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New Tosh 'droid slabs include Newton-like scrawl-pad: We try it out
Pics Among Toshiba’s Haswell-packed laptop frenzy in London yesterday were a few new ten-inch tablets: three Android and one Windows 8 slate for business.
The new Android 4.2 fondleslabs adopt the Excite brandname, as used in the US, and kick off with the Excite Pure, an Nvidia Tegra 3-powered tablet which has 1GB RAM, 16GB of on- …
Pen+tablet bandwagon finally rolling, Nvidia leaps aboard
Trying to differentiate its Tegra 4 system-on-a-chip Nvidia is desperately promoting pen computing as the future, in the hope that no-one will notice it's firmly rooted in the past.
Nvidia is calling its technology DirectStylus, and makes a big deal not only of the fact that the stylus can be made of any capacitive material - …
Landfill Android devices set to get 4G, courtesy of Qualcomm
Qualcomm's latest chips will bring 4G LTE to mid-range devices, including Windows RT tablets and medium-priced handsets, as the tech goes mainstream.
The new chips are part of the Snapdragon line, which puts an entire system, including a few ARM cores and networking stacks, onto a single wafer. LTE has been in the Snapdragon mix …
Review: HP Slate 7 Android tablet
The other day Vulture Central was visited by HP with a Google chap in tow. We were treated to a couple of HP products: the new Slate 7 Android tablet and the company’s latest Chromebook, which we’d already seen as it happens.
The smart-looking seven-inch, dual-processor-core tablet appeared to have little to distinguish it from …
Acer kicks off Computex with tabs and phabs
Computex 2013 Acer got Computex 2013 off to a less-than-spectacular start this morning with the launch of the world’s first “one-handed” Windows 8 tablet, a 5.7in phablet and a new version of its flagship ultrabook.
In a relatively subdued press conference, Acer president Jim Wong unveiled the company’s latest attempt to get back into the …
Netherlands Supremes squash iPad design patent
If even the ordinary man in the street can tell the difference between an Apple iPad and a Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1, then Samsung hasn't infringed on Apple's design rights, according to a court in The Netherlands.
It's not a killer blow in the international patent war-of-running-skirmishes between the two companies: this decision …
Microsoft offers free keyboard covers for Surface RT
Updated The TV ads for Microsoft's Surface tablets look like music videos, with happy Surface users snapping and unsnapping their fondleslabs from their keyboard-covers. There's just one problem: Surface doesn't come with a cover – until now, that is.
Previously, the Surface Touch Cover was available in five colors as a $120 add-on. The …
Galaxy Tab 3 10.1: Samsung plays Intel against ARM
Samsung are about to announce a Galaxy tablet running Android but with Intel inside. And while it is a victory for the US chip goliath, it's also one which could prove pyrrhic given the large amount of cash Intel will have to cough.
Samsung has booked a London launch for 20 June, with new Windows tablets expected but not …
HTC drops 12-inch Windows RT tablet, sticks to a 7-incher
It's been a while since we've heard much about Windows RT from Microsoft's OEM partners, and the latest rumblings from HTC are both good news and bad for Redmond's ARM-based OS, according to sources.
The good news is that the Taiwanese smartphone maker is still moving ahead with plans to ship a 7-inch fondleslab running Windows …
Microsoft bigs up Surface Pro to 256GB for Asian markets
Redmond is starting shipments of a 256GB version of its Surface Pro fondleslab to Japanese customers from June 7, according to the local Microsoft website.
Microsoft is not even bothering to push the 64GB model to Japanese consumers and is just selling its current 128GB system and the new supersized version, for ¥99,800 ($986.62 …
Review: Samsung Series 5 Ultra Touch Ultrabook
When it comes to handing out Windows 8 laptops to the UK reviewers, Samsung has been surprisingly glacial. Whether this is another Apple emulation strategy to become more elusive or a sign of hesitancy to have the brand tarnished by Windows 8’s underwhelming reception, is unclear.
The hardware was paraded at CES 2013 five months …
Mozilla teams up with Foxconn for Firefox 'fondleslab'
Mozilla is working with Apple hardware-maker Foxconn to release a mobile device running Firefox OS, it told news outlets on Monday, and plans to unveil it at an event next week.
The foundation told Reuters it had teamed up with Hon Hai Precision Industry Co on the device as part of its global expansion plans for the operating …
Petshop iPad fanboi charged with filming up young model's skirt
A Los Angeles fanboi has been charged (PDF) with using an iPad to take upskirt footage of an underwear model.
Julio Mario Medal, 38, stands accused of using his big shiny fondleslab to gaze up 22-year-old Brittanie Weaver's skirt and shoot a film about her naughty bits.
Britannie Weaver. Pic: http://brittanieweaver.com …
Tablet? Laptop? HP does the splits with Tegra-based SlateBook x2
HP is to follow its Windows 8-based tablet keyboard combo, the Envy x2, with an Android Jelly Bean version - the computer giant’s take on Asus’ popular Transformer series.
Set to ship in August - in the US at least; the UK release is less certain - the SlateBook x2 will be built around a 10.1-inch, 1920 x 1200 IPS LCD screen …
Mystery Sony big-screen ereader to sport E Ink bender
E Ink reckons its "Mobius" flexible epaper screen will be the first of its kind to go into mass production, an event the company claims will take place some time later this year.
The Mobius will make its debut as a 13.3-inch panel built into a unnamed “digital paper product” made by Sony, which co-developed the panel with E Ink …
Asus: PC market still burning, but folks are guzzling our tablets
Asustek Computer Inc is surfing the slabbie sales swell better than most of its peers, if calendar Q1 financials are a decent metric.
The Taiwanese producer of own-branded tabs - it also makes Google's Nexus 7 - pushed up turnover 16 per cent to NT$105,157bn (£2.29bn) in the first three months of 2013.
The bottom line also …
Can't beat the Nexus 7? Join it: Nook tablet gets Google Play store
Tablet maker and bookseller Barnes & Noble is to add Google’s digital shop front, Play, to its Android-based Nook HD and Nook HD+ slates.
To date, the two tablets, which run Android but keep it buried under B&N’s own UI, have sold film, music and ebook content through the company’s own virtual outlets. Software too has come …
Smaller, second-gen Surface slabs to arrive in June?
Microsoft has struggled to make headway in the tablet market so far, but sources say it may be ready to take another crack at it by releasing a new Surface model with a smaller screen as soon as next month.
Inconsistently accurate Taiwanese IT industry newspaper DigiTimes reports that a variety of Asian component suppliers are …
FONDLESLAB market DEATH STRUGGLE: Latest rankings in
The latest numbers are in from the battle for global tablet market dominance - and the questions everyone is asking are: Is Apple holding on? Has Microsoft got anywhere yet? Where's Amazon? Has Android crushed everything into tablet paste?
The good news for Microsoft is that Surface broke into the ranks of the top five selling …
Review: Panasonic Toughpad FZ-G1 WinPro 8 tablet
Vid In the UK, Panasonic is not known as a high-street PC player - but the company’s Tough range of products makes quite an impression in the world of business.
Out in the field you’ll spot them in the hands of BT engineers and the like where the manufacturer's rugged laptops, and now tablets, survive the rigours of white-van man …
What work? Tablet owners prefer to slack off with their slabs
Tablet owners love their fondleslabs, but hardly anybody thinks of them as tools for business, according to a new report from JD Power and Associates.
The study, based on a survey of 1,857 tablet owners that was conducted in February 2013, found that just 20 per cent of them admitted to using their devices for "business …
Boffins KALQ-u-late the ultimate 'board for two-thumb tablet tappers
Boffins in Scotland, Germany and the US of A have calculated what they claim is the most efficient two-thumb keyboard it’s possible to put on a tablet, at least for folk writing in English on a 7-inch slate.
Researchers at the University of St Andrews, the Max Planck Institute for Informatics and Montana Tech crunched the …
Review: Corsair Voyager Air 1TB wireless hard drive
Corsair has made a name for itself offering solid-state drives, fast memory and other components to fit inside high-performance PCs.
But its latest product takes the supplier out of its comfort zone and into the world of smartphones and tablets. It also carries the company into the network-attached storage arena.
It’s a good …
Spies catch Acer's Windows 8-incher before it hides
Acer will be the first of Microsoft's hardware partners to release a small-screened tablet running Windows 8, if photos purportedly leaked from the PC maker are any indication.
French technology site Minimachines was the first to reveal photos and specs of the sub-sized device, which it claims will have an 8-inch screen and will …
Review: Disgo 8400G 7.9in Android tablet
A 7.9in Jelly Bean Android tablet with 3G connectivity for £150? There has to be a catch, right? Absolutely. The catch with the Disgo 8400G is that you’ve probably never heard of the company before...
Now, this could mean you’ll be ahead of the game with the next big thing in affordable fondleslabs if you bought one. However, …
British bookworms deem Amazon 'evil'
Something for the Weekend, Sir? “My only real prediction is that it’s all changing.”
Well, ask a stupid question - in this case, about the future of book publishing. The lobotomy-inducingly obvious answer was provided by author Neil Gaiman. If I’d written this prediction here on El Reg, I would have been derided as a time-waster specialising in stating the …
More Brits ditch Apple tablets for Amazon, Google, Samsung kit
Almost a fifth of the UK’s adult population now owns a fondleslab, and while most of them have a tablet with a bitten fruit icon on the back, Apple’s dominance is slipping.
So says YouGov, a pollster, which regularly asks Brits about their technology purchases. During the first three months of 2012, 73 per cent of British tablet …
Review: Asus PadFone 2 phone-tablet combo
I thought the first Asus PadFone was a jolly good idea the moment I clapped eyes on it. Sadly it never made it to these shores but the PadFone 2 has. In a nutshell, what we have here is an Android smartphone that can be docked into a dumb tablet giving you not only a choice of two screen sizes but also the convenience of one …
Kobo strikes new match against Kindle: The Aura HD e-reader
Pics Kobo gathered the great and the good from publishing and distribution in London yesterday to launch its new high-res e-ink reader, the Aura HD.
Michael Serbinis, Kobo CEO, said the company asked 10,000 book lovers for the features a perfect e-reader should have. While the Kobo Aura HD probably doesn't match all the survey …
Ten Windows tablets
Product Roundup Twelve months ago the idea of compiling a list of Windows tablets that you would actually want to buy would have been as impossible to do as it would have been farcical to suggest. But with the launch of Windows 8 and Windows RT all that has changed, and we are now faced with a bewildering array of fondleslabs all running …
Foot-long slab too big? Microsoft 'has a 7-incher' to stroke
Microsoft will put a smaller, 7-inch Windows 8-powered Surface laptop-cum-tablet into production this year, according to insiders.
Shrinking the touchscreen slab wasn't part of Microsoft's strategy when the then-Windows chief Steven Sinofsky unveiled Redmond's own 12-inch Surfaces and similar-sized Windows 8 devices from PC …
Review: Kobo Arc Android tablet
As pocketable Android tablets gather momentum and e-reader manufacturers look to offer a more flexible platform, the twilight zone where both meet is certainly looking lively.
A criticism of Amazon’s Kindle Fire e-book-meets-Android offerings is the company’s imposition of a walled garden for installing apps: you have to …
Microsoft ships Surface firmware fixes with April patch batch
Along with the usual Patch Tuesday fixes for Windows, Internet Explorer, and other software, Microsoft's April 9 updates also include hardware driver and firmware fixes for its Surface RT and Surface Pro fondleslabs.
The releases mark the fifth time Redmond has issued fixes for hardware issues with Surface RT, which shipped in …
Android FOUND ON TABLETS inscribed with WORD OF GOD
A church has handed out tablets instead of hymn books - but not stone ones etched with the 10 commandments: these are Android fondleslabs whose pinch-to-zoom feature is a godsend for elderly parishioners, we're told.
The first tab-equipped Church of England congregation at St John's Church in Mickleover, near Derby, clutched …
USPTO backs down on iPad mini trademark objections
The US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) has withdrawn its primary objections to Apple's trademark filing for the term "iPad mini" – but Cupertino is not completely off the hook quite yet.
"Upon further review of the application, the examining attorney has determined that the following refusals issued in the initial Office …
Review: HP ElitePad 900 Atom tablet
If HP’s ElitePad 900 is anything to go by, not everybody expects a business Windows 8 Pro Atom tablet to be a pocketable wafer. You only have to hold it in your hand to get the impression that this model has been built for endurance rather than designed as a fashion accessory. That’s not to say that it doesn’t look good, quite …
Gartner: RIP PCs - tablets will CRUSH you this year
PC sales are in terminal decline thanks to the continued popularity of tablets and there’s nothing an anticipated surge in ultramobiles can do to stop it.
That’s according to beancounters at Gartner, who reckon the outcome will be anaemic growth rates for Microsoft’s Windows in 2013 as Google’s Android blows the doors off. …
OLPC shuns Indian founder after anti-tablet screed
The One Laptop Per Child Association has posted a statement distancing itself from Satish Jha, an entrepreneur who founded the Association in India.
The Association's beef with Mr Jha relates to what it describes as “certain recent statements”.
It seems highly likely this piece about India's Aakash project, which aimed to give …
Apple denied trademark protection for 'iPad mini'
The US Patent and Trademark Office has denied Apple's request to trademark the term "iPad mini" – but there's good reason to assume that Cupertino will overturn the decision on appeal.
The central reason for the denial is rather straightforward: that "mini" is merely identifies the original iPad's little brother as being, well, …
Relaxed Windows 8 rules hint at smaller slabs to come
Microsoft has quietly changed its OEM certification guidelines for Windows 8 to allow devices with lower screen resolutions, a move that could mean smaller Windows tablets are on the way.
ZDNet's Ed Bott was first to spot the rule change made earlier this month, which lowers the minimum screen size for a device bearing the …
I am NOT a PC repair man. I will NOT get your iPad working
Something for the Weekend, Sir? “My nephew bought me one of those iPad things for my birthday.”
My heart sinks – I can already tell where this is going.
I’m at a neighbour’s house party, the time is last summer, and one of the older partygoers is about to tell me that some new-fangled technology is too much for him to cope with now that he has reached the age …
Review: Lenovo ThinkPad Tablet 2
I’ve tried out quite a few variations on the Windows 8 theme just lately – touchscreen notebooks mainly – but I’ve been dabbling with Boot Camp and virtual machine incarnations on the desktop too but without the finger friendliness. So trying out Lenovo’s business-centric ThinkPad Tablet 2 seemed like it would be an easy …
