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Insane netbook to sliding keyboard tablet hack in progress

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tabletadventSliding keyboards aren’t exactly one of my favorite designs, but I give c0ff33 on the InsanelyWind forum credit for taking it in what I think is a smart direction and trying to get it done on his hacked MSI Wind tablet.

Nothing to see of the slider just yet, but he’s got the display with touchscreen planted on top of the keyboard. The goal is for it to slide up and tilt, making it a convertible with both slate and laptop modes. Makes sense to me. He’s using the MSI Wind keyboard, which is designed for standard touch typing, not thumb typing.

Thinking about this design further, I admit that leaving the screen exposed gives the slider design a perceived disadvantage compared to the twist convertible. But sliding the screen back and up is more convenient than a flip and twist. It also avoids screen reorientation, which can cause problems with graphics and video playback. As slates become more accepted, perhaps the slider convertible will make a comeback.

Via Liliputing

4 Comments

4 Comments

  1. Tamas

    02/01/2010 at 8:07 pm

    If you think of this as a slate with an attached keyboard the design makes sense…
    Definitely better then the flip and twist design both for orientation issues and hinge durability as well: my tx2000 has a bit shakey screen after 1 year use…

  2. Flo

    02/02/2010 at 4:49 am

    seen that, touched that,…

    Acer had a regular tablet like that years ago (Travelmate C200). Actually I’m more surprised that nobody improved that slider mechanism so that it allows the screen to turn and shut like a regular laptop (i.e not leaving the screen exposed)

  3. ChrisRS

    02/02/2010 at 10:37 am

    The Vadem Clio (about 1999) was a windows CE based design with an interesting hionge designthat would be excelent in this application. I alloewed for various configurations, including slate, laptopn , easelt and closed (sceen protected).

  4. Nameless

    02/02/2010 at 11:18 pm

    I always wanted to see the slider design of the HTC Shift and the Intel UrbanMax gain more adoption.

    Don’t know why the swivel hinge is so popular…

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