Samsung updates tablets on heels of iPad refresh

NEW YORK (AP) — Samsung Electronics Co.,  Apple's biggest competitor in the market for iPad-sized tablet computers, is updating its line to include a feature that lets a tablet act as a universal remote control for an entertainment center.

The storage space on the new Galaxy Tab 2 will also be expandable with small memory cards.

The tablets will come in two sizes. The 7-inch version will cost $250 and goes on sale April 22. The 10-inch version will cost $400 and goes on sale May 13.

Apple Inc.'s competitors are experimenting with different tablet sizes and features as they try to come up with a way to challenge the iPad's commanding lead in sales. Toshiba Corp. this week revealed a tablet with a 13-inch screen, essentially putting a laptop-sized screen in a tablet. The iPad has a screen that measures 9.7 inches diagonally.

IPads accounted for nearly 60 percent of the tablet computers sold last year, according to research firm IDC.

Apple's closest competitor in the overall tablet market is Amazon.com Inc., but its Kindle Fire is half the size of the iPad and less than half the price, putting it in a somewhat different category. Of the manufacturers that make tablets in the same size range as the iPad, Samsung has the largest share.

The iPad doesn't have expandable memory or the infrared diode that will let the Samsung's models control a TV set or cable box. Instead, the chief new feature of Apple's new iPad, released last month, is an ultra-high-resolution screen.

The updated Samsung models won't have higher-resolution screens, even though analysts believe Samsung is one of the sources for the new iPad screen.

Reference: http://yhoo.it/HC3YsL

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Toshiba’s Touchscreen All-in-One: The Perfect Windows 8 PC?

Besides the world’s biggest tablet, Toshiba today also debuted a new all-in-one PC. Toshiba claims it’s the first all-in-one model that’s completely Windows 8-ready.

The machine earns that status by virtue of its touchscreen display, which is a capacitive touchscreen — the same kind of tech found in most smartphones. By contrast, the touchscreen machines in HP’s TouchSmart line employ optical touch technology, using a set of sensors in the bezel of the display to “see” where a person’s finger is.

By going with capacitive tech though, Toshiba’s display is closer to a “true” touchscreen and the company says it meets Microsoft’s touch requirements for Windows 8. If touch isn’t your thing, you can get a model with a plain old display too.

In my brief hands-on with the PC, it felt like a perfect fit for Windows 8. It was great to do basic navigating via touch, calling up apps and setting via finger swipes, but then dropping my hands to the keyboard for any typing. Response was quick and fluid thanks to the Intel Core processor within.

The all-in-one comes with both a wireless keyboard and mouse, and both are pre-paired via Bluetooth. It has six USB ports — two equipped to handle USB 3.0 connections and four rated for USB 2.0. There’s also an HDMI input for hooking up a game console, tablet or phone.

Depending on your configuration, the PC packs an Intel Core processor (Ivy Bridge), up to 16GB of RAM and a hard disk up to 3 terabytes (TB). Options include a Blu-ray drive, TV tuner and infrared blaster for hookup to a cable box. You can also get a remote control for when you want to kick back and use the PC as a TV.

The display comes in two sizes: 21.5 (LX815) and 23 inches (LX835), both with 1,920 x 1,080 resolution, which matches up with 1080p video. They start at $600 and $880, respectively, but a touchscreen would add about $150 to your price. Both models should arrive by summer.

Interested in owning a Windows 8-ready all-in-one PC? Tell us what you think in the comments.

Toshiba All-in-One PC With Touchscreen

Toshiba says its new all-in-one, which offers a capacitive touchscreen, is the first all-in-one PC to be ready for the touch interface of Windows 8.

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Internet Explorer

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Optional Remote Control

If you want to kick back and just watch video, this remote is an option.

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Windows 8 Weather App

Reference: http://on.mash.to/HxsQ3C

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Toshiba Debuts Monstrous 13-Inch Tablet

Toshiba Excite Tablets

The Toshiba Excite 13 (bottom right), with a 13-inch screen, is the world's biggest mass-market tablet, dwarfing its brothers in the newly christened Excite lineup, the Excite 10 (bottom left) and Excite 7.7 (top).

Excite 13

The Excite 13 is intended to give multiple users a better shared experience when watching videos or looking at photos.

 

Websites

By virtue of the extra real estate, you can see much more of any website on the screen when you view it on the Toshiba Excite 13.

 

Countertop Friend

Reading on an Excite 13 is closer to a real newspaper experience.

 

Thin Chassis

The Excite 13 is still just 0.4 inches thick and includes ports for micro USB and micro HDMI as well as an SD card slot.

 

Excite Trio

Each Excite tablet is made to appeal to a different customer.

 

Excite 13 vs. Galaxy Note

The Excite 13 even makes a large-size smartphone, the Samsung Galaxy Note, look tiny.

Up till now tablets have generally been in two size classes: smaller models like the Kindle Fire whose screens measure 7 inches or less, and large-size models like the iPad that are in the 10-inch range. But the category has evolved. Now there’s a new giant-size species.

Toshiba just unveiled its new line of Android tablets, called Excite, and one of them’s a doozy. If the iPad is a mid-size sedan in tablet world, the new Toshiba Excite 13 is an SUV: a 13-inch monster that makes other tablets look like pygmies.

Why would anyone want a tablet that big? Toshiba has a couple of ideas.

The first is that in sometimes multiple people gather around the same tablet to collectively watch a video or look at photos. Say you have three kids, and each one wants the tablet. Instead of getting three tablets (or having them all fight for one), the large screen lets them all share the tablet. And propped up on a kickstand — on a kitchen counter, for example — users can see media clearly from a short distance away.

The other reason you may want a dreadnought-class tablet is as a casual gaming platform. If you lay the Excite 13 on, say, a coffee table, it would theoretically be used as kind of an electronic board game for people gathered around — similar to Microsoft Surface.

As you’d expect, Toshiba’s ginormous tablet is heftier than other models, weighing in at 2.2 pounds, although it’s just 0.4 inches thick. Its LED-backlit LCD screen has a resolution of 1,600 x 900 pixels and a widescreen (16:9) aspect ratio, and it has 10-finger touch support.

The Excite 13 packs a quad-core Nvidia Tegra 3 chip with GeForce graphics and 1GB of RAM, so it should be ready for the most performance-taxing games you can throw at it. It ships with the latest Android, version 4.0 or “Ice Cream Sandwich.” Like Toshiba’s previous Thrive tablets that the Excite line replaces, it has micro USB and micro HDMI ports, plus a full-size SD card slot.

We got some hands-on time with the Excite 13 and were taken aback by its massive size. It’s noticeably heavier than an iPad, or roughly as heavy as a smaller-size MacBook Air. Still, we must say videos look fantastic on it, making them that much more shareable between multiple people — the tablet’s main raison d’être.

The Excite 13 strains the definition of “mobile,” but we could see it as a family device, occasionally propped up on a kitchen counter, then come evening moved to the family room for the Android equivalent of Sorry.

If you like the sound of that experience, it’s going the cost you: The Excite 13 starts at $650 for 32GB of storage. The 64GB version goes for $750.

Do you like the idea of a gigantic, 13-inch tablet? Let us know why in the comments.

Reference: http://on.mash.to/Im0qW

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