While gawkers have been breathlessly predicting that Apple would be adapting its multi-touch technology for a tablet PC, the first laptop with a multi-touch screen is actually coming out from a quite different company: Hewlett-Packard.



Put simply: HP's TouchSmart tx2 adds a multi-touch screen to a traditional, convertible tablet computer. This means you can use a finger or two to draw on the screen, browse the web, click icons, and control media through HP's homegrown MediaSmart application. As with the iPhone, the screen uses a capacitive sensor so you don't have to press hard on the screen to register a tap or a trace. However, unlike the iPhone, if you want to do detail work (like writing in longhand or doing a detailed illustration), you can use the included pen to put a finer point on things.

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