One new trend in the Computer world is the new laptop / tablet convertible computers. If you aren’t familiar with this new trend, the laptop / tablet convertible is essentially a full functioning laptop that has a touchscreen and an ability to fold so you can hide the keyboard. I wanted to take a look at this overall new technology and see how these new laptop tablets stack up to a traditional laptop.
At this point in time, most major laptop manufacturers have jumped on this laptop/tablet convertible bandwagon. Dell has the XPS 12 Convertible, Asus has the Taichi, Sony has the Vaio Hybrid Convertible, and so on. The different convertibles have their differences, but the overall concept is the same.
The Specs
The one thing I was worried about with this new convertible laptop is that the specs wouldn’t be up to par when compared to the standard laptop. Generally speaking, this was not the case. Most of these convertibles are powered by some type of dual-core Intel chip. Often times, these are the same chips you would find in a regular laptop. The memory sizes of these tablet/laptop convertibles were also up to par. Most come standard with 4GB or more of memory. The screen resolutions and video cards were also pretty solid as well.
The one place that these convertibles aren’t up to par is hard drive size. Let me stress that it is hard drive SIZE only. These convertibles are powered by solid state hard drives which are much faster than the standard SATA drives. However, with a solid state drive only, you give up a lot of space. Most of the convertibles I checked out had only 128GB-256GB.
Best of Both Worlds
After some research and the chance to play around with these convertibles a bit, I would say that these truly offer the best of both worlds. These computers are mobile and responsive like a tablet, however, they still offer the full power of a laptop. Having access to a real keyboard and the specs of a full powered laptop truly make these devices pretty powerful. I can see these laptops becoming very popular in the business world. They are powerful enough to be your everyday computer. At the same time, they are mobile and responsive, so I can see them being taken to meetings or on business travel.
Price and Other Downsides
As you can expect with any new technology, the price can be a bit high. Most of these laptop/tablet convertibles start at over $1000. The other downside, as I mentioned above, is that these hybrid PCs don’t have that much hard drive space at this point. So, if that is something you need, this new technology is probably not for you. Last, the processor and video card are pretty solid, however, they are not going to be powerful enough to run any modern games, run AutoCAD well, or edit video. If you need this kind of power, you may want to look at a normal, high-end laptop or desktop.
Overall, I would recommend this new technology to anyone who wants the power of the average laptop, but the mobility and responsiveness of a tablet.