Hasta La Gadget!

A research project from Intel can turn any surface into a touchscreen. Instead of propping up a tablet or putting a touchscreen computer in your kitchen, picture yourself tapping on the counter top to pull menus, look up recipes and add items to a shopping list.

“There’s nothing absolutely special about the surface, and it doesn’t matter if your hands are dirty,” says Beverly Harrison, a senior research scientist at Intel. “Our algorithm and a camera set-up can create virtual islands everywhere”

Intel demoed the project during the company’s annual research-day fest Wednesday to show touchscreens can go beyond computing and become a part of everyday life.

The project uses real-time 3-D object recognition to build a model of almost anything that’s placed on the counter and offer a a virtual, touchscreen-based menu. For instance, when you put a slab of meat on the counter or a green pepper, they are identified, and a virtual menu that includes recipes for both are shown.

“The computer in real time builds a model of the color, shape, texture of the objects and runs it against a database to identify it,” says Harrison. “And it requires nothing special to be attached on the steak or the pepper.”

Smartphones have turned touch into a popular user interface. Many consumers are happy to give the BlackBerry thumb a pass and instead swipe and flick their finger to scroll. New tablets are also likely to make users want to move beyond a physical keyboard and mouse.

But so far, touchscreens have been limited to carefully calibrated pieces of glass encased in the shell of a phone or computer.

Intel researchers say that won’t be the case in the future. An ordinary coffee table in the living room could morph into a touchscreen when you put a finger on it, and show a menu of music, video to choose from. Or a vanity table in the bathroom could recognize a bottle of pills placed on it and let you manage your medications from there.

Some companies are trying to expand the use of touchscreens. For instance, Displax, based in Portugal, can turn any surface — flat or curved — into a touch-sensitive display by sticking a thinner-than-paper polymer film on that surface to make it interactive.

Intel research labs try to do away with the extra layer. Instead, researchers there have created a rig with two cameras, one to capture the image of the objects and the other to capture depth. The depth cameras help recognize the objects and the difference between the hand touching the table or hovering over it. A pico-projector helps beam the virtual menus. The cameras and the pico-projector can be combined into devices just a little bigger than your cellphone, says Harrison. Sprinkle a few of these in different rooms and point them on tables, and the system is ready to go.

At that point, the software program that Harrison and her team have written kicks in. The program, which can run on any computer anywhere in the house, helps identify objects accurately and create the virtual menus. Just make a wide sweeping gesture to push the menu off the counter and it disappears. There’s even a virtual drawer that users can pull up to store images and notes.

Harrison says all this will work on almost any surface, including glass, granite and wood.

“The key here is the idea requires no special instrumentation,” she says.

Still it may be too early to make plans to remodel the kitchen to include this new system. The idea is still in the research phase, says Harrison, and it may be years before it makes it to the real world.

Photo: A counter top acts as a touchscreen display.
Priya Ganapati/Wired.com

See Also:

• Thin Film Turns Any Surface Into a Touchscreen
• Finger Fail: Why Most Touchscreens Miss the Point
• Sony Promises Emotion Detecting Touchscreen Table
• Skinput Turns Your Arm into a Touch-Screen

Intel’s attempt to get inside cellphones will take just a little bit longer.Though the company had hoped to get smartphones with Intel chips in the hands of consumers this year, it is likely that the first phones powered by Intel will debut early next year.

Mobile handsets featuring Intel processors are likely to be shown at the Consumer Electronics Show in next January or at the Mobile World Congress conference in February.

“That would clearly be the window of opportunity for us,” Intel CTO Justin Rattner told Wired.com.

In May, Intel showed its new chip codenamed Moorestown for mobile devices. The company said the chip would be extremely power efficient, while offering enough processing power for features such as video conferencing and HD video.

Though Intel’s chips power most desktops and notebooks, the company’s silicon is glaringly absent in the fast growing category of smartphones and tablets. Worldwide, companies shipped 54.7 million smartphones in the first quarter of 2010, up 56.7 percent from the same quarter a year ago, estimates IDC.  Most talked about smartphones today from companies such as Motorola and HTC that are powered by chips based on Intel rival ARM’s architecture.

Intel has tried its hand in the phone-chip business earlier, with little success. In 2006, the company sold its XScale ARM-based division to Marvell. More recently, it tried to pitch its current generation of Atom processors to smartphone makers but the chips were not accepted because they consumed too much power for phone use.

Moorestown processors can beat the competition, says Intel. Rattner hopes the chips will also go beyond smartphones and into tablets.

So far, Apple has sold more than 3 million iPads in just three months since the product’s launch. Apple uses its own chip for the iPad.

Rattner says tablets using Intel chips are on their way and will be available to consumers by the end of the year.

“Almost all the tablets at Computex (a trade show for PC makers held in Taiwan every year) were Intel-based devices,” he says. “There’s a tremendous amount of interest and activity in the tablet space.”

Yet Rattner says he is “cautious” in his hopes for the tablet market. Rattner does not own an iPad, but has an iPhone 3G S.

“A lot of people are saying that the tablet is the next netbook,” he says. “I am not so sure.” More than 85 million netbooks have been sold, since the devices became popular about three years ago.

Netbooks appealed to consumers because of their price, portability and their ability to offer a computing experience comparable to a notebook, say Rattner.

“With tablets, their utility remains to be seen,” he says. “The first generation of tablets including are missing some important things. The absence of a camera is especially baffling in the iPad.”

The iPad may have its flaws but for consumers it’s the only choice for now — unless you count the very flawed JooJoo.

Some tablet makers were waiting for Moorestown chips but Intel has already started production and handing it to manufacturers, says Rattner.

“Apple’s gotten everyone’s attention and they have set that bar,” he says. “For others now coming to market, they have to have something substantially more capable than the iPad and it is going to take time to get there.”

Photo: liewcf/Flickr

See Also:

• Why Intel’s Processors Aren’t Big on Cellphones
• Next-Gen Cellphones Will Run 1080p Video, 3-D Games
• Intel Introduces Ultra-Low-Power Processor for Smartphones
• Intel, LG Partner To Create New Mobile Internet Device

Toshiba and Intel have announced that they’re partnering up to deliver the latter’s convertible Classmate PC to Japanese youths — just in time for the new school year. Sporting a 1.66GHz Atom N450 and an overhauled design, this latest iteration of the educational use netbook will start filtering through Nipponese school corridors this August. It packs 160GB of storage room and 2GB of RAM under a nice 1,366 x 768 10.1-inch touchscreen. The latter flips around to facilitate pen input with an included stylus, while the whole package is protected by a well rubberized and ruggedized case. Now if only it had some multitouch and one of those crazy 15-hour batteries, we might have considered going back to school and using it to finish our floristry studies. Full PR after the break.

Continue reading Intel Classmate PC becomes Toshiba CM1 in Japan

Intel Classmate PC becomes Toshiba CM1 in Japan originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 01 Jul 2010 08:12:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Developers to get native x86 version of Android 2.2 this summer? originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 28 Jun 2010 11:51:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Let’s not forget that before “tablets” were all the rage there were, well, tablets. While most tablet PCs were — and still are — aimed at the business market, the HP TouchSmart tm2 (which began as the tx2000) was one of the first tablets for the average Joe. And despite rumors of a slate product and future WebOS devices, HP hasn’t given up on the tm2, and rightfully so. Just updated with a brand new Core i3 ULV processor, the convertible has a 12.1-inch capacitive touchscreen, a new TouchSmart layer for laptops, an onboard stylus for taking notes, and a striking design with a rather stellar chiclet keyboard. There’s no doubt the form factor still appeals to students or those simply looking for the power of a PC with a touch experience, but we wish HP paid a bit more attention to a few key features before shipping. Find out just what those are in our full review.

Continue reading HP TouchSmart tm2 review

HP TouchSmart tm2 review originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 27 Jun 2010 08:01:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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