Last week Panasonic released its new UMPC, Panasonic Toughbook CF-U1, in Canada. Rugged, of course. (Available in the US since June.) In the photo the Panasonic rep is pouring water on the PC to show it continue working in harsh environments. This announcement is a good reminder how Tablet PC form factors have continued to diversify. Think about how many different types of Tablet PCs are available today.

Tablet taxonomy may have changed over the years, but fundamentally two familiar categories are the pillars: 1) Slate and 2) Convertible.

Slate form factors have all the PC components centralized behind the display. Several companies offer slates: Motion, TabletKiosk, Electrovaya, HTC, OQO, Samsung, Fujitsu, Avantech, DRS, General Dynamics, Everex, Getac, MobileDemand, Panasonic, Roper Mobile, and others. The simple design where the display is always exposed makes it easy to use in medical environments, manufacturing, military, and other mobile work place environments.

Convertibles are traditional clamshell notebooks with a swivel or sliding hinge. All of the major OEMs offer convertible Tablet PCs, including Dell, HP, Lenovo, Toshiba, MPC, Fujitsu, and ASUS. The attached keyboard and choice to use a pen when needed appeals to general business users, students, and a growing number of consumers.

There have been attempts to segment the categories by type of digitizer too, with EM and resistive. But then along came dual EM + resistive digitizers and today dual EM + capacitive are available. Too complicated.

Screen size was another marketing distinction. Tablet PCs with 8.9" display and larger and UMPCs with 7" and lower. Then came MID, still a PC, but even smaller display than UMPCs. Of course, individual companies started calling things whatever they needed to so they could appeal to their specific customer base.

There are rugged, semi-rugged, commercial, and even consumer Tablet PCs. Some are called UMPCs, others MIDs, and I'm sure we'll see some Netbooks with digitizers eventually.

At the core, if these units have digitizers, then they are Tablet PCs. But Tablet PC may not apply as this category of multi-functions, multi-features, multi-shapes continues. What do you think the next generation will be called?

This is a nice problem for the software to have -- many different types of form factors on which it can be used and used in many different ways. I'm glad there are creative people helping to move these various form factors forward. I look forward to seeing what's next.



What Is New in Tablet PCs and UMPCs.