Perhaps importantly for an OS that still suffers from instability, tablet use is improved by the inclusion of a dedicated Ctrl-Alt-Del button. This allows you to start Windows' Task Manager without having to swivel the display, and close any programs that fail to respond.
The 12in display doesn’t show up reflections or grubby fingerprints
The pen is housed in the side of the machine, and can be knocked out a little too easily for our liking. It can be tethered to the laptop, which makes the machine look slightly toy-like but reduces the likelihood of it being lost. The pen itself has a pleasing heavyweight feel, and has a right-click button on the side. There’s a clip on the top, allowing you to attach the stylus to one of your pockets, but there’s a good chance you’ll resemble a school teacher if you do.
One of the most impressive things about this machine is the fact that its tablet capabilities haven’t compromised it when it comes to general use as a laptop. The keyboard is a good size, and the responsive and firmly attached keys make it a pleasure to type on. However, it’s a shame navigation is restricted to a pointing stick rather than a touchpad.
Build quality is excellent, with a mixture of brushed aluminium-magnesium alloy and tough plastics used in the construction. The bottom of the HP features a rubber-like coating, making it easy to hold without worrying it will slip from your hands. Although you can lock the display for tablet use, there’s nothing apart from the hinge to hold it properly in place when open, so it can swivel accidentally.
Apart from the use of lightweight materials, HP has attempted to keep the weight down by leaving out an optical drive. This won’t please everybody, but it does make it a lot easier to balance the device on one arm while you write with the other. That said, at 1.8kg it still had a habit of making our arm go dead when you hold it for long periods of time.
HP has kept the weight down by leaving out an optical drive
One of the things that sets this machine apart from its rivals is the attention to detail. Apart from the impressive quality, the 2710p is crammed with neat touches, such as the keyboard light that pops out from above the screen. There’s also a pull-out telescopic antenna for an optional 3G HSDPA module.
COMMENTS
nice!
i just bought an HP TX1340EA, VERY similar. twisty screen (of dubious benefit), touch screen (which has a weird slightly silvery sheen to it, which messes up colour representation a bit), but is a nice little box, for £700, considerably less than this, admittedly nice looking box.
windows was originally written on compaq hardware, so it always used to run best on it, tho what actually runs at all on vista is up for debate, atm! (probs with SP1, already!)
i always found the compaq brand to be usually better, stronger build.
i love these new tiny laptops'. imo it's what laptops should always have been, not vying for desktop business!
btw, i'm collecting stories about baby laptops:
http://eupeople.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=487
if anyone has any others they think should be considered, you're welcome to let me know or post there ;)
Pfft
The tx1320 is also a million miles away in terms of quality. Still, you pays your money...
*sigh*
the tx1320 is hardly a tablet/umpc even if they try and call it one.
Another HP laptop is better
I'm writing from an HP tx1320. Far better specs, far better performance, fingerprint scanner, DVD writer, 2Gb ram, 250GB HDD, 2 x turion, price < 1000€.
Debian installed, not even one problem. The downside is very poor battery life (2hrs).
Battery is so awful that HP gives the laprop with BOTH 4 cell & 6 cell battery.
Hmmm
Hmmm , to me in some ways the product specification would be closer to the two year older Toshiba Portege M200 Tablet PC in size and mass and missing optical drive .
The hard drive is a 1.8 inch unit so is limited in capacity and choice of suppliers for replacement units and is or will be replaced by a solid state unit within the products life time.
However , the other thing is that the unit can be downgraded as an option from Vista to Windows XP Tablet PC as is now being demanded by all corporate and business unit or bulk sales (chain store over the counter sales will not be so lucky in that aspect)!
It is also certified for SuSe Linux installation as well for sales to all German Municipal Authorities who have ditched Windoze (must have fixed that certain HP Bios Bug?)!
I wonder if they have that neat spiffy docking station Toshiba sold that enable to switch from portrait to landscape or back and install an additional hard drive in it's base and use an external keyboard .
As always , you pays your money and takes your choice .
link http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bizsupport/TechSupport/Document.jsp?objectID=c01057796&lang=en&cc=uk&taskId=101&prodSeriesId=3355644&prodTypeId=321957
