Intel demos touchscreen ultrabook concept
updated 09:45 am EST, Wed March 7, 2012
Intel shows how touch ultrabook can work
Intel has been giving hands-on demonstrations at CeBIT of a concept ultrabook with a touch display. At 13.3 inches, it would have one of the largest capacitive touch displays yet. The Verge in its time with the ultraportable got to use an example of Zinio's magazine reader app, which was a "delight" to use with multi-touch input.
These screens and others were "in the pipeline" and could be bought by PC builders towards the end of 2012, Intel's Dave Rogers added.
Touchscreens may be vital to recovering lackluster Windows ultrabook sales later this year. The introduction of Windows 8, where touch is the centerpiece of the interface, could give these systems an advantage versus notebooks that still use trackpads. Unable to compete with the MacBook Air solely on price, companies like Acer and ASUS could use touch as a stand-out feature.
Whether or not touch is embraced isn't as clear. Touchscreen PCs are still marginal, and most interest is focused solely on tablets. Apple when it unveiled the current MacBook Air design noted that using a touchscreen on a conventional PC design was fatiguing, since it required a constantly raised hand.
Mac Enthusiast
Joined: Apr 2001
There's a reason Apple haven't done this
it's simply much less effort to NOT lift your arm and use all of it's muscles and imprecision and instead use your much more dextrous fingers which are poised directly above a keyboard and (on Mac) intuitive trackpad
Were this screen to swivel and lay down atop the keyboard they might have something that appeals to those who are not familiar with the trackpad on a MacBook, of course anyone who has used a MacBook trackpad is going to see right through this gimmick