tx2635us Micro Review

Hi Everyone,
I just got my new tx2500 and I'm pretty happy with it so far. Great forum here for it BTW. For anyone searching around let me share some info about the machine. Some questions I had before buying I really couldn't get good answers to so this might help someone out there.

First, the screen isn't really bad at all. It's grainly but not overly so--basically just like most other tablets I've owned. Brightness is fairly bright (approx. 80-90% or so of my macbook pro which is *really* bright) and the viewing angles are sufficient but lower than most laptops these days. Works fine for the user looking directly at the screen. It's a feature really for privacy during flights, right?

Keyboard is actually very nice feeling although the F keys are a little on the small side. Annoying power button--seems to be a little stiff and sometimes doesn't turn on the laptop so I have to hit more than once. Probably user error though. Trackpad is a pleasure to use (I like the design a lot). Although, no right click on the pad using two fingers? C'mon guys.

Case is plastic but well made, no flex or "cheap" feeling. The hinge seems strong (and for once my screen isn't tilted or otherwise off-center when in tablet or laptop mode, and yes I'm looking at you X61T.) I do have one "defect" which is a slight bump in the top plastic (silver piece) that comes up a little over the fan area. It's in the back so it doesn't bother me and it doesn't cause any other issues.

As far as noise goes it's a loud one, but only really under some load. Once I got Vista tuned up where I wanted it the noise came down dramatically. Still some fan noise but I don't notice any longer.

Digitizer is good, with proper tracking/calibration. Touch screen takes little pressure to use but nothing much (it really is 'touch'). Touch seems to interfere with using the tablet in slate mode though since I touch the tablet when I write. Currently, I'm looking for a way to turn off touch to fix this so if anyone has a tip I'd appreciate it.

Just thought I'd throw this review into the mix to see if it helped anyone out. For comparison, I've owned a few tablets (TC1100, X41T, X61T, Fujitsu T4220, 2710p) and a whole bunch of Mac/PC laptops. I'd say this one is a very nice machine and certainly capable of a wide range of things especially considering the video card and decent processor along with optical built-in and a very nice keyboard/trackpad for using as a laptop.

 

I haven't bought a laptop in 4 years, but are you saying many have had multi touch track pads like the new Macbooks?

I mean when you put two fingers on a track pad it usually sees it like a bigger finger, not two. Kind of like the touch on this laptop's screen, put three fingers down and the cursor ends up dead center between the fingers, like one big finger.

You can by apps for iPhones and Touch to turn that into your track pad and get multi-touch features, like two finger scrolling.

The grain is strong, but I'm use to the concept from owning rear projections for some time. And I begin to forget it's there.

On noise, when I had it on power saver for battery, it was quite, the fan never came on full blast.

You know what we need, is an adaptive power save mode. So that when you are actually using it it switches to high performance, but if you leave it for 5 minutes, it auto goes into power save mode so the fan isn't going crazy when you are trying to do something else.

The digitizer accuracy is a little off depending where you are. Mines pretty good, but when near the bottom left corner of the screen it can be off by a letter A character. Calibration doesn't help since the 4 corners it uses are perfect to begin with, so that bad area comes perfect just at the corner, but away from the corner it's off. I hear Windows 7 uses more than 4 points to calibrate, so that could possible solve that problem eventually. I haven't calibrated the finger touch yet, not sure if that effects the pen.

I find the screen good enough on viewing angle, but gets worse in tablet mode when technically looking at the screen upside down, so I often rotate it to have the battery face me and hit the rotate desktop button a couple times. In some graphic apps that have a dark interface, black background, and deep shadows, like zbrush, the viewing angle stands out then.

Pen seems to work great so far. The button on it can be a little hard to press, since it's hard to feel for it and you have to push one side of it with a feeling that makes you think you missed it, or while trying to push it you lifted the pen to far away.

Oh, and on the pen. From what I saw, the moment the pen is active with the screen the touch goes off. Though, I think someone remapped one of the outside buttons to turn touch on and off at will.

 

@flanders look at a program called "Touch Control" to turn off the touch screen when you write. You can create a shortcut to it so its easy to toggle on & off as you want touch.

 

Thanks for that. I think I will give that app a try and see if that fixes my touch issue when using the pen.

@timothyb you know I remember something about the pen deactivating the touch--maybe I'm touching while the pen isn't close enough. Also, I hear what you're saying about the multitouch (and you're right); I guess I've had enough macbooks lately that the 2-finger right-click is pretty familiar to me and I get annoyed with machines that don't have it now. I have to remember that the 2500 isn't new, but just 'new to me.'

 

Drtigerlilly, can you provide a link to the program? I've been looking for a simple shortcut to toggle on/off. Most others I've found install a tray icon or are a bat file that only turns it off.

 

Touch Control