Hands-on with Dell's Latitude XT2 tablet
By Laura June 
posted February 10th 2009 5:23PM
posted February 10th 2009 5:23PM
Official word just arrived this morning of Dell's Latitude XT sucessor, the Latitude XT2, and Laptop Magazine's already spent some quality time with the tablet. They note the XT2's aesthetic similarity to the previous model, but point out a few standout upgrades, most notably the 12.1-inch LED backlit capacitive touch-screen, which they say is significantly brighter than the last iteration, and the up to 1.4GHz Intel Core 2 Duo ULV SU9400 CPU (with a Montevina chipset). They also point out that the finger navigations are "smooth as butter" -- but hit the read link for full details and video of the tablet in action. The Latitude XT2 is going to have a starting price of $2,399.
Oh boy, Google Earth.
Can't wait to see Windows 7 installed on that baby.
Defo built for Windows 7....
Oh boy, huge price tag. I would definitely expect much better specs for that price.
specially compare to the HP Tx2z which starts at 999.
It is? Excellent! I was thinking about buying this, and now I'm definitely going to buy it.
Ditto. More the reason for me to buy it now.
I've been waiting for this to launch to order it for our company's CEO. He takes his older tablet all over the country to do site visits and ADA surveys. The implementation of tablets has saved us tens of thousands of dollars a year. That said, once it came out, and I saw the specs, I ordered a Toshiba M750.
We have both older Toshiba tablets in use and a single Dell XT with the TFT screen. The Dell has a great screen, and is light to carry, but it is just simply under powered for even some basic functions like syncing to a large outlook (1.5 gig) account.
For the cost of the *cheapest* XT2, I ordered a Toshiba M750 w/ a 2.53GHz, 25 watt proc, 4 gigs of ram, 128 SSD, and a dual mode LCD touch screen. The XT2 does have a longer battery life, about a pound lighter and ability to have built-in Evdo internet, but it lacks a built in optical drive, microphone and webcam - all of which are big needs of the user in mind. Sorry Dell, you need to drop the price by a grand to be competitive.
For details on how we use tablets, we worked with MS to develop the first tablet platform, here's their whitepaper on our experience (doc) http://download.microsoft.com/download/6/c/5/6c548052-d605-4cfe-95ea-5055885f6377/OneNote_Benefits.doc
You don't think that providing a CAPACITIVE touch-screen as opposed to a RESISTIVE touch-screen is the reason for the price premium?
How many other multi-touch capable, capacitive screen tablets do you see floating around in this form-factor? To my knowledge the Toshiba you have is a resistive and has the option of being outfitted with the Wacom capacitive setup but I am unaware of the price of conversion.
However I do agree that an integrated optical drive would have been most beneficial.
neat
not worth it.
honestly i'm pretty disappointed w/Dell's first tablet, XT. we have over 300 in our company and have had nothing but horrible horrible problems w/the SSDs performance and terribly written drivesr.
ntrig, yea. expect this error: ntrig could not detect driver.
you'll see that about once a week or so.
yup, i'd stick w/Lenovo or HP on a tablet. just my .02
That driver issue has been fixed between the newest chipset drivers and BIOS drivers.
Don't know why I said BIOS drivers, meant in the chipset drivers and BIOS.
Also, the new XT2 uses a 1.8" SATA drive, as opposed to the PATA drive of the original XT. That should help performance. But I agree, the XT is slightly limited by its chipset for the HD/SSD (my SSD is rated 100/50 read/write and I get around 80/30 on the XT.
Guys, just low-rank this bastard and don't feed the troll...
I presume you all supported Apartheid in South Africa too.
I suppose you supported the Holocaust? See I can make silly, nonsensical comparisons, too. Demagoguery is fun!
Wow, this is more than 2x HP's tablet, and it has half the speed. Magnificent.
i think Dell doen't know HP also makes ultra cheap tablets at a fraction of the price.
Its because they're in different classes. The HP tx2 is their consumer level tablet at $1000. It's heavier, thicker, and has a cheaper feel.
The Dell XT/XT2 is a business level tablet, which is meant to be compared to the HP 2710p/2730p, both are in the $2000 range.
Hp's consumer laptops feel like absolute trash. I regret ever buying my dv9500. I purchased a macbook pro and i can't even touch the hp without hating it.
The new one are even uglier, a mirror surface touchpad is a brilliant idea.
No Asuka, of course I don't support the Holocaust and that's exactly why I'd urge you and others who read this to support the boycott against Israeli products and stop the oppression of the Palestinians. The Holocaust is no excuse for the theft and brutal occupation of Palestinian land and the peaceful boycott of Israeli goods and services is designed to send a message to the Israelis that the crimes they are committing will no longer be accepted. A boycott worked in South Africa and there's no reason why it can't work in Israel with enough support.
If you live in America I'd also urge you to speak to your politicians and demand that they stop funding and arming the Israelis.
its sooo expensive man!!!!!!
Well, you could always get a CTL 2go Convertible for $500. A lot less powerful and it has XP, but it's rugged as all heck, lighter weight, and it has a webcam. :-)
At least contribute an intelligent comment if you're going to advertise your website..
Well, you've sealed the deal for me; not only will I buy the XT2, but I'm going to go out of my way to purchase Israeli products. Thank you Engadget troll!
I suppose you don't know that Israeli technology is some of the best in the world?
The Whole All the Core based Intel CPUs: Intel Core Duo, Core 2 Duo, etc. All came from the Banias core which was designed by their Israeli Design team. Why not just Boycott all Intel Core based CPUs?
Btw, i support what Israel is doing. Go live in a country that actually has to deal with constant terrorist attacks, and you would support it too.
Look ma! I drawed tha earth!
@Stereotype: It's irrelevant whether Israel produces some of the best technology or not. Once Palestinians are given the right to return to their land and Israel is held accountable for the war crimes and violations of international law it commits I'll be happy to continue buying their products. Until then I support the boycott and urge you to do the same.
@Asuka: You're just being needlessly obtuse and it saddens me that anyone could be as heartless as you are. It's hardly trolling to do something positive to try and ease the suffering of innocents.
@Shyam D: Perhaps if you were lived in the occupied territories you would understand the need to do what you can to reclaim land that was stolen from you and fight against constant oppression and starvation. Israel doesn't suffer from "terrorist" attacks.
Ehh. Still not sold on the multitouch implementation. I'm happy for the capacitive touchscreen.
Beautiful tablet, though. I love the XT form factor. It manages to make the tablet look not so fat.
I watched the video of the XT2, and the multitouch seemed sluggish. Although I'm not a Mac fan, but I bought my wife a Macbook, and the multitouch capability on the pad outperform anything I've seen so far on the Windows side. It seems to me that this defeats the purpose of having the multitouch capability.
What bothers me is that the XT(2) has capacitive touch, which allows for softer interactions, but on the software side, the response is horrible which makes soft capactive touch seem as responsive as the resistive touch.
They're serious about that "multi-touch"? That looks awful in the video... I must have missed something. I'm very happy with my TX2000z... and I actually did have hopes for the Dell tablet, but that entry price is cost-prohibitive in light of the fact that you can get a very functional entry-level tablet (even a Lenovo), produced by a manufacturer with more experience, for less than Dell's.