Demo: 'Eee PC' Tablet

LAS VEGAS -- Could the Tablet PC concept break out of its "niche" if combined with one of the hottest trends in computing? That's the question raised by the upcoming Asus Eee PC T91, which takes the company's tiny netbook computer and turns it into a convertible Tablet PC. William Lai of Asus gave me this quick tour of the device on the CES show floor today.

As Lai explained in the video, the PC is expected to be released around March or April at a price around $549.

Note that it's running Windows XP Home, not Windows Vista or Windows XP Tablet PC Edition. Windows Vista is too much of a resource hog for netbooks, although Microsoft is addressing that problem with the upcoming Windows 7, which is expected to work on them.

Why not XP Tablet Edition? Microsoft extended Windows XP's lifespan for Windows XP Home but not for other editions of the older operating system. That rules out XP Tablet PC Edition in situations such as this. So even though the T91 screen can sense touch and take input from a stylus, it can't convert the on-screen scribbling into text without installing a third-party application.

About Todd Bishop

Todd Bishop is co-founder and managing editor of TechFlash. He has covered Microsoft and the technology industry for more than five years, most recently as a daily newspaper reporter and blogger based in Seattle.

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