| | |  Technology News | June 2009 
PC Touch Screens Move Ahead
 Ashlee Vance - New York Times
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 |  | The next version of Windows from Microsoft, Windows 7, will usher in a new era of touch technology when it appears on PCs later this year. |  | | |
Mountain View, California - The computer industry has a lot riding on your fingers.
For years, companies have dabbled with the touch-screen technology that lets people poke icons on a display to accomplish tasks like picking a seat at an airport check-in kiosk. Apple elevated such technology from a novelty to a must-have feature on mobile devices with its iPhone.
People can flip through pictures with a flick of a finger or make a document larger by pressing two fingers against the screen and stretching them out.
Now both personal computer manufacturers and software makers hope to do more with touch on larger devices by giving people a 10-fingered go at their screens.
"You don't even operate your TV with two fingers," said Amichai Ben-David, the chief executive officer of N-trig, which produces touch-screen technology for PC makers. "In order for this to feel really natural, you need more than two fingers for sure."
The PC industry hopes the feature spurs sales. PC makers like Hewlett-Packard and Dell have been clobbered during the recession as struggling businesses drop computer upgrades to the bottom of their to-do lists. Consumers have shown more interest in new machines, but they are buying cheap, tiny laptops rather than decked-out goliaths.
H.P., Dell, Intel and Microsoft expect that when companies and consumers increase their spending, touch technology will be one of the things that nudge them to upgrade.
Computers with the special screens will probably cost consumers about $100 more than standard machines.
H.P. has been selling a PC with an early version of touch technology. The $1,150 TouchSmart PC has been popular, H.P. says, particularly in kitchens as a family computer. But outside of science-fiction films, touch computers have been met with lukewarm reactions.
Tabletlike computers that ship with plastic pens for marking on screens remain a niche in the overall PC market, as do pure touch machines.
Ben-David said that about two million of about 300 million PCs sold last year were touch computers.
The PC industry wants to make touch functions more sophisticated and widespread. On-screen objects could be twisted and turned with several fingers, mimicking the action used in real life.
The next version of Windows from Microsoft, Windows 7, will usher in a new era of touch technology when it appears on PCs later this year, according to Ben-David.
Backed by Microsoft, Israel-based N-trig uses a combination of software and sensors to create a special type of computer screen that can interact with pens and fingers. N-trig's technology works by pumping an electrical signal through the screen.
When a finger hits the screen, the electricity is discharged. Software interprets that to move graphics on the screen.
The company claims that its technology works better on the larger displays of laptops and PCs since it handles many inputs at once.
Working together, Microsoft and N-trig have created a type of software interface that lets other companies add touch functions to their programs.
Such touch software can handle lots of fingers hitting a screen at once rather than just relying on one or two digits, as most of today's touch screens do.
N-trig hopes to build more momentum later this year, when three more PC makers are set to join H.P. and Dell as backers of the touch technology. It did not disclose the names of those companies.
The big question is whether companies can create software that makes touch useful rather than a mere curiosity.
Corel, which makes document and photo editing software, also plans touch products that rely on N-trig's technology for Windows 7.
SpaceClaim, which makes software for designing objects in 3-D, has taken a business-oriented approach to touch. Its software, which will work with Windows 7, creates 3-D models that can be turned, pinched and altered via two-handed touches. Frank DeSimone, the head of development urges other software makers to try something new and stick with the technology rather than just replicating the functions of a mouse.
"A lot of people say they will support touch, but they do a disservice to everyone by not doing anything interesting," he said. |
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