The HP Tx2000 Notebook could make a good Media Center Notebook

I don’t normally talk about laptops on this blog but one that I wanted to mention is the Tx2000 from HP. The reason I wanted to talk about this is that HP call this an Entertainment Notebook, it comes with Windows Vista Home Premiums so that means that Windows Media Center is included. I got to play with this at CES and I think it makes a great Media Center laptop. First off I love it’s dual digitiser which means you can use your finger to control all of Windows and  Media Center works very well with touch, I use my Samsung Q1 UMPC and control Media Center all the time with touch and they way Media Center is designed in Vista means that it’s easy to control with a finger. The benefit of it being dual digitiser is that when you want to write on the screen with pen it uses a special active digitiser so that if you catch the screen with your hand the cursor does not shoot off to the other side of the screen (this is called vectoring). So the touch is good for controlling apps like Media Center and browsing the web, the active Pen is good for writing notes etc.  One thing I love about Tablet PCs is that when your sat on the sofa or anywhere without a desk switching to tablet mode is so much better for browsing the web and reading documents, its hard to explain but I find it more natural, its almost like reading a book or a magazine.

Anyway James Kendrick of jkOnTheRun has posted his first thought of the Tx2000 and one of things he noticed is how well Media Center works with touch

The dual digitizer is a welcome upgrade over the touch-only predecessor, the tx1000.  The touch is feather light and reminds me a lot of videos I’ve seen of the Dell Latitude XT with its capacitive digitizer.  I can barely stroke the screen and have things happen just right which is very nice.  The dual digitizer auto-switches so when I want to ink and bring the pen to the screen the touch-screen turns off to prevent interference and this works well too.  All in all the tx2000 is a breeze to use with either touch or the pen and is well implemented.  It’s especially cool to run the Media Center by touch.

I would not give up the lightness of my HP2710p tablet PC (the Tx2000 is on the heavy side) I think the Tx2000 would make a good notebook for using around the home. I am trying to get hold of a review unit, I really want to have another play with one of these!

The price is £699 on Amazon UK