Lenovo IdeaPad K1 Tablet

Lenovo has finally entered the Android tablet market with the 10.1-inch IdeaPad K1, which mixes innovative UI enhancements and a useful selection of pre-loaded apps with a stylish, colorful design. With a $499 price for the 32GB version, this tablet is $100 less than theSamsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 and Apple iPad 2 with the same amount of storage. But is the IdeaPad K1 innovative enough to steer you away from better-known slates?

Design

At 10.4 x 7.44 x .52 inches and 1.6 pounds, the IdeaPad K1 is quite a bit larger and heavier than rivals such as the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 (9.7 x 6.7 x 0.34 inches, 1.2 pounds) and the iPad 2 (9.5 x 7.3 x 0.3 inches, 1.3 pounds). However, the 10.75 x 6.7 x 0.6-inch Toshiba Thrive felt a lot bulkier in our hands despite weighing the same amount. The tapered edges on the K1 help.

With its matte, chrome-colored side and back trim and deep red back panel, the IdeaPad K1 is one of the most attractive tablets we've ever seen. The back panel also comes in white and dark gray, but we strongly recommend the snazzy red shade of our review unit. Unfortunately, there's nothing particularly unique about the glossy front panel and the large surrounding bezel. Both the screen and the back panel are fingerprint magnets, showing nearly every touch you've made when viewed in bright light.

Display

The 10.1-inch, 1280 x 800-pixel glossy display provided sharp and bright images, but colors were not nearly as vibrant as on the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1. When we looked at the two tablets' displays side by side, the red bar at the top of CNN.com was a dull brick red on the IdeaPad K1 and a lighter, more orangey red on the Galaxy Tab 10.1. However, edges of objects seemed a bit sharper on the K1 than on the Tab.

Viewing angles were solid on the K1; we were able to watch a movie without significant color degradation while the tablet was sitting on a table a few feet away from us and when we viewed it from 45 degree angles. However, the glossy panel kicks back a lot of ambient light.

The capacitive digitizer was highly responsive to our swipes and taps--most of the time. Multitouch gestures such as pinch-to-zoom also worked smoothly.

Keyboard

The Lenovo IdeaPad K1 features just the stock Android 3.1 Honeycomb keyboard with no special features. Typing on the keys, particularly in landscape mode, was quick and easy. However, we wish the K1 offered haptic feedback and gave us the option of using Swype, which lets you type by tracing the letters together.

Ports and Buttons

The IdeaPad K1 offers a useful selection of ports and buttons. On the left side (when the tablet is held in landscape mode) sit a power button, up/down volume rocker, a screen rotation lock switch, and a microSD card reader. Opening the card reader, which sits behind a tiny metal cover, is a huge hassle that requires sticking a paperclip into a hole next to the port.

On the bottom, long side sit a mini HDMI out port, a headset jack, and a proprietary docking port. Unfortunately, you must use the proprietary docking port to AC adapter cable to charge the tablet and the docking port to USB cable to sync with your PC. There is no microUSB port for charging or transferring data, so if you lose the cables the tablet comes with, you're in trouble.

We appreciated the large, physical home button that sits on the bezel, but wish the IdeaPad K1 also had a physical back button like the ThinkPad Tablet. A full-size USB port such as the one found on the Toshiba Thrive also would have been appreciated.

Software and UI

From its home screen on down to its Android buttons, the IdeaPad K1 features some major improvements on the standard Honeycomb interface we've seen on all of its Android 3.1 competitors. Instead of the electric-blue Tron-esque wallpaper and back/home/layers (a.k.a. task switching) buttons, the K1 comes with a rustic wheat field that reminded us of an Andrew Wyeth painting. The all-white back/home/menu buttons also have a much more down-home feel.

In the center of the home screen sits the Lenovo Launcher Widget, which features four "zones" (a.k.a. buttons) surrounding a giant globe icon. The five "zones" are Watch (default launches mSpot Movies), Email (default launches Gmail client), Listen (default launches Slacker), Read (default launches Zinio magazine reader), and Web browser (the giant globe).

Tapping the settings wheel on the left of the widget allows you to customize which apps each of the zones launches and replace the globe button with a single image or slideshow. You can also change the color of the zone buttons and turn on/off Lenovo messages which appear as a tiny "I" icon between the Email and Read zones.

We strongly recommend disabling the Lenovo messages, because they are nothing more than advertisements for movies, music, and other paid services. In fact, throughout our testing, the Lenovo message kept recommending that we buy an explicit rap album from the group LMFAO at Amazon.com. This kind of adult content recommendation would pose a serious problem for families with children.

The home screen is also adorned with shortcuts that toggle the speakers and microphone. A lock-shaped icon allows you to put the device to sleep without hitting the power button.

In the middle of the status bar sits the App Wheel button, which looks a lot like a comics-style speech bubble. When you tap it, the App Wheel appears on the right side of the screen, showing thumbnails of your six favorite apps. Swiping up and down on the wheel rotates through these thumbnails, while tapping on one launches its associated app. You can add/remove apps from the wheel by tapping the + / - icon that appears when it is active. This feature is welcome, but we guarantee that first-time Android Honeycomb tablet users will initially confuse the App Wheel with the Recent Apps button in the System bar.

As with other Honeycomb tablets, tapping on the Recent Apps button reveals a scrollable list of thumbnails for your open apps. However, Lenovo has innovated in a major way by adding "close" buttons to the corner of each thumbnail. Tapping one of these red Xs closes its associated app, saving precious system resources.

Toughbook

Panasonic Drops ‘Toughbook’ Android Tablet, Which Doesn’t Break

Dubbed the Toughbook tablet, Panasonic’s Android slate caters to those prone to excess dropping, be it electronics or otherwise. The Toughbook joins the company’s line of durable, impact-resistant devices. Panasonic’s Toughbook product line has been around since 1993, touting a device portfolio comprised mostly of notebooks and slate-shaped PCs. The rugged devices come encased in high-impact plastics normally reserved for items that expect to take a beating, like car bumpers and bicycle helmets.

As 2011 has seen countless Android tablet debuts, manufacturers must fight to differentiate. Motorola’s Xoom tablet launched in February as the flagship device for Android 3.0 (Honeycomb). HTC’s Flyer tablet recently dropped, with the company heavily hyping the accompanying stylus pen to make the tablet unique. The Toughbook has a better chance of standing out in the crowded field, however, as the heavy-duty construction may appeal to the roughnecked crowd. Think: geologists in the field, or perhaps an emergency room doc.

 

Like Samsung’s recent Galaxy Tab revamp, the Toughbook comes with a 10.1-inch screen. The display differs from many existing Android tablets, however; Instead of a glossy TFT screen, the Toughbook tablet features a matte-finished XGA display, which the company claims is easier to read in outdoor, high-brightness settings.

Although further details are scant at the moment, we know the Toughbook will come with a stylus (like the Flyer), as well as optional 3G and 4G versions. We aren’t sure what version of the Android operating system the tablet will run, but press photos suggest it isn’t Honeycomb. Mum’s the word on pricing, but you should expect to see the Toughbook tablet come Christmas time. Rest assured we eagerly await getting our hands on one for demolition testing.

MediaPad

MediaPad Android tablet launched

In Singapore today, Chinese electronics manufacturer, Huawei hosted the official global launch of its latest tablet, the Huawei media pad. Present at the event were Qualcomm, Gameloft, and Real as well – partners that worked together with Huawei to create the tablet. The event was brief and straight to the point, showing off to the world what Huawei has in store for us.

The MediaPad’s specs are what you would expect from what Huawei calls the world’s smartest, slimmest, lightest, and affordable tablet in its class. It will be the world’s first tablet to run on Qualcomm’s 1.2GHz Snapdragon processor, and Android 3.2 Honeycomb. Yes, that’s 3.2 and not 3.1. According to Victor Xu, Huawei’s Chief Marketing Officer – it is the first version of the Android operating system that’s been optimized to run on 7″ tablets. Other than that, he didn’t elaborate on what else Android 3.2 brings to the table. Perhaps we’ll find out more in due time.

The tablet features a 7″ display that has a pixel density of 217 PPI, which is pretty impressive, especially when compared to other tablets such as the iPad 2 (132 PPI), Galaxy Tab 10.1 (149) and Motorola Xoom (160). But keep in mind that the tablet’s display is smaller: the other tablets have ~10″ screens. It supports 1080p full HD video, HDMI output, and Flash 10.3. The tablet is also touted to play audio and video files of any format. Huawei worked together with RealNetworks (the folks behind RealVideo and RealPlayer) to ensure the tablet’s ability to play any format. Announced formats include: WMV, Flash, Mp3, and H.264.

It has a sleek two-tone uni-body aluminum alloy body with a design that is said to resemble an hour clock. It weighs 0.86 pounds (390g), and is 10.5mm thick – with its 7″ size, its small form factor is the ideal size to travel around with. The MediaPad also features HSPA+ 14.4Mbps, WiFi and Bluetooth2.1+EDR connectivity. It comes with a GPS radio, and A-GPS support. The tablet packs a 5-megapixel rear camera with HD video recording (not mentioned if its 1080p or 720p), and a 1.3-megapixel front facing camera.

The tablet will support the Android Market, Huawei’s own app store, and other 3rd party app stores. No prices were announced but Victor Xu promises that it will be available globally in Q3 this year (America, Asia and select European markets). The tablet will be sold through carriers and retail outlets. So far the tablet sounds like a great device for watching movies, listening to music and playing games on the go. We’ll just have to see is Huawei delivers what it promises when the MediaPad is released later this year.

EKING S700 e-notepad

Shenzhen Guangxuntong communications technology, has a Chinese company now the world’s first E-S700 notebook launched called subsistence farming. The 7-inch set is for those who developed outside their normal office environment and the need to take notes work. It has a 7-inch color screen with both resistive touch input and an electromagnetic stylus integrated 3G, fingerprint scanner, 3-megapixel auto focus camera and a music player. The subsistence economy S700 will be available before the end of the year, unfortunately there is still no word on pricing details.

The kids at Eking don't always take due credit for their handiwork (they're usually busy manufacturing devices that get badged by companies like Viliv) but this time around they seem pretty proud of their S700 E-notepad. "A notepad," the company states in its PR, "means 'a memorandum' in English. With the prefix E, e-notepad means electron memorandum, abbreviated as electron book.

It's concise and easy to understand and can be accepted by consumers." You get all that? It sports a color 7-inch display with both resistive touch input and an electromagnetic stylus (just like your old Wacom tablet), integrated 3G, fingerprint scanner, three megapixel camera, and a plastic case that looks similar to the one that came with our old Day Runner knock-off. And it's apparently a color display, because "multi-purpose colored electronic notepads will certainly replace the black and white E-books of simple features. It's a trend the same as that of the color TV sets replacing the black and white ones." Took the words right out of our mouth, Shenzhen PR guy! Not entirely sure on a price or release date for this one, but you'll know as soon as we do. Promise.

LG E-Note H1000B

LG E-Note H1000B Tablet Powered by Atom Z530 Processor

The LG E-Note H1000B Tablet is new portable device is first available in South Korean market with price of $854. powered by Atom Z530 processor which running at 1.6 GHz, sports a 10.1-inch display with resolution of 1366 x 768 pixels with touchscreen compatibility, up to 1GB of system memory and solid state drive capacity of 16GB which pre-installed with Windows 7 Starter OS.

The E-Note H1000B PC also support a wide range of peripherals such as USB interface, SD card slot, built-in Bluetooth 3.0, and 802.11 b/g/n WiFi connectivity.

After seeing an unceremonious outing by the FCC and Twitter, LG's newest take on the Windows 7 tablet form-factor is finally official. The 10.1-inch 1366 x 768 pixel capacitive screen E-Note H1000B runs Windows 7 Starter on a 1.6GHz Atom Z530 processor with 16GB of SSD storage and 1GB of memory all powered by a 4-cell battery. The 14.5-mm thick / 850-gram slab packs 2x USB 2.0 jacks an SD card reader and 802.11b/g/n and Bluetooth 3.0 radios when sold for 961,000 Korean won (about $850) with a portable WiMAX router bundle on LG's home turf. The perfect tablet to accompany you at the world premier of Avatar. What? With specs like this it must be late 2009, right?

SHOGO Tablet

SHOGO Tablet Announced in Japan

The tablet computer war has just started with another addition of a 10.1 inch display SHOGO tablet computer which has just been released in Japan by RealEase Inc. This SHOGO tablet even has a 2.0 mega pixel camera which is not present in most of the tablet devices released this year.

The SHOGO Tablet device is a Linux powered tablet measuring 268×168x16 (WxHxD) mm and only weighing 0.8 kg. The SHOGO device is powered by ARM processor (iMX-51 Cortex A8 2H2010) and has a 256MB DDR RAM. The device has an internal storage space of 4GB which can be increased by adding an external memory card. Like many other tablet computers, the SHOGO tablet has support for Wi-Fi along with a handy Ethernet support as well. The device has integrated camera as well as mic for making video calls.

The display has a 10.1 inch LED backlit display supporting maximum resolutions of 1024×600 pixels. Depending upon usage, the battery will last for 4-8 hours. Currently the SHOGO tablet device is only released in Japan with a price tag of 56,800 JPY or roughly 670 USD which includes shipping and tax.

ASUS 12-inch Tablet

ASUS 12-inch Tablet EP 121

ASUS is now planning to launch ASUS Eee Pad EP 121 and is most probably coming in this summer. This Eee Pad is designed with amazing features which are far better and advanced than the running Eee Pads from ASUS.

The prominent features include:

• Intel Core Duo CULV (low voltage processor)

• Webcam support

• 10 hours battery time

• Windows 7 Premium OS

Due to the smart dimension and light weight of the EP 121 tablet it is easy to carry anywhere and also the display screen is wider than the previous ASUS tablets having 10-inch display. As news are coming, it is also expected that the Eee Pad can play video for 10hrs like the iPad does, if this could happen than this Eee Pad will get the similar popularity as Apple’s iPads have.

Original JooJoo tablet

Fusion Garage ends original JooJoo tablet, plans native apps
Fusion Garage chief Chandrashekar Rathakrishnan said on Thursday that the existing JooJoo tablet was being phased out. The one-time iPad rival was marked as "end of life" and would mark an end to the original platform, the CEO told e27. The switch to Android was going to lead to a "completely different" set of hardware.


He also acknowledged that the strategy of a web-only tablet originally conceived before the TechCrunch split hadn't worked. Apple's success was considered a lesson for Fusion Garage as it proved that native apps were still necessary for a tablet. The JooJoo was built with the idea that it would cost no more than $300 or as little as $200 since it wouldn't need storage, but the end product cost $500 after the decision to use an Intel Atom and NVIDIA Ion graphics forced the price upwards.


"I think it's very obvious with the advance of the iPad that while web remains probably the number one thing that we do with our devices, the lack of end-to-end connectivity means that there’s a need to have a hybrid, to have both a web and non-web experience," Rathakrishnan said. "And that's where we fell short with our product."

Sales were softer than expected and were primarily weak in the iPad's American home, but Asian and European sales were relatively strong. The executive wouldn't give out actual numbers, but they weren't as bad as what was "read on the Internet," he said.


The company has raised another $5 million and is hoping to avoid some of its early mistakes. Every device will have 3G with a unique inter-device communication method. The Singapore-based company also plans to sell through large retail chains and make carrier deals where its early sales were hampered by the online-only limit. Ad agencies, hospitals and transportation firms may also start carrying the hardware, albeit de-branded.

Galaxy Tab

Galaxy Tab may reach AT&T with $50 premium
A leaked AT&T document courtesy of Engadget indicates the provider will offer the Samsung Galaxy Tab tablet on November 21, priced at $650 off-contract. This is $50 dearer than what T-Mobile and Sprint charge on the same terms but is not yet official. The document also shows that AT&T will offer the same data plans as it does for Apple's iPad, including a $15-per-month, 250MB plan and a $25, 2GB plan.


What the AT&T Galaxy Tab will offer that both the T-Mobile or Verizon versions do not, however, is a preloaded Nook eReader app and AT&T's own Account Manager app that will let users activate the device and refill monthly credits. Owners of the Android-powered device from AT&T will also get access to the provider's network of hotspots around the country.


A formal announcement confirming these numbers and date is expected from AT&T in the near future.

MSI FX600MX Notebook

MSI FX600MX Notebook – Something Naughty and Nice

These days notebook manufacturers are doing their utmost to get the best performance and battery life from their devices, it seems as if MSI may have came up with the perfect solution in their new FX600MX notebook. This model features a new graphic switching technology, this allows you to use the standard integrated GPU when you are not carrying out graphically intensive tasks, however when you do want to game or edit some video etc you can switch on its NVIDIA 310M graphics card, which features 512MB of RAM.


Other specs include a 15.6 inch LED backlit display which supports 720p HD visuals, up to 8GB of RAM, a 320GB or 500GB HDD, the choice of either an Intel Core i5 or Core i3 processor, Bluetooth, a dual layer DVD writer, VGA-out, HDMI-out, a 6-cell battery and Windows 7 Home Premium.
Currently we have no idea of pricing or a release date, therefore we will have to keep you posted. I wonder just how much extra this graphics switching tech will cost…



In addition to the MSI FR600 3D laptop that we mentioned a few days ago, there is another MSI notebook entitled FX600MX which doesn’t have a price tag or release date so far.  Anyway, the MSI FX600MX packs a 15.6-inch screen with 1366×768 as the resolution, a nVidia GeForce 310M graphics card with 512MB, and an Intel Core i3 or i5 processor. Other details include a hard-drive with 320GB or 500GB, Windows 7 Home Premium as the OS and the usual extras like WiFi, Bluetooth 2.1, a 4-in-1 media card reader, and VGA + HDMI connectors.