There's no hiding the fact that the
first images of the Lenovo IdeaPad U1 Hybrid amazed us, and now after seeing the device we can say the feeling was well-founded -- the detachable resistive multitouch display worked better than we ever expected for such an early preproduction unit. Check the mouthwatering gallery below and then head over the break for full impressions and a few videos showing off the U1's finer points.
When closed the IdeaPad U1 Hybrid looks like a regular laptop, and with a rounded aesthetic and a red shimmery paint job it's a nice looking one. Under the lid there's chiclet-style keyboard surrounded by a fun rubberized palmrest with integrated touchpad. When docked, the U1 looks and feels like any other snazzed-up laptop, with an Intel CULV processor and a 128GB SSD running Windows 7 Home Premium. You actually wouldn't know there's a slate hiding in there -- until you pull it out and watch it switch to Lenovo's Skylight UI, a process that was smooth and quick for us. Lenovo says the goal is for the full switch to occur in under 3 seconds, and the U1 delivered, as far as we could tell.
The slate itself is essentially a touchscreen version of the Skylight smartbook: it runs the same Skylight OS on a similar Qualcomm Snapdragon CPU, and it seems to be pretty quick, though there's a bit of lag in between switching windows. (To be fair, we were playing with a super-early pre-production unit.) The GUI is slightly different than the Skylight -- it's built around a six-
panel interface, which can be customized with email, calendar, RSS, and social media widgets, and there's a second four-panel screen with image, music, video, and e-reader widgets that's especially finger friendly. The tablet also turns into a pretty good e-reader; we flipped to portrait it to read a preloaded PDF and the accelerometer kicked right in.
How's the touch experience? Well, the resistive 11.6-screen supports multitouch, (Lenovo wasn't saying where it came from) and though it was responsive, it was far from flawless; we had to double tap a few times to make sure our touches registered. It's also a little bit loose, although we expect that'll be cleared up by the time the U1 ships. The on-screen keyboard is big enough for entering a URL here or there, but you're not going to want to type an email on it. Unfortunately, the screen itself was pretty abysmal, with terrible horizontal and vertical viewing angles -- it basically disappeared at 45 degrees off axis. That's probably not optimal for a hand-held device, and we're hoping Lenovo sorts that out before release.
posted January 5th 2010 3:43PM
I just want to say "suck it" to the haters and iSheep, who thought this would take forever to convert into a tablet.
@pankomputerek, priced @ 999 according to earlier article: http://www.engadget.com/2010/01/04/lenovo-ideapad-u1-hybrid-laptop-by-day-unhinged-tablet-by-nigh?icid=sphere_blogsmith_inpage_engadget
I love the concept... but it will definitely need a better screen before it's ideal, and it will probably need a little more oomph for independent HD multimedia on the tablet as well.
But yeah, I'd still love one, thanks!
wow nice viewing angles. /sarcasm
as for resistive....what????
Fail 6 months before release, excellent work Lenovo.
They could not get the scrolling to work in the first video so the camera guy stopped recording. Why show something if it's going to be buggy and not working properly. These companies need to learn how to have a properly working demo available when events like this come around.
@Steve Jobs CEO a lot of these companies are showing prototypes and early builds, CES is a tradeshow, where companies show concepts in hopes of writing orders for the final builds of the products, yes they should be fully functioning close to final build quality, but that's just not gonna happen.
PS, chrome accents need to go away, they look cheesy. even on the iphone
@Steve Jobs CEO
Yeah, i suppose they could wait until 2-3 months before and have the media be part of the herd of iSheep speculating on vaporware or they can debut their products when and where people want to hear about them. Steve Jobs Fail, even though u succeed financially (and very well at that). Still, douche!
@juanvaldez
Well Apple will show theirs, working, in 2-3 weeks. Not months.
And I love how its so ironic to you that Steve Jobs, a 100% dick, is rich. Guess what? So's Ballmer. So was Gates when he was in the game. It's business.
This is really an awesome idea. I totally dig it. Id love to get my hands on it to really feel what it would be like to use every day, but just from the photos it looks like a great device.
Kudos to you Lenovo!
Make the tablet continue to run Windows, and I'm sold. But for me, a Tablet's useful precisely because I can run Powerpoint from it. Take that away, and there's little point.
@mmaestro
Uh? You would rather use a massive tablet to run a PPT presentation than a miniscule remote?
I'm not sure what you want to do with this thing, but if you're actually doing John Madden-style doodles during your presentations, dude, I don't think technology is your problem.
If they make the laptop part a bit more professional looking and not so "bubbly", I'll take one.
Cool except note taking is basically out, right? Unless there's a stylus hiding somewhere.
What is wrong with you?
resistive are cheaper and you can do multi-touch with them now as well as finger or stylus input. Can even be used if you have gloves on, which capacitive can't. Hand writing recognition software works better with resistive because resistive is more accurate.
This is the most innovating product that is coming out from Lenovo so far. I would gladly pay for this product if the shape of the device would be more conservative.
@k2001
Ugh, but watching that video is just painful... it doesn't work.
It's still in development, but hey, that's why you don't show off something until it's done. Now when we hear about this again in 3 months, the first question is gonna be "did you get the multitouch to work?"
@N900 Just being a good little iDiot by attacking other products.
It looks nice.
I like the concept and the SkyOS thingie looks pretty sweet but I am not even going to question where their design came from. That is a shoddy cheap slap in the face to the iPhone 3G design. what a shame they couldn't innovate and come up with something more original.
@TimT
I'm sorry, since when were rounded edges and chrome borders a new revolutionary concept that Apple invented? You're just pissed off that you finally realize Apple copies just as much as every other major company. Welcome to the real world.
@M3 " since when were rounded edges and chrome borders a new revolutionary concept"
I think you hit the nail right on the head there. The aesthetic design is not a new and revolutionary concept and that is a shame. That said, the concept is awesome and solves both the concerns I have with tablets, as a general rule they suck when it comes to user input. Lenovo did a great thing by allowing the screen to dock with a keyboard and from what I understand the base provides additional processing power to the display (If I read that right) and that is revolutionary IMO.
If anything the black and chrome look is out dated and over used.
It looks very much like the iJoelaf Orgasmatron3000, but without the vacuum ports
Instead of having two OSes, why not just build a tiny OS that turns the slate into a thin client that's streaming from the base computer via WiFI?
All I can think is battery issue.
I'm starting to think of the next evolution of Macbook, it's a hybrid with the slate. Makes sense and definitely worth the $1k for it.
@MikhailT
That's exactly what Microsoft's Side Show did back in the day (2002 or so). It just never took off and was probably ahead of its time, but perhaps they'll resurrect it!
Too much bezel.
But also a huge problem is the lack of responsiveness. Seems a bit laggy and shaky. This sort of device needs about a year for must faster CPUs and OS refinements.
@JS
The technology is here to make this work. No need to wait for anything. What you are looking at is a pre-pre-production version. Of course, there will be bugs in it. They are showing off a concept not a finished product.
I'm wondering about the durability of such a design. It would be pretty sweet to have a tablet to look stuff up on without having to lug a laptop around when I'm studying. But decoupling and coupling the screen day in/day out must incur some serious wear and tear on the connectors.
How many hard drives are there? Is there a single hard drive in the tablet, or two? If there are two, are some files synchronized, or is the tablet part primarily a web device? Do you have a rough estimate of the heat of the device? Thanks!
@N900
I'd list all the many things that appear to be wrong with this cherryboom character, but it's easier to just sum it up this way:
cherryboom = iDIOT!
looks pretty cool - albeit gimmicky. Put in a better screen and I'm there,
It looks lovely but the sheen in it makes me nervous. I'd rather they build such jewels with rubber like edge. I have to have an ugly wii style condom on my iphone. I'm sure it would be better aesthetically if these kinds of products just have more spongey edges. I don't care for its chances when it's dropped; and it will be dropped sometimes.
I'd like to have a week with it, just to see how I'd use the form factor(s). I don't know how useful this entire contraption would be.
Why even bother making this thing? I mean what's the point of having it seperate from the base?? Why even have a base?? jeez why do these designers waste so much time and effort on such a trainwreck!!
EPIC FAIL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I fucking hate the way Yanks say "multi"
@Chuck Dugan Well, I don't like how you say it either.
I thought the screen would be capacative, after all most touch oriented screens would be this. The fact the screen is resistive brings to mind why a stylus and inking wasn't demoed. I missed the use of the windows 7 tip and onenote use on the tablet. Guess the idea is nice, but Lenovo still has a long way to go on this product. Also.. what's up with the 16 GB on the tablet, that can hardly support windows 7. I do not understand this. Unless Lenovo takes more consideration on the choices it made on this product, I think its succes will be shortlived.
yeah; screw apple tablet, give me one of these.
HOT DAM thats nice.
Sometimes I wish pre-production models never get videoed.
That was awesome. It was seamless. The transition. Amazing.
I see we are starting to call tablets "slates" now. It makes it even more impending that the Apple tablet will be called iSlate.
We all laughed at the leaks when it ID'ed the new notebook as MacBook Air. Air Jordan jokes out the ass, etc. But we learned to accept. Just like Wii and Xbox.
@cutepuppyz
When the Macbook Air launched you were giggling about Air Jordan...? I seem to remember half the Internet population having a collective orgasm over the thickness of the laptop, and the other half pissed that it doesn't have enough USB ports (or a DVD drive for that matter).
Yeah as with others, I wish it was just one OS shared between the two components. I think I'd like to see a top heavy version where all the core components were in the tablet part and the shell provided a keyboard, touchpad, few extra connectivity options such as usb or display ports and maybe even an extra battery.
As it is, I find it a bit convoluted to have what appears to me to be essentially two systems on the one device complete with separate CPU's and OS's.
Yeah...that's an AHSOME idea. Just AHsome. To be able to be as MOBILE as "mobile" allows. There shouldn't be a need to lug around an entire laptop if you don't need to, plus the e-reader-esque functionality of a touch screen tablet is sort of defeated as an ergonomic device when there is a keyboard, battery, HD, processor, etc. in your hand too like a convertible tablet normally brings. The UI is definitely cool on the slate portion, (touch interactivity in general needs to be greatly improved...also tracking and speed to keep the action on the screen as close to the actual finger as possible.) The multimedia focus of the slate is AHSOME (easy to access AND use). Running full windows 7 on the slate would be a battery KILLER, so I can see the need for two "OS'es". And it looks like they are integrated pretty well (remove from dock and window stays), but what can't you run when not docked? Catch-22.
It's AHsome right, now but needs tinkering to beat Apple.
Just make the whole thing a god damned track pad.
Looks good! +1 innovation. -1 iPod/iPhone clone. The touch experience doesn't look good.. but we'll see...
Looks pretty cool...
Would be nice if it had pixel qi screen on it.
But I think you said earlier about $1000 ?
Almost seems like lots of companies are talking about similar stuff cheaper...
As in just a tablet and separate notebook for about the same money maybe??
I guess we'll see how it all washes out.
I would like cheap docks available that just had some nice speakers and a charger, which hung on the wall and were not too expensive.
Something a tablet like this just popped into.
Awesome! My brother Dino's winning sketch for the "One Hour Design Challenge" appears in the video at about 1:05 on the laptop screen!!
Go Dino!
Revision3 just did a video review of this PC as well.
http://youtube.com/watch?v=-5DYuVN6nuY
the multimedia interface looks exactly like the AOL OpenRide software that came out several years ago. it had mail, web, etc and that same button thing in the center of the 4 panes where u could resize everything
here is an article on openride that i found really quick on google...
http://gigaom.com/2006/10/04/openride/
somehow the whole big rounded corner thing is looking really old fashioned for me. it's making it look like an enlarged iphone, without the style (done by microsoft engineers).
Needs the pixel Qi screen to be complete. Please make a pixel qi version for ebook win! The killer app for me would be a epaper like screen with multi touch for google reader goodness. I love google reader, but wish I could read it on my Sony-505. Also would love to be able to read PDFs on a decent e-reader device. Hopefully the tablet will have bluetooth (would love to be able to record lectures with an external mic) as well.