News Week of May 23, 2010

Why the Fate of Windows 7 'Slate' Tablet Is Sealed

Remember all the buzz around Hewlett-Packard's Slate, a Windows 7-based tablet that Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer featured in a keynote presentation at the Consumer Electronics Show in January? It was Microsoft's shot across Apple's bow, meant to show Microsoft wasn't ceding the tablet market to the then-unreleased iPad. HP kept the Slate in the blogosphere's eye through occasional posts and carefully vague videos of the device at its Website.

But quietly, the Slate went away, and now the buzz around HP is that it will use Palm's WebOS as the foundation for iPad rivals, once it's completed its buyout of Palm. (On Friday, Digitimes quoted an HP Taiwan exec saying the Slate would use WebOS instead of Windows 7.)  (Source: Galen Gruman, Infoworld )

Dell To Introduce Streak Android Tablet PC In US This Summer

Personal computer maker Dell Inc. (DELL: News ) Tuesday announced plans for Streak, a 5-inch, Android operating system-based Tablet PC, designed to provide people with entertainment, social connection, and navigation experience. The company plans to make the Streak available in the U.S. later this summer.

Tablet PCs establish a new class of devices between smartphones and laptops. In April 2010, technology company Apple Inc. (AAPL: News ) introduced its tablet computer iPad for internet browsing, media consumption, gaming, and light content creation. Internet giant Google (GOOG: News ) also is in the process of making its own tablet device.

In the UK, the Dell Streak will be available in early June at O2 stores, O2.co.uk and the Carphone Warehouse. It will be available at Dell.co.uk. later in the month. The company also said that pricing and data plans for the UK will be announced by O2 ahead of availability.  (Source: RTTNews)
Posted Tuesday, May 25, 2010 by ChrisD
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Dell to marker Latitude XT2 tablet PC

The new Dell Latitude XT2 is shipped with an Intel Core2Duo ULV proccessor with Microsoft Windows 7 or Vista and with Intel�s Montevina chipset, it has a 12.1″ premium WXGA LED display and can be purchesed with a SATA 120GB hard drive or with a 128GB mobility SSD, has an onboard 4500MHD video accelerator and built in WLAN (broadband capable  (Source: Seven-Sided Cube)
Posted Tuesday, May 25, 2010 by ChrisD
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Microsoft cancels Courier tablet project

We contacted Microsoft, who confirmed that Courier will not go into production. Microsoft Corporate VP of Communications Frank Shaw told us:

At any given time, we're looking at new ideas, investigating, testing, incubating them. It's in our DNA to develop new form factors and natural user interfaces to foster productivity and creativity. The Courier project is an example of this type of effort. It will be evaluated for use in future offerings, but we have no plans to build such a device at this time.