Always Innovating is preparing to launch a new product:

Until now, all netbooks were engineered the same way: Power-hungry Intel Atom, ugly case, and outdated 90’s OS. Our goal: To achieve a breakthrough in both architecture and design.

The result: a revolutionary device that works as both a netbook and a standalone tablet thanks to a detachable keyboard and a 3D touchscreen user interface.

I wrote about this in July of 2007 in a post titled “The iPhone Killer”:

One Gadget, Multiple Uses

The idea of convergence in technology is an exciting one, I mean who wants to carry around a backpack full of different devices just so you can go online, track your appointments, listen to music, watch videos/TV, and make telephone calls? Pretty soon you have 20 pounds of gear and half-a-dozen chargers.

The idea behind the iPhone is an attractive one. There is one major drawback, however, with this kind of connectedness: it’s too much and too little at the same time. Don’t get me wrong, I am looking forward to the day that we can get a small device that can handle all sorts of functions: combining the power and utility of a laptop with the portability of a Palm Pilot or BlackBerry, the “notebooks” one finds in William Gibson’s fiction. But I do not want it to be a phone.

Phone + ______ = “The Next Big Thing”

I personally find it difficult to understand the current fetish of combining one’s phone with other types of devices – the phone/music player, the phone/video player, the phone/organizer, the phone/camera. Can someone please take all of the other devices and combine them into one, 5″x7″x1″ unit with a screen and a little keyboard? This would be a useful device. Then we can do all of the things that we need to do while we are on-the-go and experience the productivity that this technology promises. Without being interrupted every few minutes by incoming calls.

The Wrong Direction

The Marketing Geniuses are taking the idea of the telephone down the wrong road, adding features that phones just do not need. I can just imagine a bunch of “creative types” sitting around a table brainstorming, “What if you had a phone that could also make cappuccino? That would be cool!”

No, it would not.

This device is pretty close to that ideal. The specs are good:

I especially like the idea of the internal USB ports and the small size makes it very portable and conference-friendly.The device is being debuted at DEMO today, and I for one am looking forward to the reviews.

UPDATE: Gizmodo has a hands-on review of a beta-model of the Touch Book:

As far as software goes, the OS is based around the Open Embedded Linux platform, but fully customized for the Touch Book hardware. As such, the Touch Book has the power to handle full screen video, and render OpenGL 3D graphics. Gentil says the Touch Book can run some of the same games found on the iPhone and plans to offer them in the future.

The Touch Book UI design depends on what configuration the hardware is in. When docked to the keyboard, the Touch Book uses a standard, cursor-based UI that looks like other Linux desktops. However, when in tablet mode, it uses a custom-designed, touch-based UI. The touch UI is based around spherical icons that rotate in a circular fashion as you swipe to the next one. Content is divided into three categories: web, apps and settings.

Crunchgear has this to say:

It will also include Mozilla’s Fennec browser and – get this – the screen is magnetic, so when you detach it from the keyboard you can “put the tablet on the fridge to serve as a kitchen computer or digital frame.” Finally, there are a whopping six USB ports – three internal, two external, and one mini. The internal ports are for things like a wireless dongle or a USB thumb drive – stuff you wouldn’t want hanging off the side of the machine all the time.

The Touch Book will be available in “May or June 2009” and will come in two versions; tablet only or netbook (tablet + keyboard). The tablet version will cost $299 and the netbook version will cost $399. Those are both going to likely be tough prices for would-be customers to swallow but perhaps the cool features, tiny weight, and super long battery life will be enough to win people over. If the company could eventually lop $100 off each model, though, this thing might have a much better chance.

And thanks to Patrick Rhone for sharing this video:

If anyone out there has had a chance to see it in action, please leave a comment.