Dell Latitude XT2 XFR – Rugged touchscreen laptop

June 21, 2011 – 8:00 am

The Dell Latitude XT2 XFR is the Bear Grylls of laptops, drinking its own pee and surfing down avalanches are all in a days work for this rugged laptop.

Powered by an Intel Core2 Duo 1.6Ghz processor, up to 5GB of RAM and using either a 64GB or 128GB solid state drive for storage the XT2 XFR is a laptopt with respectable specs. This laptop isn’t about dazzling processor speed or gaming performance though, if you are considering buying this laptop then you are more interested in it’s tough exterior and military grade damage protection. The Latitude XT2 XFR has been tested to military standards, rated for ingress protection and drop tested to 3ft it’s built for extreme use, it won’t be stopped by humid environments or vibration which would halt other laptops in their tracks.

The screen of the Latitude XFR XT2 is a full multi-touch screen which swivels round and folds over to turn the XT2 XFR from a rugged laptop into a rugged tablet. Dell has realised that this laptop is going to be used outside so have provided a 12.1″ outdoor viewable screen which excels in sunlight. The rubber backlit keyboard is another great feature which ensures that the XT2 XFR can be used in dark conditions.

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Acer Iconia dual screen laptop

June 20, 2011 – 5:59 am

Every now and then a laptop design comes along which you know is about to start a step-change or a revolution in the world of portable computing and the Acer Iconia is that type of laptop. The Iconia is a touchscreen laptop but instead of going down the predictable route of providing a keyboard and touchscreen in the traditional design Acer have given the Iconia two touchscreens, so where you expect to see a keyboard there is a second touch screen.

The Iconia is a well spec’d laptop with an Intel core i5 processor, 4GB RAM and 640GB of storage providing good performance. Where the Iconia excels is in providing a personalised user experience, the two 14″ HD screens allow an infinitely customisable set-up. Placing both hands palm-down on the lower screen activates a full-size QWERTY keyboard but the Iconia offers so much more such as the opportunity to create hot-gestures to open applications or complete functions. People have been using customisable keyboards for years and the latest progression has been towards OLED keyboards with a screen built into each key but the what the Iconia offers could see the OLED keyboard become obsolete before it has even started.

On the downside the screens are a bit too reflective and not fantastic quality in terms of viewing angles. There will also be a lack of software which can take full advantage of the Iconia’s input options.

We see a lot of concepts which promise so much but with the Iconia Acer delivers something innovative and unique and its not a concept, this a real product and available now it’s maybe not the finished article and could be improved but kudos to Acer for trying where others default to the same tried and tested formats.

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LG Optimus Pad

June 19, 2011 – 11:07 am

The LG Optimus Pad is the first tablet to arrive on the market with a 3D camera but is that enough to make this tablet stand out from the crowd?

The Optimus Pad is an Andriod tablet running on Honeycomb 3.0 with a NVidia Tegra 2 processor so it’s comparable in spec to the Motorola Xoom and Asus Transformer. The Optimus Pad has a slightly smaller screen size than it’s Android powered competitors at 8.9″ but the screen itself is bright and picture quality is excellent. The smaller screen means the Optimus Pad is smaller in terms of overall width and length but in terms of thickness it is slightly chunky.

The Optimus Pad is fuelled by a 1Ghz Tegra 2 dual-core processor with 1GB of RAM and 32GB internal memory which all means that in benchmarking tests it is on a par with the Xoom and Transformer.

Where the Optimus Pad is set apart is in the camera department with a 5MP front facing 3D camera which can take 5MP still photos, 720p HD video and 3D video. The 3D capture has two modes, mixed mode which is only viewable through a 3D TV or another 3D enabled device and anaglyph mode which is the older style of 3D output which we’ve all seen before using red-cyan 3D specs. The quality of the 3D footage is fair but also unrivalled in the tablet market. The Optimus Pad is unfurtunately unable to show 3D footage so the full benefit of the 3D camera is lost and somewhat lessens the impact, basically unless you’ve got a 3D TV you aren’t really going to be able to fully appreciate all that 3D video you are capturing.

Th verdict? Current prices for the Optimus Pad are high so it seems expensive compared to the competition in the Android tablet market unless you’ve really got to have that 3D camera………..

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