iPhone Ubiquity, Windows 7 Could Propel Tablet PC Beyond CES Buzz
Much of the buzz around tablet PCs at CES is centered around Microsoft's push to reinvigorate interest in the devices and on rumors that Apple might finally enter the market, and is being supported by several established PC vendors and startups that are demonstrating their latest wares.
While Apple has been rumored for about a year to be bringing out its first tablet PC, reports say the company may actually do so as early as this month.
And for Microsoft, which has failed in the past to generate much excitement with its Windows CE for tablet PCs or the Tablet Edition of its Windows XP, or even tablet PC features built into Windows Vista, the release of Windows 7 with built-in tablet functionality could help drive the growth of the market, according to Brian Lisse, owner of Madison Computer Works, a Madison, Wis.-based solution provider.
But the biggest factor driving interest in this market is the widespread use of the Apple iPhone and the very real possibility that Apple will finally come out with its own tablet PC, according to solution providers.
"The iPhone has made it hip to use touch screens to change their displays," Lisse said. "And they [users] want a bigger screen."
Anyone who has used a touch screen to do their existing applications resists going back to the mouse and keyboard, Lisse said.
"It's fun," he said. "Use Google Maps, touch on a place to enlarge it, spread out your fingers to zoom in, put your fingers together to zoom out. Younger people are used to that kind of thing. Your young professionals, young students, they're your main market."
Business users are not as likely to move away from laptops to tablet PCs, Lisse said. "They like DVD burners and 15-inch screens, and don't care that they have a battery life of only two to three hours. But younger people, if they're going to buy a new laptop to do what they can't do with their iPhones, will consider a tablet PC."
The ubiquity of the iPhone spells good news for Apple when it brings its rumored tablet PC to market, said Jerry Pape, principle at Excalibur, a Big Sky, Mont.-based solution provider.
"Watch the majority of people in airports," Pape said. "They'll open a PC, but be talking on an iPhone. If Apple does the product right, it could be an avalanche."
Getting it right is something that has not really been done to date, Pape said. Tablet PC resolution has been too low, and the devices too large, to gain wide acceptance.
They are popular in certain verticals, especially in the medical field. But, Pape said, the satisfaction level of his medical customers with tablet PCs is about zero because they can barely read the screens. Customers can also break or lose their styluses which can take months to replace. And latches and hinges break. "They can get beat [up] in one year," he said.
The medical field will be the big business market for tablet PCs, if the manufacturers get the products to work as promised, said Kevin Bruce, owner of Professional Computer Solutions, a Durango, Colo.-based solution provider.
With new healthcare regulations and the healthcare stimulus program, medical workers will be a big potential market for tablet PCs, Bruce said.
"Paper records have to go away," he said. "From a HIPAA point of view, we can't have people walking away with paper files. So records will go on tablet PCs. And doctors currently collect patient information for someone else to key in. That could all be done automatically with tablet PCs."
A handful of vendors, including Toshiba and Fujitsu, have been offering tablet PCs for years, but cater mainly to customers in specific verticals such as medical or government.
This year's CES has been the forum at which several new tablet PCs are being launched at a wider market. However, most of those devices are still months away from release.
Steve Ballmer, CEO of Microsoft, used his CES keynote to discuss the future of tablet PCs and introduced models from Hewlett-Packard, France-based Archos, and Taiwan-based Pegatron, none of which are yet available.
Freescale Semiconductor, Austin, Texas, is demonstrating a new sub-$200 tablet PC with a 7-inch touch-screen and the Android and Linux operating systems, and is hoping to interest OEM vendors to adopt its smartbook tablet reference architecture and have touch-screen smartbooks available for sale as early as this summer.
Lenovo, Raleigh, N.C., unveiled a hybrid notebook PC which can be used as a tablet PC.
Meanwhile, companies like enTourage Systems, McLean, Va., are blurring the line between tablet PCs, notebook PCs, and eReaders with their new devices.
Beijing-based Hanwang Technology (Hanvon) also used CES to unveil its first tablet PC.