NVIDIA Tegra tablet prototype hands-on

Hey, remember that mystery tablet NVIDIA CEO Jen-Hsun Huang was pimping a mere couple of weeks ago? Well, it's made its way to London, and woe betide the Engadget editor who didn't get a hands-on with such an exclusive piece of hardware. So what we're looking at here is a Windows CE-powered, resistive touchscreen display spanning somewhere around 15 to 16 inches, with the same Tegra internals as may be found in the Zune HD or one of them smartbook devices. As we reported earlier, the company behind the machine is ICD, and this particular unit was built to try and entice T-Mobile into placing a few orders.

Being a prototype, the device on hand was quite literally rough around the edges, but what we saw was appetite-whetting. The overall construction is under an inch thin, 720p video playback was excellent, and there's even a terrific-looking wireless recharge station cum base accessory -- think of Palm's Touchstone, only enlarged and magnetized to the point where it can support the whole tablet in an upright position. If somebody marries all that hardware potential with the Stantum multitouch firmware and a more finger-friendly OS, this thing just might make the whole Apple tablet brouhaha utterly irrelevant. Video after the break.

NVIDIA Tegra tablet prototype hands-on

See more video at our hub!

[kgdickens Posted Nov 27th 2009 11:40PM]

This is sweet!

[poet Posted Nov 27th 2009 11:44PM]

Yeah, Windows CE is a definitive NO GO!
I'ld prefer a decade old AmigaOS to that ;)

[AppleTom9 Posted Nov 27th 2009 11:50PM]

I like this NVIDIA Tegra Tablet Prototype!

[Bookmark Posted Nov 28th 2009 12:01AM]

looks a bit too chunky

[jat09g Posted Nov 28th 2009 12:18AM]

@_@

[Coolarj10 Posted Nov 28th 2009 12:36AM]

Why aren't these tablets using capacitive touch screens? What's the reason they're either using resistive or haptic feedback touch screens?

I think what would be really cool is:
a) A capacitive touch screen tablet, 15" seems pretty nice
b) If it were running on webOS - great web browser, nice multitasking, and being able to type a URL or search phrase at anytime and go straight to your web browser! (of course, this is assuming it would be compatible with things like word documents, WMA audio file types, WMV videos, and other things that webOS doesn't yet support)

[rexmateus929 Posted Nov 28th 2009 12:45AM]

Sweeeeetttttt

[JS Posted Nov 28th 2009 2:40AM]

I wish the bezel was non existent (like the Fujitsu frame zero concept) or minimal.

It should also detect pressure as one of the commenters about asked for.

Also .. I believe is that the best form factor for tablets is ultra wide (movie screen like or minimally 16:9) and 6 inches wide .. if it was movie screen format maybe as high as 7 inches diagonally would be OK. The key here though is that there should be virtually no bezel .. or VERY minimal bezel.

[johnkzin Posted Nov 28th 2009 10:33PM]

@JS

They're supposed to do 3 versions: 7", 11", 15"

Personally, I think the ideal size is 9" or 10" ... I have a 7" tablet (Samsung Q1 Ultra). It's too small.

[graey Posted Nov 28th 2009 6:49AM]

Indeed, make that use the resistive multitouch Stantum is doing (although it probably needs a bit more then just their firmware for that), and then put some extra ports and processing power in the base unit and you've got yourself quite a nifty home computer as well. Imagine something like a current all-in-one computer whereof you can loosen the screen and take it with you on the go. Instant win!

[richb93 Posted Nov 28th 2009 6:58AM]

Is that What CE STILL looks like? I have an OLD OLD COMPAQ palmtop with CE 2.11 and it looks exactly the same. What gives Microsoft?

[link83 Posted Nov 28th 2009 7:48AM]

@richb93

The UI you see is like a "demo" UI, that is very light and that is able to run even on the least powerful devices, so that the engineers can test the device during development.

Microsoft does not encourage device manufacturers to ship this user interface. Device manufacturer are supposed to replace it with a custom user interface (that will exploit the device potential and fit with the end user needs - which are different if the device is supposed to be a medical device or a PMP)

[richb93 Posted Nov 28th 2009 7:57AM]

@link83

Ahh I see, fair enough.

[Yoda Posted Nov 28th 2009 9:52AM]

Need. I want one for OS X and one for W7. Please, thanks.

[Silverfox21 Posted Nov 28th 2009 2:16PM]

Windows CE? Get real !!! Why not Android or Chrome?

[Deeival Posted Nov 28th 2009 3:59PM]

I'd buy that in a heart beat.

[johnkzin Posted Nov 28th 2009 10:29PM]

Yeah, we better see Android on this thing...

I'm still hoping that they do a 9" version, but if not, the 11" ought to be ok (they're supposed to do 3: 7", 11", 15").

[fansipanian Posted Nov 28th 2009 11:20PM]

the obvious question: why is it so big? because it's a prototype?

[donsan Posted Nov 29th 2009 9:14AM]

Why would you want it to be smaller?! There are plenty of touchscreen devices that will fit in a purse. I want to draw and edit on this thing whilst sipping whiskey on my back deck. I want it to magnetically snap to my dashboard. And I want it by the holidays!

[kruzilla Posted Nov 29th 2009 11:47AM]

Anyone know if this will be good for us artist-folk? I do my inking on a tablet pc right now but I'm looking for something with better accuracy and a bigger screen and I don't want to invest in a Cintiq. They're nice but I feel they're very overpriced.

[funnywow Posted Dec 20th 2009 11:40PM]

they might make it a giant zune hd because the zune hd os is based on windows ce

[Azlew Posted Jan 30th 2010 4:47AM]

Moon was an awesome film!