Tim,

Thanks for the review - it matches what I've seen from the tablet.

> However, Squeak runs _really_ nicely on it. So much snappier feeling
> than the 'real' OS. The only real problem was the use of the pen
> button/switch, which lagged a lot but only occasionally.

I've been on and off about this with Chuck Thacker and it all looks as if
this is an XP problem. I found that this problem not only shows up when you
use the pen but also when you use (for example) an external USB mouse. It
all looks as if Windows is not handing us mouse events at all under certain
conditions. I'll be looking into this problem more closely as soon as I got
my own copy of it ;-)

But other than that - boy, this tablet is *great* fun with Squeak/Croquet
(yay! finally someone putting a Real Graphics Chip (tm) into one of those).
Now, if someone can only get the weight right (it's still a little on the
heavy side)...

Cheers,
  - Andreas


> -----Original Message-----
> From: squeak-dev-bounces at lists.squeakfoundation.org 
> [mailto:squeak-dev-bounces at lists.squeakfoundation.org] On 
> Behalf Of Tim Rowledge
> Sent: Tuesday, February 18, 2003 11:53 PM
> To: squeak-dev at lists.squeakfoundation.org
> Subject: Squeak on Compaq TC1000 tablet
> 
> 
> 
> Last night I got to play with one of these new fangled 'tablet pcs'
> (funny, I built something like that _14_ years ago).
> 
> It's definitely a quite nice bit of hardware. At least, the 
> basic tablet
> is - the keyboard thingy is very tacky and wobbly. The screen is nice
> and is protected by a pretty solid feeling sheet of textured and
> tempered glass. I'd say the texture was a bit too much, personally,
> because it made using the pen feel very draggy. It doesn't weigh too
> much (definitely something that wasn't the case with the Active Book)
> and the size is ok. The screen visual quality is good, especially with
> the brightness downa click or two so that one doesn't get too much
> back-scatter from the texture. The one I played with is a 
> 1GHz Transmeta
> crusoe with 512Mb or ram (_512_ Mb!! Good gravy. When I was a 
> lad.... )
> and that ugly windows XP stuff. It's the first time I've actually seen
> XP so far as I can recall and it is _ugly_. It also seemed really slow
> and unresponsive, particularly in the web browser. Pen calibration was
> pretty bad too, drifting as you watch; I suspect some temperature
> dependence, varying as it warms up. I'm sure they'll fix it 
> by the third
> release, as usual.
> 
> However, Squeak runs _really_ nicely on it. So much snappier feeling
> than the 'real' OS. The only real problem was the use of the pen
> button/switch, which lagged a lot but only occasionally. All the sound
> demo stuff ran perfectly, Scamper, balloon3D, Alice, etc etc. Very
> impressive. If one could get the hardware with just enough OS to start
> Squeak in fullscreen mode it would be wonderful. In a way it's
> gratifying to see a 'real' product based on so much of our work and
> dreams, in another way it's really annoying to see such ugly 
> software as
> its standard suite.
> 
> Some pics at http://sumeru.stanford.edu/tim/pooters/TC1000 for those
> interested.
> 
> tim
> 
> -- 
> Tim Rowledge, tim at sumeru.stanford.edu, http://sumeru.stanford.edu/tim
> Useful random insult:- Always sharpening his sleeping skills.
> 
>