We love us a good multitouch wall experience, sizing up and rotating irrelevant bits of media like the Tom Cruise wannabes we are, but this new multitouch wall unveiled by Schematic at the Cannes Lions advertising festival almost brings the tech into the realm of relevance. The main innovation is the identification of specific users through the swipe of an RFID badge, allowing multiple users to operate the display simultaneously with personalized data and "social" functionality. Schematic's dream really is a Minority Report-style world of advertising, but until that chilling future is fully realized, we suppose we can handle a few gimmicky multitouch walls and half-developed socializing functionality in the near term. Hit up the read link for video.

ASRock isn't exactly the very first company we think of when it comes to innovation, but the ASUS spinoff actually has a pretty good track record of going out on a limb. The new Multibook G22, for instance, combines the dual core Atom 330 processor, NVIDIA Ion, 2GB of RAM, a feature-rich multitouch trackpad, and a widescreen 12.1-inch 1366 x 768 display. It still feels "netbook-ey" for our money, but in a good way. Other perks include a 10-in-1 card reader, big people hard drive capacities (320GB instead of the 160GB netbook max), VGA and HDMI, 802.11n, Bluetooth 2.1+EDR and a DVD burner. It all weighs in at over 3.3 pounds without battery, and measures more than an inch thick. Yeah, those last few bullet points might throw this out of the realm of netbook contention, but at least there's an Atom processor in here keeping things slow enough for the most basic of tasks. No word on price or availability.

Update: According to Liliputing, ASRock has made contact and states that the G22 is actually running an Intel CULV processor and chipset, instead of Atom and Ion -- bad news for Ion junkies, good news for CULV lovers. A bit of a mixed bag, if you ask us.

[Thanks, Shawn]

This video of iPhone OS 2.x running on a 24-inch multitouch monitor from Swedish design firm Dreamfield is almost certainly fake, but hey -- it's Sunday night, nothing's going on, and we were thinking about how well touch-specific systems would work on a larger screen after seeing those CrunchPad videos anyway, so we thought we'd get some conversation going. We'd be willing to bet that a future Apple tablet has more in common with the experience shown in this video than with what we currently think of as OS X, but we're not so certain we're seeing anything here that makes us want to throw our mouse or keyboard away -- or spend the entire day with gorilla arm. So -- artfully mocked-up glimpse of the future, or just a pipe dream?

Keeping with the likely-fake theme, there's also a probably-fake video of SNES and PS1 emulators running on the Pre, controlled by a Bluetooth gamepad. Yes, it's incredibly awesome -- and undoubtedly possible -- but until we see some evidence of how things are loaded up and connected with the gamepad we're sticking it in the fake category as well.

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]

Synaptics has always been quick to pick up the latest innovation in the multitouch space -- whether its own functionality, or something Apple's brewed up. This latest innovation is squarely in the latter category, with new ClickPad trackpads offering that love-it-or-hate-it buttonless design of the new MacBooks and MacBook Pros (pictured). Synaptics is targeting the new pads at netbooks, which many manufacturers have had trouble fitting regular clickers onto. ClickPads work with Synaptic's latest Gesture Suite 9.1, which includes all the regulars, along with three-finger flick and three-finger press, which lets you start up your computer along with up to six predetermined startup apps. SGS 9.1 is also officially Windows 7 ready, and will be available in OEM systems out of the gate.

Our initial experience with Windows 7's multitouch was decidedly less than stellar, but it looks like Microsoft's taking the initiative to ramp up the usability with the newly-unveiled Touch Pack. It's a software suite consisting of three games and three Surface apps, including a a globe you can pinch and twist around, the ever-popular surface collage for images, and and a zen-inspired lagoon screensaver. OEMs making touchscreen-capable Windows 7 rigs are being offered the pack to use as a pre-installed option, so look for these to arrive around the same time as the new OS, which should be sometime this holiday season. In the meantime, GottaBeMobile's gotten their hands on the app collection early, and you can view their efforts in the video after the break.

Read - Windows 7 Team Blog
Read - GottaBeMobile's hands-on

Immersion (known for creative input experiences) demoed a fairly interesting new haptic experiment its working on dubbed TouchSense -- a virtual, iPhone-like keyboard that not only responds with sound and vibration, but some kind of feedback that recreates the feeling of actually moving your fingers across a keyboard. Details were scarce on the technology used, but during the demo at D7 the company showed off multitouch typing, and a new form of feedback which seems to create the sensation that there is a physical keyboard beneath your fingers. The functionality sounds eerily similar to the Haptikos technology that Nokia showed off way back in 2007. We're working on more details, but for now, feast your eyes on the pics in the gallery below.

Update: Press release after the break.

DigiTimes has a couple of back-to-back rumors from its industry sources that could be of interest to Nokia fans. Yesterday, the Taiwanese rumor rag said that Nokia will adopt a Synaptics touchscreen integrated circuit (which may or may not support multi-touch) solution for an upcoming "high-end handset" due for launch in the 3rd quarter of 2009. To be clear, this is not the N97 which is expected to go on sale in June. Now DigiTimes adds that capacitive touch panel orders from Nokia have been received from Wintek, the same supplier fitting Nokia's 5800 with resistive touchscreens. We're big fans of silky smooth, capacitive glass panels on finger-friendly touchscreen phones so we'll be stoked if these rumors prove true.

Read -- Nokia adopts Synaptics touchscreen IC
Read -- Wintek lands orders from Nokia

Japan got the first crack at Dell's new multitouch all-in-one Studio One 19 in March, but it's finally headed our way. As expected, prices start at $699, with a Pentium E5200 Dual Core processor, GeForce 9200 integrated graphics, a 320GB HDD, 2GB of RAM and a slot-loading DVD burner in the low-end. Built-in webcams and multitouch features are present across the board. Check out a video of the multitouch functionality after the break: nothing much beyond the usual gimmicks, though we're a fan of letting your kid lay down beats with his jam-covered fingers -- that's true love.

While attempts to add feedback to touchscreen displays via vibration and audible tones are laudable, these attempts are nothing by comparison to the tactile euphoria felt at the press of a well-designed button. Still, many of us are willing to sacrifice tactility in order to maximize display sizes on our pocketable or portable devices. Now researchers at Carnegie Mellon have developed touch-sensitive displays with physical buttons that "pop-out" from the surface. CM's prototypes pump air through geometric-shaped holes to create concave or convex "buttons" on a screen covered with a semi-transparent latex -- IR sensors and cameras detect finger placement while a projector cast images (like numbers and graphics) onto the display. It can even sense press-force by monitoring changes in air pressure. Sure it all sounds overly cumbersome until you see the technology demonstrated. For that you can travel to Pittsburgh to count the rivers or just hit the read link below for the video.

Read -- Video
Read -- Technology Review

If the recent footage of Sharp's Mebius NJ70A and its LCD multitouch trackpad has gotten you hot, bothered, and reaching for your wallet, Dynamism is now taking pre-orders for the Japanese import netbook. The 4-inch touchscreen notwithstanding, you're looking at a 1.6GHz Intel Atom machine and the usual, ho-hum specs that go along with it -- not an easy pill to swallow when you're staring down a $999 price tag. Ship date is June 5th, and you might want to take that time to brush up on your skills with a Japanese International Layout keyboard if you're seriously considering the purchase.

About a year ago Lenovo's ThinkPad X300 launched as a direct competitor to Apple's slinky MacBook Air. Over that time, the ultra-slim Thinkpad with a face for business has come to either match or dominate the MBA in nearly every category except the sexy. Now you can tick off one more as the X301 brings a new multi-touch trackpad option with fingerprint reader. In the typical befuddlement that seems to greet every new on-line spec on the Lenovo store, the new TouchPad is listed as a $9,969 option. Too rich? They maybe the $8,402 bump from a 1.4GHz to new 1.6GHz Core 2 Duo SU9600 processor will interest you?

[Thanks, James C.]