A touch too much?
Computing giant HP likes to launch new products in bursts and, with the launch of Microsoft's new operating system - Windows 7 - due in nine days, it wasn't about to make an exception this time. Both consumers and businesses got some HP love this morning, so we'll cut to the chase and get straight to the shiny things.
One of the key features of Windows 7 is the ‘multitouch' functionality it enables. HP has been among the most enthusiastic exponents of touch-screen PCs, so it comes as no surprise to see three new TouchSmart PCs, as well as a 42 inch HD digital signage touch display.
The HP TouchSmart 300 and 600 are 20 and 23 inch touch-screen PCs and run on AMD and Intel CPUs, respectively. They offer full, gesture driven multitouch functionality. Among the pre-installed touch-enabled applications are:
- Hulu desktop
- Netflix
- HP Music Store with Rhapsody
- Pandora Internet radio
- TouchSmart RecipeBox - voice command recipes
- TouchSmart Live TV - TV recorder
- TouchSmart Canvas - photo displayer
- TouchSmart Link - Bluetooth transfer from mobile devices
There's also a new tablet PC - the HP TouchSmart tx2. As well as most of the above applications is also has some touch-enabled games and Corel Painter Sketch Pad. It weighs 4.65 pounds, has a 12.1-inch WGXA HD HP LED widescreen, AMD Turion dual-core processors and an HP Imprint finish. It has a swivel screen and a rechargeable digital ink pen with OCR software for hours of tablet fun.
Apparently not available in the US is a new HP dv3 - a 13.3 inch Intel based notebook with TouchSmart functionality, shown below.
