It's said to be the second largest computer expo in the world; and regularly attracts key manufacturers both in its local Taiwan and worldwide. Today, the 2014 edition of COMPUTEX Taipei kicked off; and as you may have expected, some cool technology was shown off. Much of the action today was dominated by ASUS, who were later followed by Acer - Taiwan's two main computer and smart phone manufacturers and a mainstay of the expo; with Dell taking centre stage in the dying minutes to reveal two new Inspiron Tablets. Grab a coffee and read on for all of today's news.
Skip to Announcements from: ASUS - Acer - Dell
Just ten minutes since their keynote started, and already we've moved on to smart phones. With a claimed 72-per cent screen to body ratio, the ASUS FonePad 8 - the company's next addition to their range of really big smart phones - is “designed to maximise your viewing experience”, so says chairman Jonney Shih. Interestingly, it's planned to be released in 7- and 8-inch varieties, but the company already has a FonePad 7 - will this device supersede it? But these aren't the only devices ASUS is planning to release in 7- and 8-inch versions. ASUS are planning to refine another of their products, the MeMoPAD HD7, with a thinner, lighter profile and a choice of 7- and 8-inch screen sizes. The 299g, 7.45mm-thin ASUS MemoPAD 8 is new too — it has an 8-inch screen as you’d expect, with Full HD resolution. It’s 1920x1200pixels, which means it’s a 16:10 ratio panel. It uses an Intel quad-core Atom Z3580 processor running at 2.3GHz. It’s the most powerful and beautifully designed 8-inch LTE tablet out today, apparently.
ASUS has often tried to combine phone and tablet with their FonePad and PadFone lines, but perhaps the biggest news is they feel this is only the beginning. In their words, the “ultimate convergence” of devices would be a device that combines Android Phone and Tablet along with a Windows Tablet and Windows and Android laptops. That's apparently the plan for their boldest device revealed yet, the Transformer Book V. A full HD IPS phone slots into the back of an LTE-capable tablet with a 12.5-inch screen. This then slots into a laptop keyboard dock with a 1TB hard drive, turning the tablet - phone still inside - into a full-power laptop. A single button press on the keyboard switches the device from Android to Windows 8.1, after which the screen can be undocked and used as a tablet, or kept in place for a laptop. When you're done, remove the phone out the back of the tablet and you're back to an Android phone and on your way. Now THAT'S a bombshell!
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After Samsung's announcement earlier this year of plans to launch two new wearable, electronic fitness devices, 2014 seems to be the year of fitness wearables - and Acer's first announcement today was to let us know the choice of devices available is only set to grow. The company announced the Acer Liquid Leap, a fitness armband with a 1-inch display, which will also be capable of call and SMS notifications.
Acer also revealed its new line of Liquid brand mobile devices, comprising four different smart phone models as well as one new tablet. One of these, the Acer Liquid Z200 smartphone, is already being referred to by some members of the press as Acer's attempt to compete with Motorola. Expected to retail at just €79, has a modest 4-inch display; and will be available in a choice of five colours: Titanium Black, Essential White, Fragrant Pink, Sky Blue and Sunshine Yellow.
As for the other models, here's a quick bullet-point summary:
- Acer Iconia Tab 8 tablet – 8in 1920 x 1200 IPS display, quad-core Intel Atom processor, “sleek” metallic finish, 7.5 hours of battery life “for uninterrupted multimedia enjoyment”, dual speakers
- Acer Liquid Jade smartphone – 5in HD display with Gorilla Glass 3, 13MP rear camera, KitKat Android 4.4
- Acer Liquid E700 smartphone – 5in HD IPS display, 3,500mAh “never-ending” battery offering 60 days standby or 24 hours talk time, quad-core processor, 16GB internal storage, 2GB of RAM
- Acer Liquid E600 smartphone – 5in IPS display, quad-core processor, 8MP rear camera, 4G-LTE compatibility
When the Lenovo Yoga released and showed off its super-tiltable screen, which allowed it to be suspended in a number of positions or even have the screen fully folded back to use as a tablet, it seems the concept was popular enough to spawn a number of imitators - and now Dell has thrown one of its own into the mix. The Dell Inspiron 13 7000 is a great-looking convertible laptop, but sadly little is known so far of the specs - we'll have more as its revealed.
But if you prefer an actual tablet, Dell had an announcement there too. The new Dell Inspiron 20 is an upcoming tablet that supposedly will last six hours on a single charge, but maybe someone should tell the company that bigger isn't always better - sporting a sizeable 19.5 inch display, this tablet isn't going to fit into anyone's coat pockets any time soon - in fact many laptop bags would struggle to contain it - but it is handy for moving from room to room, and watching your favourite films wherever you want to sit in the house. In fact, perhaps standing it up and using it as a TV replacement isn't actually too far-fetched, given the powers of on-demand TV, Chromecast and so on...
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That's all for today - tune in tomorrow for the next instalment of COMPUTEX action!
