Hasta La Gadget!

Microsoft’s Surface Pro tablet is set to get its missing pressure sensitivity for the digital stylus in apps like Photoshop, with a Wacom driver update incoming to address the glitch. The Windows 8 tablet, launched back in February, shipped without full support for recognizing how hard stylus-users pressed with the pen in apps like Adobe’s Creative Suite. Now, according to Microsoft’s Panos Panay, the end is in sight.

Panay, who led the Surface project, and is a corporate VP at Microsoft, took to Twitter to confirm that he had been testing out the latest Wacom beta drivers. “Cool to see Pen pressure in Photoshop” he commented, along with the promise that the software update would be “releasing soon.”

That was then followed by the quiet release from Wacom of what’s described as an “Enhanced Tablet Driver“, v7.1.1-12. Although the driver makes no specific mention of Surface Pro, the details given around what, exactly, it does for a Wacom digitizer-enabled system does sound just like what Panos was talking about:

“Expand the capabilities of your tablet computer with the enhanced tablet driver for systems that use Wacom Feel IT technology! Installing this driver will provide many advanced pressure-sensitive features that Wacom pen tablet users have come to enjoy. The driver supports advanced features such as pressure-sensitivity in graphics applications such as Adobe Photoshop and Corel Painter. It also allows you to adjust the pen tip pressure sensitivity and to program the side switch of the pen for a wide range of alternative settings and functions” Wacom Feel It driver documentation

Microsoft is yet to confirm whether this is, in fact, the relevant update, though given there have been mixed messages around why pressure sensitivity does not work properly in all apps in the first place, that’s arguably not a surprise. Anecdotal reports from Surface Pro users have indicated that it the driver does, indeed, address the issue, ZDNet reports.

One proposed explanation is that Microsoft scuppered third-party support by forcing the Surface Pro to use its own InkAPI drivers for the Wacom digitizer, whereas others have blamed Adobe for not building the necessary support into its software. Adobe has been pushing for the WinTab API drivers instead.

Meanwhile, Microsoft is tipped to be preparing a new line of “Surface 2″ tablets, potentially including a smaller, roughly 7- to 8-inch model, for reveal at its BUILD 2013 developer conference this year. So far, Windows RT and Windows 8 have been reserved for 10-inch tablets or bigger, leaving the smaller scale touch market to the iPad mini and various Android-powered options.

Surface Pro pressure support in Photoshop added with Wacom driver is written by Chris Davies & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

A rise in convertible and slider touchscreen form-factors will offset the “post-PC era” slide of notebooks, but will be unable to fend off the full might of tablets, new research suggests. Tablet shipments will rise to 579.4m units by 2017, NPD DisplaySearch projections indicate, while traditional notebooks will drop to 183.3m units by the same point. However, a new breed of touch-enabled notebooks will step in to help arrest some of the slump.

NPD suggests hybrids, sliders, and convertibles will all break into the segment, straddling the line between traditional portables and tablets by pairing QWERTY for text entry with a touchscreen. Although a minority niche in 2012, the projections claim touch-enabled models will outsell their non-touch counterparts by 2017.

Helping that acceleration will be ultrabooks, NPD claims, which are most likely to gain touch-sensitivity. Intel has already confirmed that third-gen ultrabooks based on Haswell processors will require touch in order to be certified, though whether manufacturers will step beyond the traditional touchscreen-on-a-clamshell – or, indeed, if consumers will actually buy the more outlandish form-factors – remains to be seen.

Perhaps disappointing to Microsoft, the research company claims that Windows 8 has had a “limited impact on driving touch adoption in notebook PCs”; that, it suggests, is down to a paucity of apps that actually take advantage of the display technology.

Nonetheless, several manufacturers have attempted to integrate touch in interesting ways into their Windows 8 machines. The Lenovo IdeaPad Yoga, for instance, has a hinge with extra range, so that the keyboard can be completely folded back behind the touchscreen. Meanwhile, Acer’s Aspire R7 borrows elements from a tablet and from an all-in-one PC for its folding/twisting notebook.

Touch-notebooks to suck some tablet sting from Post-PC says NPD is written by Chris Davies & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

This week the folks at Microsoft have been tipped to be wrapping up production of a second-generation Surface tablet for Windows 8, readying the device for a reveal at this year’s BUILD developer conference. A release of a second-generation Surface tablet will be done “cautiously” according to sources speaking this week, with the original run of the tablet having sold less than expected in its initial push. Both the Surface RT and the Surface Pro may be getting a full refresh this year.

Word from upstream supply chain sources speaking with Digitimes have suggested that BUILD will be the place where a new generation of Surface tablets will likely appear first. They’ve added that the first generation, having sold what they claim is 1.5 million units total for the first two releases of the tablet (RT and Pro). This being half of the expectations the company had, a “cautious attitude over promotions” has been initiated for the 2nd generation.

This second generation has a series of components largely the same as the first run, with what these same sources say are parts from LG, Samsung, NVIDIA, Intel, and Pegatron. Changes would be in the chassis of the tablet switching from what was manufactured by China-based Chungnam Precision Casing to Ju Teng. At the moment there’ve been no confirmations from any of the named manufacturers on a second-generation Surface model.

The final bit of information this source spoke about this week was the idea that this generation of the Surface tablet would feature between a 7 and 9-inch display, this matching up well with the trend for larger and smaller than 10.1-inch tablet standard sizes in the industry.

Microsoft Surface 2 tipped as cautious BUILD release is written by Chris Burns & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Wacom has revealed its latest pen-enabled graphics display, the Cintiq 22HD Touch, adding finger control to the stylus-equipped Full HD LCD monitor. The new version pairs a 16.7m color, 1920 x 1080 panel on an adjustable easel stand with the ability to use both Wacom’s special active-digitizer stylus or your fingertips for art apps, multitouch in Windows 7/8 and OS X, and more.

As with the non-touch variant of the Cintiq 22HD, this new screen recognizes up to 2048 different levels of pressure from the digital pen, as well as +/-60 levels of tilt on the pen’s nib. The included stylus also has an eraser head on the other end.

Spread around the bezel there are multiple shortcut buttons, with a total of sixteen customizable ExpressKeys – that can change function depending on which application has focus – on either side of the display. Touch-strips, meanwhile, are on the back of the panel, and can be programmed to control zooming, scrolling, bruss size, or rotation of the canvas.

The panel itself supports between 10- and 65-degree incline, and can be rotated by 180-degrees in either direction. It’s priced at $2,499 in the US and £1,899.99 in the UK.

Wacom Cintiq 22HD Touch adds finger-friendliness to graphics display is written by Chris Davies & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

This week the folks at Toshiba have revealed yet another oddity in computing the world might never have seen had it not been for Microsoft’s push for touchscreen interation with Windows 8. The device that’s opening up Toshiba’s push for the future is the Toshiba Portege Z10t. With Ultrabook on its back while its tablet display detaches from its keyboard dock, it is what Toshiba hopes will create yet another market for notebooks: the detachable Ultrabook.

This device will do what Toshiba hopes will draw in the odd-device-seeking masses with a set of specifications only otherwise seen on solid one-piece notebooks. Here the user will be employing an 11.6-inch touchscreen (Full HD) that functions as both the display for the notebook and a tablet on its own once detached from what then becomes just a keyboard dock.

This device aims also to take on the likes of the Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1 with an optional DigitizerPen. Writing notes and sketches on the display of this machine will be an interesting comparison to make with the Android competition, especially since at the moment, it appears that Toshiba’s solution will require said pen to be carried separately.

This device appears to be quite similar to the Acer Iconia W510 convertable tablet/notebook revealed earlier this year, but the big difference remains the Ultrabook angle. With full Windows 8 coupled with an Intel Core processor under the hood, Toshiba’s bid may end up being a win in this season’s Windows 8-toting market.

Toshiba aims to create new “detachable Ultrabook” segment for Windows 8 is written by Chris Burns & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.