Tablets and slates still need physical keyboards

Apple, Inc.’s iPad shook the tablet world and changed its face forever. Before the advent of Apple’s signature slate, tablets were a little different from notebooks and netbooks.

Now every electronic and computer company is thriving to enter and conquer the tablet segment with more or less the same features offered by iPad. However, all these slates including iPads have one shortcoming in their hardware, a physical keyboard.

Although the virtual keyboards offered in the tablets are very interactive and responsive to capacitive touch, they still lack the oomph of physical keys.

Most of the time, users lose their bearings of keys on these virtual keyboards, especially in lengthy typing. In the wake of these hindrances, these tablet manufacturers offer different keyboards, wired and wireless (Bluetooth), with their slates.

Following are some of the best options offered by these manufacturers to cater to the problem of lengthy typing.

Asus Eee Pad Slider and Transformer

AsusTek offers Eee Pad tablet with Android OS, version Honeycomb, to the market and with it comes two types of keyboards. One is a transformer for $120 that effectively changes the slate into a laptop as the dock houses both a keyboard and a mouse touchpad.

The other one is a simple slider that can be attached to the tablet as an integral part as it slides underneath the tablet. However, it also substantially increases the thickness of it.

Apple iPad 2

For a mere $69, Apple offers a Bluetooth keyboard to its tablet users while the Smart Cover that comes with the iPad serves as a stand, so there is no need of a dock device for it.

Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1

The second most famous tablet in the world, the Galaxy Tab, also comes with a detachable keyboard for a mere $79. The beautiful keyboard converts the slate into a laptop, but it is without a mouse pad. However, the touch screen interaction does not require
such increments.

There are several third party manufacturers like Logitech, Belkin, Targus, and Kensington who also offer keyboard for more or less the same prices.

With the advent of contemporary tablets, it was believed that keyboards and mice devices will become obsolete in coming decades but their revival in the market in such a way is a sight for the sore eyes.

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Posted by Usman Khalid on Oct 31 2011. Filed under Sci-Tech. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry