Soon after the news of HP acquiring Palm became public, tech pundits have come out with all sorts of predictions and expectations. And for some reason a weird claim that we see if that HP would kill the Windows Slate that Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer proudly went on stage with at CES. The logic behind the claim comes from the new found OS strength in the form of WebOS that HP has now added to its inventory. Palm has had a touch of netbook before with the Foleo and they might well have been planning a iPad competitor themselves. Even though the WebOS on a Slate would be cool, wanted and certainly a future option, I am highly unsure if HP would go ahead and jeopardize its relation with Microsoft by canning the Windows 7 Slate project.
The HP Slate has already made a good enough buzz and comparisons with the iPad were plenty, the one concern with might trouble HP is the fact that Windows 7 isnt a OS made for full tochscreens like the iPhone OS or the WebOS, but then HP is the same company which did the TouchSmart PC’s and I see no reason why they won’t feel comfortable launching the HP Slate specially given the hype iPad has created!
How can the author say Win 7 is not made for full touchscreens?! I own a 64-bit HP TouchSmart Tablet running Win 7 Pro, and Win 7 performs all the multi-touch features including two finger zoom, rotate, scroll, etc. It also registers flicks in 8 directions and it lets me assign my own functions to them. The addition of a pen only expands the touchscreen experience beyond the ipad, giving me writing recognition, rollover, and precise clicks when I need them.
Looks like my HP 12″ TouchSmart tablet is as close to a Win 7 Slate as we are going to get for now.
I agree…everyone is quick to make judgements of an OS that they more than likely have never even worked with. Windows 7 is very touch capable, and i can see thsi tablet working fine with the UI layer that HP places on top. Highly doubtful HP will can the Windows 7 Slate. I’m certain they will add a Web OS slate, but that is a ways off, since there is a great deal that needs to be done to integrate WebOS to the hardware, etc.
I think it’s wishful thinking on the part of MS haters. All this hate on the net about who has the better OS. The answer is simple: the one that has the OS that can handle your needs best. What handles user A’s needs may not handle user B’s needs.
P.S. Let’s not forget that all of this discussion has come from ONE post on a tech BLOG site by Michael Arrington. It’s a BLOG…his oppinion, not based on fact.
I should clarify that in the post above I meant to highlight that the rumour of HP cancelling the Slate comes with the reasoning that ‘windows 7 cant handle touch’. I didnt mean to say that myself and thats why I have gone against the flow and said that HP won’t cancel it in all probability.
I have played around with the Win7 touch and Surface and LIKED the touch capabilities. http://onlygizmos.com/thrilling-day-1-techfest-2009/2009/01/
http://onlygizmos.com/win7-community-launch-delhi/2009/11/
http://onlygizmos.com/win7-community-launch-mumbai/2009/10/