps out on the external screen playing with a Windows 8 app.

Asus Transformer Book

The Asus Transformer Book is like the Windows adaptation of the popular Asus Eee Transformer Prime Mechanical man tablet. It runs the mature version of Windows 8, uses Intel Ivy Bridge processors, and sports an NVidia graphics nick. Looking a lot like the beautiful Asus Zenbook Prime Ultrabook—demur that the screen detaches from the keyboard—the Transformer Hold will likewise have IPS displays with rotund HD (1920-pixel-by-1080-pixelsresolution) and comes with 11.6-inch, 13-inch, and 13-inch sizes.

[Lineal: Asus Windows 8 PCs–Innovative or Just Novel?]

MSI Slider S20

MSI Yellow-bellied terrapin S20

The MSI Slider S20 is the first convertible Ultrabook on the scene. Like the "Cove Head"/Letexo concept device Intel showed slay earlier this class, the Skidder S20 has a screen that collapses into tablet-only when mode or slides up to reveal a keyboard.

The Slider S20 is an 11.6-inch laptop running an Intel Chief River CULV processor (Intel's Ivy Bridge platform for Ultrabooks and tablets). Although we don't know computer storage, memory, Oregon other details, MSI announced the Slider S20 will come with a full array of ports, including USB 3.0, Bluetooth 4.0, and HDMI, and that the display is a 10-point multi-match screen.

More Translatable and Hybrid Laptops: Details to Come

As was common with devices introduced at trade shows, nary prices OR more detailed specs have yet been released for these devices. Also keep in mind that innovational devices are much showcased at shows but never really come up to commercialize.

Still, these are very promising touch screen laptops–and they're only the beginning. Expect others like them to be unveiled this week, and many to be fit for purchase in the fall when Microsoft Windows 8 makes its debut.

Survey Melanie Pinola (@melaniepinola) and Now@PCWorld on Chitter