Dell Latitude XT2 shows up in a flurry of documentation
By Laura June 
posted January 24th 2009 11:58AM
posted January 24th 2009 11:58AM
Dell's Latitude XT2 convertible was leaked to us way back in March,and although it missed that planned November ship date, it's suddenly showed up in an absolute downpour of documentation -- great news if you didn't have any light reading for the weekend. We did a nice heavy skimming of the material for you, and spec-wise, it's basically just the expected bump up to Montevina: an unspecified ULV Core 2 Duo on an 800MHz bus with integrated Intel GMA X4500 graphics, up to 5GB of DDR3 RAM and the same 12.1-inch multitouch-capable capacitive touchscreen as in the original. (Hellooo Windows 7!) Still no solid word on availability or pricing yet -- hopefully we'll hear more soon.
[Thanks, Johnny]
[Thanks, Johnny]
800 MHz core duo?
Okay, my comment was meant as a reply to you aimed at Laura, but then Engadget decided that wasn't cool.
http://support.dell.com/support/edocs/systems/latxt2/en/SM/specs.htm
800mhz is the bus frequency. So long as the C2D ULV has an 800mhz fsb, it'll work with the XT2.
The Dell specs also have it down for a max of 5GB RAM, not 4.
Less skim more read please Laura!
@404
wait- what?
haha
Daren, take a look at the link.
"Maximum memory: 5 GB capable (requires 64-bit Windows Vista® operating system)"
Well, as someone who's school provided the XT tablet, I can't imagine how they could possibly do worse. It is the slowest piece of shit laptop I have EVER worked on. And I used to repair HP and Compaq machines!
I sent this in as well, but didn't expect the writer to totally mess up the CPU speed. For the umpteenth time, its 800 MHz FSB. That's Front Side Bus.
The CPU will likely be any ULV CPU that works with an 800 MHz FSB. Obviously it isn't going to be 800 MHz.
From the looks at what's available, they'll have the Penryn-3M 45nm chips: they offer either a 1200 MHz, 3MB cache w/ 800 FSB or a 1400 MHz unit.
The power consumption of these chips is 10 watt, and from their listed specs, the display consumes only 3 watts, so likely an LED display.
Hope it's one of those sub-$500 models. I'm dieing for a cheap tablet to play with.
Are you kidding? From Dell? The XT wasn't that popular from sheer overpricing against competitors for the hardware you got, and tablets ain't cheap anyway.
Methinks your only hope for a sub-$500 real tablet is going to be the smaller ASUS offering. For a while, anyway.
You can pick up a refurb of the original XT fairly cheaply although I think $500 is a bit unlikely.
You can always get a used one on eBay for ~$300. I got an old Toshiba tablet for around $350 last summer. Nothing special but it was like 1.5ghz, 1gb ram and an nVidia video chipset. No powerhouse but very light and of course it had the tablet functionality.
Try Gigabyte M912V.
800 mhz is the external BUS frequency. Way to get it wrong, Laura :(
http://support.dell.com/support/edocs/systems/latxt2/en/SM/specs.htm
I'm rather irritated at these specs, actually.
This thing can take an ExpressCard34 while the HP Mini 2140 can take an ExpressCard54. Something feels so wrong with that comparison.
Hell, the friggin 15 and 17" Macbook Pros have only 34mm Expresscard slots whereas notebooks half their size have full size 54mm slots. : /
800mhz? Hmmmm
Why the hell can't tablet makers put in a decent video chipset? Make it switchable in order to save battery power or in order to actually play hi def stuff at a decent rate. I was really hoping 2009 would be the year of no Intel integrated GPU's. Bloody hell.
The X4500 isn't horrible actually, although it's still a far cry from a dedicated GPU. But I don't think there are any tablets with a dedicated GPU, except for one I saw with a Radeon 2400 but the ones with integrated Radeon 3200 are just as good if not better. And I think X4500 is actually close to Radeon 3200 in performance, and my friend can play TF2 pretty well on his 3200 IGP.
You're completely delusional if you think integrated video chipsets will be done away with.
My ancient HP TC100 has a geForce GPU, so I guess I'll stick with it for awhile.
Dedicated GPU means more space needed to cram it in and better fans to cool it for when it would be in use, which also take up more room. It means a thicker/bigger footprint and more weight - considering the fact that Tablet PC's are meant to be used while they're being held while walking, for instance - it's not a good design choice (leaving the battery life issue alone since you would switch to integrated while on the go).
However there have been Tablet PC's with dedicated graphics units that focus less on the mobile experience and understand that they are more for Photoshop work or for people who think that Tablet usage is not a priority, Gateway comes to mind - http://www.gateway.com/systems/product/529668180.php although the X2300HD is definitely not a powerhouse by any stretch of the imagination, it does have 128 MB RAM on-board the GPU (only a 1280x768 screen though so that's not that bad), a 14" screen (most tablets are 12"), a DVD drive built into the chassis, and a $1300 price which is very cheap for a new tablet - do keep in mind though that machine has not been updated to Santa Rosa yet.
errrr..... updated to Montevina yet, it's got Santa Rosa right now :S forgive my mind being frozen
Awesome, they kept the pointing stick; only if they had it as an option for their consumer models.
I really wish they'd put a pointing stick in each and every notebook/netbook/whatever; how much would that cost, $5?
Dell's pointing stick is horrible compared to a Lenovo though.
I won't buy a machine if it comes with a nipple mouse. I find them horrible to use.
spensive...guarentee it will be ssd only..so expect at least to drop 2g's on this bad boy
For some reason that illustration screws with my sense of perspective. It's like MC Escher's laptop or something.
The bottom left of the screen looks like it's getting bent forward in comparison to the rest of the screen...
look at that chrome-ass keyboard
I was about to say......800MHz ? Phones are even closing in on that speed.
No one has noticed how similar the design is to the original XT?
Besides a few upgrades and sensible design changes (like the WWAN antenna), this looks exactly like an XT with upgraded guts. Maybe they really did get their design right the first time, by researching heavily and not rushing to the market.
I wonder if the Intel integrated graphics will actually outperform the ATI chip in the XT, or if it was a battery-related change.
I would bet a little of both.
At least I hope there's battery improvements, with my current XT using an SSD, I get about 3 hours maximum.
Have you tried the "battery slice"?
I don't need it (thus, haven't tried it), but Dell claims it makes some pretty impressive improvements to the battery life.
No, I haven't tried it either, and its not enough of an issue for me to spend another $300 on a battery, but I just meant comparatively. For its battery size of 42WHr, it doesn't last very long. Compare it to the 2710p for example.
The battery slice is an absolute must-have as far as I'm concerned. I was getting almost the same as you, about 2.5 - 3 hours on the internal battery.
I got a battery slice on eBay very lightly used for ~$100.00 shipped, and saw my battery life basically more than double. Easily 5 - 6 hours of balanced use with wifi on and the brightness somewhere midway. I don't know why they don't just ship out those with all of them at this rate. It really really needs that battery.
I think a lot of the battery drain was coming from that power-hungry and somewhat inferior ATI chipset they went with. If you remember, there were a lot of hard locking issues caused by the northbridge and graphics drivers, which led to a lot of confusion. I had similar problems until I mobility modded some of the latest catalysts after installing the dell drivers (you need to do so to get the northbridge drives).
So, are there any decent sized, >15" multi touch tablets?
Nope. Far as I can remember the biggest commercially available tablet is the 13.3" Fujitsu T5010, and it's not multitouch.
The problem is that tablets got labelled as mainly business & education machines, so most of them are geared around small, portable form factors and sacrificing performance for battery life. If Windows 7 takes off and companies jump on the multitouch bandwagon that'll hopefully change though.
You'd think that would change now that everyone + dog knows about Windows 7.
There are a few Gateway 14" tablets, but I don't think a bigger tablet is that useful when the resolution is still 1280x800 anyway.
The screen looks like it's come out of an Escher drawing.
Oops, sorry, didn't see sockatume's comment.
its funny how history repeats itself. we had tablets PC's start off in what like 02 or 03 mainstream, but they went away for a minute, you could still get them but today, now everything is turning touch. 3D movies, had them back in like the 50 or 70's whenever it was, that went away for a couple and now look where were heading back to. 2004 was a bad year for me, and now look where Im heading. lol
2004 baby
Wooh those isometric renderings freak me out
the HP Touchsmart TX2 is the same size, multi-touch and has more ram capacity (up to 8 gb), and discrete ati graphics. It loooks nicer in my opinion as well.
The TX2 is heavier, thicker, runs hotter, and has less battery life. It is slightly faster, but not enough for that to be worth it.
Also, it feels cheaper, probably because its a consumer product and the XT is a business product, which just feels plain solid.
ME WANT
optical illusion:
can you tell if the LCD is actually facing up or facing down..
has anyone tested Windows 7 MultiTouch support on their old XT? (or other multitouch tablet>)