The trickle of news about Microsoft’s Courier device continues, and this time there’s a bit more of a realistic walkthrough. The device is being shown to be much more of a next-generation notepad than all-purpose tablet, and that’s probably for the best; Microsoft overreaching with a device like this could result in a real crash and burn. I suppose the best way to picture the Courier is just as a web-connected organizer — you know, one of those leather-bound ones that business people used to have, and which the Courier seems clearly designed after.
Of course, with an internet connection and full-color touchscreen, much more is enabled and the device becomes much more complicated. Microsoft’s (and Pioneer’s) task has been to pare that down to a product, and it really looks like they’ve done it right.
You’ll note that the video above shows absolutely no reference to music or media, and the minimal menus shown don’t show any connection to such functionality, although to be sure there could be a gesture they haven’t shown us which hides and shows the media player. There is a camera on the back, though, so there must be at least rudimentary photo organization. The one exception is a “watch” button next to an incoming item in the calendar mode, so it will have playback capability, which implies audio as well.
The preceding limitation sets it apart from our own CrunchPad and other all-purpose tablets, which are designed for light internet use and web apps, and the Apple Tablet, which is presumably is orientated toward media playback and possibly some gaming. See, we can all get along.
The default interface appears to be the “infinite journal,” which can hold rich content and be shared, searched, and downloaded. An endless piece of paper, or really corkboard, to which you can attach web clips, pictures, notes, and so on. Aside from that there appear to be standard gestures for displaying your calendar, displaying a paint application, and so on. The center area works as a clipboard, which is a very smart way of utilizing the dead space necessitated by a folding device.
The actual physical interface (the touchscreen, that is) remains a mystery. The finger gestures are pretty coarse, but that doesn’t mean it’s all resistive. But the pen is clearly a resistive tool, so it’s not all capacitive. There is the possibility that it is both, like what RIM was working on. In fact, if a design team were given a dual-touch-mode screen, I wouldn’t be surprised if a Courier-type hybrid was the first product they devised for it. That’s just fantasy, though; I’d expect it’s a fully resistive screen, more like a Wacom tablet with “fat touch” optimizing than anything else. Oops — as Lee points out in the comments, the Wacom does not use a resistive screen but incorporates an intelligent stylus and a capacitive screen that is aware by other means of the stylus’ exact location. That could certainly be the case here.
One last detail, confirmed by Mary Jo Foley at ZDNet, is that the Courier runs Windows 7, as I’d have expected. After all, 7 has touch interfaces integrated on the ground level, much of which was pioneered by the Surface team and later added to the OS proper. Building this device on 7 is really the best and only course of action, especially considering its certain communication with Live services.
While it appears to have more limitations than we thought when it first broke, it still is an impressive piece of work. I’m running my Microsoft contacts to ground, but it’s pretty clear they’ve already reached a secret agreement with Gizmodo to put out a morsel every once in a while. I’m headed down to Microsoft Hardware HQ tomorrow anyway, though, so I’ll do a little sleuthing.
Interesting that they use Nike in this video. Wonder if they have teamed up with them for design work?
Apple would never do a two screen device.. clear inefficiency…
Or lack of innovation.
hahaha…MS fanboys are crying again…
About what?
Other than the embarrassment of cretins like you sharing the same first name as me that is?
The illustration is soooo coooool !!!!!!
Sadly, in practice, response times will probably be much slower.
How is a two-screen device inefficient? You are probably sitting in front of a two- or three- screen setup right now like I am. I think that boosts my productivity.
Instead of 2 small screens give me single screen, even if it is smaller than 2 screens combined. I can watch video/images better and from farther and with friends.
We’ve seen how image spanning 2 pages looks in mags.
The two-screen device makes this a competitor, not with Apple’s tablet, but with the Amazon Kindle.
The Courier is going to catapult e-books to the forefront.
I don’t buy it. If it’s really capable of what is demo’d here, why would MSFT stop at that? Why wouldn’t it be an eReader, full tablet, multi-media player et?
I don’t get why Microsoft would be ‘overreaching’ if they attempted all of this and yet Apple would just be cool if their tablet did. I believe Microsoft is just as capable of pulling it off. I hope for their sake that I’m right.
I’ll play devil’s advocate.
eReader, would eat up too much battery for extended reading.
Full version of Win7, would cause headaches. People wanting to print, or try to run photoshop on it, or just push the device too much would have a bad experience, and blame the product.
MP3/video, would need lots of storage, and would eat up a lot of battery.
A web browser can also play music/video.
If you’re right about this, then maybe MSoft is smartening up. How many times have we seen them stuff everything they can into a device just to make everyone happy?
Funny thought.
I have a Windows Mobile phone (Touch Pro). I tell all my iPhone-owning friends that MY phone does everything…just not very well.
It’s also old Interface prototyping… which makes me question how far this thing really is. THe date reads Sep 29th, but the Apple Website displayed in the fan is at least 8 months old. Since the introduction of the new iPod shuffle… leave it up to a fan boy to notice the one smidgen of Apple in the entire demo… thing looks sweet though.
I should have mentioned – nobody really knows, but it’s said that it’s past research and prototype and is rumored to come in 2010. That’s as specific as anyone can get ATM though.
OMG! At 2:00 there’s the Apple.com homepage! This can’t possibly be a Microsoft product.
One thing you failed to mention is that it shows a screenshot of the Apple homepage when the new iPod nano was released, and in big text you see: “Small talk.”
Microsoft is smart. Rather than entering into a heads-on battle with Apple and other upcoming tablets, they are creating a product with a very specific purpose that will appeal to the types of people who actually spend the amount of money that this will cost. By targeting a specific set of consumers and building it on a platform that can be expanded in the future, they will be able to pull in more and more consumers. From all the demo videos (and assuming that they will become reality), this device will compete not at the technical level but at the usability level.
Ok, I have to make a ton of comments on this. Has no one at Crunch Gear ever seen a Tablet PC?
As far as the intended purpose of the device, it is clearly designed to be a digital Moleskine, more than a digital Franklin Planner. As far as how restrictive that is, are you aware of the program OneNote? Given how Microsoft does things, I am fairly sure that what we are really looking at here is a fancy dual-display Windows 7 Tablet PC, running a new version of OneNote optimized for the configuration. I would be extremely surprised if this ended up being a single-purpose device that was OneNote and nothing else. I have seen no reason to believe it wouldn’t still have a fully-functional version of Windows 7 on it, when you closed the journal app.
As far as the screen goes, you say “I’d expect it’s a fully resistive screen, more like a Wacom tablet with “fat touch” optimizing than anything else.”
Do you not know how a Wacom tablet works? A Wacom works on radio location between the pen and a network of antennas behind the screen. The pen is actually quite smart, which is how it supports tilt, pressure, and several buttons. It is neither resistive nor capacitive as you are using the terms.
If you wanted to make a device that supported both touch and the Wacom-style tablet functions, then you could setup (as several tablet manufacturers and Wacom themselves already have) a capacitive touch device that was disabled as soon as the pen came within range of the antenna array. This is how Wacom’s Touch+Pen products work, this is how the IBM and Dell notebooks that support touch and tablet work, and there is almost a 99% chance this is how the Courier device will work.
The addition of sketch functions like Autodesk Sketchbook to the existing OneNote tools makes it pretty clear that this is going to be a tilt-and pressure sensitive tablet, so I don’t see why Microsoft would move away from the Wacom technology they have been using for years. I don’t really see how that adds up to much of a “mystery.”
Oops, I forgot that the Wacom puts so much in the pen. I’ll correct that.
pwned
that said, though, you can reduce it to whatever equivalent set of programs you want, the fact is that hardware made with software and ecosystem in mind makes for a powerful and intuitive device.
Oh no, I am not criticizing the device, in fact I’m chomping at the bit to get one in my hands and play with it. I was just saying that it kind of seems to me like this is a simple and welcome refinement of existing Tablet PC applications. I kind of find it odd how revolutionary people seem to think this is, when it looks pretty much like OneNote 2.0.
It just smells a lot more like a $2,000+ Windows 7 UMPC running some special software, rather than a $600 dedicated device that is just a journal.
Okay, I hear you, I think I was just taking your comments too negatively (since you pointed out an error on my part, damn you) – I’d say it’s going to go for under a thousand though, I’d go $700-$800 maybe. They want people to buy these in bulk, and they really don’t take a lot of horsepower. The hardware, if it’s what we think it is, is already available in bulk manufacturing.
Very cool. I have been impressed with a lot of the creative things Microsoft has been doing. This looks awesome. I had fun playing with the Microsoft Surface too.
Microsoft is never creative. Every time they “innovate” all it takes is a small amount of digging to see who they actually stole the idea from. Microsoft Surface and Courier? Like Microsoft invented the tablet PC? Nope.
Microsoft isLarge companies are never creative. Every time they “innovate” all it takes is a small amount of digging to see who they actually stole the idea from.Fixed that for you. Innovation comes from below, and it’s popularized from above. It’s just like that, Microsoft and Apple and everyone else are no exceptions.
You’re right, of course. I was mostly just responding to the misinformed parent who seems to think Microsoft creates. Apple doesn’t either, but that doesn’t stop the Cult of Steve Jobs from acting like Steve Jobs invented everything PC users employ today.
Yeah. I agree. I don’t necessarily credit Microsoft for these things. They are simply impressive products, regardless of who actually thought of them. For the most part, I’m not really a big Microsoft fan. I don’t own a single Microsoft product at the moment.
Yaro,
“Apple never creates?” “Microsoft never innovates?” Seriously?
Your erroneous interpretations of the words “create” and “invent” and “innovate” seem to have a nearly-impossibly high bar, making them almost worthless.
Here are some definitions found online:
invention — ” contrivance or construction of that which has not before existed”
create — “to make; to cause to exist”
innovate — “To change or alter by introducing something new; to remodel; to revolutionize”
By these standards, I’d say roughly that any time a company or person delivers something out of the lab and to market, good or bad, it creates it. I’d say that any time something is largely new or novel, it’s invented, and any time something is improved upon, refashioned or remodeled dramatically, usually in a positive way, it’s an innovation.
I’d certainly say that the iPhone was an innovation — it was created. The Mac was an innovation, and a creation. In neither case were all the components or concepts brand new, but they were brought together in a new, useful and innovative way.
In the same way, I’d say that Microsoft Access and XBox Live and XMLHttpRequest all meet that standard as well.
Oh please, if Apple gets credit for “reinventing the music business” with an MP3 player in 2001, and for “innovating” with a smartphone in 2007, then you HAVE to give MS some credit for plugging away at the tablet concept for more than a decade.
The reality is that there isn’t a company still in business who has been working on tablet computers longer than Microsoft. They’ve been plugging away at this since Windows 3.11, whether people cared to take notice or not.
Oh, don’t mistake me. I hate Apple just about as much as I hate Microsoft. The iPod was nothing we hadn’t seen before, just shinier and a larger capacity at the time. And there’s not a single damn thing in the iPhone I would call “revolutionary” no matter how many times the Steve Jobs Cultists call it so. In fact, as far as smartphones go, the iPhone is a pretty poor sampling.
so when the iphone came out, to you, it was just another run of the mill smartphone… something you’ve seen countless times and had nothing innovative about it?
James, are you kidding? When the first iPhone came out I didn’t even consider it a smartphone at all. No ability to install apps, no cut and paste, no MMS, no decent push email support, EDGE, awful camera. It was a featurephone with a nice browser and an Apple on the back.
About a year ago, I wrote a blog post entitled “Getting Pretty Tired of the ‘Microsoft Never Innovates’ Zeitgeist”.
I think the argument that Microsoft never innovates is either laziness or willful ignorance.
http://stevemurch.typepad.com/blog/2008/07/getting-pretty-tired-of-the-microsoft-doesnt-innovate-zeitgeist.html
I took a look at it. Everything you cited was dead wrong. Everything you seem to think Micorosft invented was a non-innovation.
Please, cite me a REAL example of how Microsoft innovates. No one ever has.
It’s not laziness or willful ignorance. I researched it (Like your incorrect claim that the Xbox was the first console to use broadband, for example, or that Project Natal was a new invention (Look up Eyetoy.). Claiming you used to work for Microsoft doesn’t prove anything.
You sure you don’t still work for Microsoft? Because that entire article was pure bullshit.
Hi Yaro,
You sound like someone with a very open mind.
No, in fact you didn’t respond to every one of the items I mentioned in my post. I named about 10 items off the top of my head, but you replied to about half of them.
How about:
* First to market with a satellite-based mapping technology where you could see any place in the US on the web. Released to market years before Google even existed as a company.
* XMLHttpRequest(), which is the foundation of AJAX. Microsoft didn’t invent the idea of asynch communication, but IE5 was the first browser to include asynch + XML capabilities in a shipping browser. Other browsers soon followed.
* Language embedded entity modeling and querying, fully enabled in an IDE. (Microsoft released LINQ; it is extremely innovative.)
* Microsoft Access was the first graphical relational database (I worked on it’s first and second releases)
* Open Database Connectivity was the first database middleware in any operating system
* XBox Live was the first broadband multiplayer gaming network to provide real-time audio, matchmaking and other built-in services right out of the box, and remains the most innovative console multiplayer gaming experience
* Innovations like AutoSum in a spreadsheet and Intellisense (correct-as-you-type for both spelling and grammar) — we take these for granted today, but they first appeared in Word and Excel.
* Microsoft has over 9,000 basic research patents granted. Now, I’ll stipulate that some percentage of these are errors on the Patent’s office part (and I generally don’t advocate frivilous patent filings), but are you sure you’re standing by your view that every single one of these has prior art? If so, I think the burden’s on you.
These are just a few off the top of my head. There are many more.
I’m not arguing that Microsoft is the MOST innovative company. I’d even stipulate that they should be MORE innovative given their size, resources, and history. But to say they never innovate or invent anything is just plain lazy — it’s as close as we get in technology to a bigoted worldview.
Yaro I agree with Steve Murch, MS should innovate more but they do innovate and invent.
Natal may be a little like eyetoy but eyetoy didn’t have motion sensors. Natal will use motion sensors to give more accurate motion capture and voice recognition as well. That is innovation and that is evolutionary to the eyetoy and even the new PS3 motion capture system. The PS3 motion capture system is an evolution to the Nintendo Wii system.
I’d say Surface is an evolution, I haven’t seen anything like that off movies.
Palm pretty much invented the hand held organizer which later turned into the smart phone. Apple then took that idea and evolved it…not revolutionized.
Apple stole Mac OS from Xerox, and used freebsd to make OSX. So again evolution not revolution. Apple never revolutionized anything. I’d actaully say that if MS never came out with Windows the home PC wouldn’t be as strong as it is because MS kept the price cheap because of the clone market. If Linux was even developed at a time without MS it would still probably be using a command prompt interface and not graphical.
So not only does MS innovate and create but it also pushes other companies to as other companies have pushed MS to innovate and change.
There’s no way this is running Windows 7…unless Windows 7 runs on ARM.
Windows 7 could be leading a double life just like OS X did for all its releases—every OS X release has been compiled for both PowerPC and Intel.
i’m getting one when it comes out…
This is what Microsoft’s Courier device will really look like in the end. http://pic.gd/1c621e
Wow, that joke’s both relevant AND creative!
Jackass.
Ha.
Very nice. Despite being Apple all the way, I might buy if Apple sticks to the consumer (rather than producer, i.e. creator) market with its upcoming tablet.
Now why doesn’t the kindle come like this; they should have made it similar to a book.
Microsoft needs to come up with a e-ink version of this specifically for books and the like.
except a version with e-ink would be nearly worthless for most other features.
Although a Pixel Qi tri-mode screen could be a good compromise.
e-ink is stupid
my calculator has a better screen than e-ink
so they havent announced what the capabilities are, but we’ll bash it for what we think it doesnt have
i love how they have apple as one of the main sites in the bowser.
I wonder what the range is on the hinge? I’m thinking backseat Battleship for the kids among other two-player games. If it indeed runs Windows 7, and is released with some slick hardware, I’d say it definitely has potential.
As said before, this thing runs on top of Windows 7. There’s a (good?) chance that we’ll be able to access the full blown Win7 experience (Windows Media Center, etc), so media and web might not be a limitation after all.
What I find interesting though is the recent patent filed by MS, you know, the one for a touch screen keyboard. [http://gizmodo.com/5368149/microsoft-getting-cleverer-and-cleverer-with-new-multitouch-screen-keyboard]
This software + Win 7 + A possibly solid solution for touch screen input might just seal the deal.
http://gizmodo.com/5368149/microsoft-getting-cleverer-and-cleverer-with-new-multitouch-screen-keyboard
For all those who hate copy & paste.
Can’t believe I didn’t see that. Turn it sideways and you have a pretty amazing laptop. Brilliant.
Be quite MS!. plz sell real product.
I could care less about another tablet device (i.e. iPad, CrunchPad) but this thing is very smart. I can see Microsoft targeting students and business professionals for this and marketing it as a reader that will rival the Kindle, a personal manager device, and PC all rolled up into one elegantly designed package.
Argh IE6 interface for the online sharing… put it away, put it away! *runs*
I think in order for this to be a success Microsoft needs to find a model where they sell for an enormous loss- make it accessible so people get into it ASAP. Perhaps a marketplace model for books and applications. If these things were anywhere near 150-200GBP they’d fly off the shelves… perhaps that could be done if they were sold with a contract for wireless carrier? The pirce needs to be low enough that it becomes a new standard in multiple fields- from university to e-readers.
The interface looks very impressive, and they manage to make it look very simple to use, although in reality that probably isn’t the case. The main issue though is the target market, as a ‘web-connected organizer’ it is limiting itself somewhat to a business niche, and with other touch interfaces on the horizon such as the apple tablet, I just think it won’t compare, resulting in minimal sales.
I am a microsoft hater … mostly because of Vista … but this device looks really good … it’s elegant and easy to use
I have been waiting for an electronic ‘moleskine’ for ages. As some point out this is not technological innovation but usability innovation so it’s long overdue.
Lately, MSFT is putting less applications its high end devices trying to address the historical problems they have bugged them in the past.
Think at the Zune, has better technical capabilities than the Ipod but far less applications, at least to start with; gradually, they’ll increase those.
I am looking forward to the moment all the devices MSFT has been working on will come together in an integrated way.
As for the Courier, I’d be surprised if you couldn’t turn it 90 degrees and use the left screen as your main screen and the right screen as a virtual keyboard that can slide in and out.
I hope it will release in Europe as well, damn…
i’m gonna get this when it comes out because i need something i can do work on. i’m not looking for another i prdocut, and i’m not looking for a bb or a smart phone because i’m not using it for email or social networking. i want this to be more like google wave or google products…i don’t even mind if it has Ms stamped all over it and windows 7 doesn’t suck.
I was watching a rerun of this cartoon Dexter Laboratory. This genius kid though to smart up by listining to a french language record while sleeping.
It would work well if the record played did not get stuck by repeating ”Omlet du fromage” So the next morning dexter woke up that was all he could say ”Omlet du fromage”. The funny thing is he got succesfull with the talking french to the girls.
The drawback was he could not get into his laboratory caus he could only say “Omlet du fromage”‘. Off course Dee Dee laugh at him hard for thats all he can say.
So where will it end up if it does only that.
Gizmodo is just writing what MS is giving them on Courier. If MS is smart they won’t give everything out at once, they would want Apple, other companies and people to think and wonder and talk….and you know what, thats what people are doing. You let out a little at a time. MS has a lot going on with the Zune HD and coming Pink and Windows 7 and Windows 7 mobile. Just like leaking those mockups of the phones, its just to get people talking and wondering. We really don’t know what these will be. Courier could be just an organizer/journal type thing, but maybe thats what they want people to think. Maybe it’ll be more.
The due date isn’t until 2010 and I’m guessing later in 2010 so they have plenty of time to leak more out as time comes. If I worked at MS I’d do it this way. Listen to the buzz and let out a little more. If they let it out all at nice and the product isn’t going to come out for another 8-10 months then by the time its almost ready to come out the talk would be done. Its smart to leave some to wonder and slowly give a little info here and a little there.
They’re also just letting the info out to one source which is smart. Gizmodo writes their article on it and the others just copy or specuate from what Gizmodo wrote. Maybe MS is getting a little cloak and dagger. Hell if I worked at MS I would probably just say MS is coming out with a new tablet and mention for the phone Project Pink and let peoples minds wonder. Every so often I’d let out a tad of info to keep people talking. I might leak out some drawings or a mock up, but never much more. Get people going crazy wondering what it is then when its in beta phase I’d show it off. I wouldn’t want other companies to know exactly what I’m up to until the last moment.
You know I hate game trailers because most of them don’t show any game play at all, but they get me wondering and wanting to know more. Thats the way you do it, you don’t show much, and you get people to the point of getting to believe its vaporware, or “when are they going to show something real about the product” then you get them waiting a little more, then at the right time you show them and they ooh and ahhh about it. Then if you have a product thats really good the buzz is so huge and other companies are peeing in their pants. Maybe MS is working on a variation of that strategy?
Yeah, that’s exactly what’s happening. it’s smart PR. Engadget got the zune hd “leaks” – now it’s Giz’ turn.
Wait a minute. So there are two separate screens? How big is the separation between the two? Is it small enough for it to be used as a single larger screen?
Way too cool. Way too cool in concept at least. If the actual product one day turns out as cool as the demo, the world will be a better place. I can’t get over how cool this is.
Is it a tablet PC or an extremely cool organizer? Either way it will probably be on my “must have” list if it ever makes it into production.
We’ve seen this before, typical Microsoft Vaporware. Check out this story
http://www.metawedgie.com/journal/2009/10/1/can-you-say-vaporware.html