Glimpsing into a futuristic world through Lenovo's transparent laptop

Lenovo has unveiled its latest innovative device, the ThinkBook Transparent Display Laptop, at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. This futuristic laptop features a 17.3-inch MicroLED display with up to 55% transparency, transitioning from opaque to translucent as its pixels illuminate. Although its practical applications remain uncertain, Lenovo suggests it could benefit digital artists by enabling them to sketch while viewing the environment behind the screen. Additionally, the laptop boasts a flat touch keyboard that transforms into a drawing tablet, catering to creative professionals. However, challenges such as resolution limitations and usability issues persist, indicating that the device is still in development. Lenovo aims to spark public discourse on potential uses for this concept, anticipating that its technology may evolve into a consumer-ready product within the next five years.

Reliance and Lenovo Partners to Introduce New Range of Smartphones..

Reliance communications (RCOM) has joined hands with Lenovo to come out with a range of smartphones which will come in different screen sizes and processor speed.

Talking about this partnership, Gurdeep Singh, President & CEO – Wireless Business, Reliance Communications Limited, said, “We are confident that the unmet demand of an innovative CDMA smart-phone with exciting features at an attractive price point bundled with our most innovative “All Share” plans will fulfill the demand of every customer on our superior network.”

These smartphones will run on Android platform and will be powered by dual core 1 GHz processor. They will be exclusively available to Reliance customers on CDMA and GSM network.

According to an official statement, “The complete range of smart-phones across screen sizes and processor speed will be attractively priced and works on CDMA and GSM network simultaneously and use the Reliance ‘Dual Core’ network advantage that switch calls between the two networks automatically based on the strength and quality of RF signals.”

“The Indian smart-phone market represents solid growth opportunities where CDMA / GSM smart-phone penetration is still low. The consumer response to our smart-phones in these few months has been very encouraging,” said Liu Jun, President, Lenovo Business Group.

These smartphones will be available at all retail outlets of Reliance and Lenovo distribution channel.

Lenovo Multimedia Remote..

Over a year ago we cut the cable/dish around here and began using Home Theater PCs, and various extenders and it has worked out much better than I had hoped. My wife and two sons have been delighted with the selection of content available and we’re saving almost $125/month by not having DirecTV.

All went smoothly in the transition, building the HTPCs was easy, putting the Rokus, Popcorn Hour, Microsoft XBox360 and Thecus NAS on the network wasn’t a problem either. The only real issue we had was finding the right remote keyboard. I tried a slew of them and could never find one that was easy to use, small enough to fit in one hand and accomplished all the functions necessary to fully utilize the Windows 7 based PCs that were acting as the heart of our system.


Along came the Lenovo Multimedia Remote, a fan-shaped, gem with a roller-ball and qwerty-keyboard. It was almost perfect except for two things: 1. The keys weren’t back lit so it was very hard to see, and 2. There was no way to easily scroll (wheel) through web pages. Well, it appears my desires are about to met as Lenovo has introduced the Enhanced Lenovo Multimedia Remote Keyboard (N5902). The new model incorporates a scroll bar, touch pad rather than a ball, back-lit keyboard and, it appears, a little nicer overall look. It’s going to sell for $79.99 and should be shipping September 1. I promise a review as soon as I can get my paws on one.

It’s really refreshing to see a company that has listened to its customers and made changes to an already pretty-good product. I’ve included a short video highlight the keyboard and the changes that Lenovo made.

Lenovo IdeaPad U1– a laptop with a detachable tablet screen..

CES 2010 hasn't even started yet and already Lenovo has unwrapped its latest computing concept at the pre-show warm-up CES Unveiled. The computing company has shown off something called the Lenovo IdeaPad – a laptop which comes complete with a detachable tablet screen. The Lenovo IdeaPad U1 is certainly an intriguing concept. It calls itself a 'hybrid notebook' and is essentially two devices, with the tablet part of the IdeaPad working completely independently of the notebook cradle. Screen-wise, it's 11.6 inches and LED backlit, and while Lenovo were tight-lipped over what other specs the IdeaPad U1 has, they did let us have a peak at an as-yet-not-finalised specification sheet which noted the tablet part of the machine used a Qualcomm Arm 1GHz Snapdragon processor, with the main notebook powered by a Intel Core 2 Duo processor. In total the whole thing will weigh 1.61lbs, but if you fancy just carrying the tablet around then this will only weigh you down 0.7lbs. Other specs we managed to glean from Lenova are that the IdeaPad will incorporate 4GB of DDR3 Ram, house 2x USB ports and an eSata port. Interestingly, once the tablet is freed from the notebook body, you can hook the notebook up to an external monitor and it will work just fine. When the tablet is removed, what you are left with is a see-through red Perspex screen.

Another cool feature is that the device will know to automatically change your web surfing from full web to mobile web when the tablet is set free. Although the Snapdragon processor is more than capable of supporting full web, it is a handy little feature to have. Given the size of the device it's no wonder that it uses a resistive screen, but we tried it and there wasn't too much forced prodding to be done. Lenova has certainly hit onto and intriguing concept with the IdeaPad U1. While it may not be the only tablet device the company releases at CES, it's a great compromise for those who want to try out a tablet but don't won't to rid themselves of the notebook completely. Another compromise may be the price. Looking to be around the $999 mark when it is released in the US in the second half of the year, expect a UK release date of the Lenovo IdeaPad U1 later in 2010, with pounds matching dollars.

Laptop tracks gaze, taking eye-tracking out of lab..

It tracks your gaze and figures out where you're looking on the screen. That means, among other things, that you can play a game where you burn up incoming asteroids with a laser that hits where you look. In another demonstration this week, the computer scrolled a text on the screen in response to eye movements, sensing when the reader reached the end of the visible text.

In the future, a laptop like this could make the mouse cursor appear where you're looking, or make a game character maintain eye contact with you, according to Tobii Technology Inc., the Swedish firm that's behind the tracking technology. The eye tracker works by shining two invisible infrared lights at you. Two hidden cameras then look for the "glints" off your eyeballs and reflections from each retina. It needs to be calibrated for each person. It works for people with or without eyeglasses.

Rather than a replacement for the traditional mouse and keyboard or the newer touch screen, the eye-tracking could be a complement, making a computer faster and more efficient to use, said Barbara Barclay, general manager of Tobii's Analysis Solutions business. Tobii has been making eye-tracking devices for researchers and the disabled for nearly a decade. The laptop is its way of showing that eye-tracking could expand beyond those niches, Barclay said, calling it an "idea generator."

The laptop is made by Lenovo Corp., and incorporates Tobii's eye-tracking cameras in a "hump" on the cover, making the entire package about twice as thick as a regular laptop. But future, commercial versions can be slimmer and are perhaps two years away, Barclay said.

Lenovo and Tobii made 20 of the laptops and planned to demonstrate them at the CeBIT technology trade show in Hanover, Germany, on Tuesday.

Tobii's current, standalone eye-trackers cost tens of thousands of dollars, but Barclay said the cost of adding consumer-level eye-tracking to a commercial laptop could be much less. New ways to use computers have been proliferating in recent years. Touch screens are becoming popular on smart phones and tablet computers such as the iPad. Nintendo Corp.'s Wii game console brought motion-sensing technology to the masses. Microsoft Corp. released an accessory for its Xbox games console last year that uses an infrared camera to sense the movement of bodies in three dimensions.