Mac|Life - July 2008

AXIOTRON MODBOOK

IT’S ONE OF A KIND, BUT WE WISH IT WEREN’T

Mac tablet’s innovative interface may not be enough to keep it afloat.

Take away a MacBook’s keyboard, and add a touchscreen display, QWERTY keyboard, we missed having even a few buttons. You can and behold the Modbook. Literally a retrofitted MacBook, this forget hitting the spacebar to start playback in most audio and video Apple-sanctioned tablet Mac shares the same features and editors, for example. Command-Z, Command-A, and other essential performance. But the Modbook does more—and less—than Apple’s key commands don’t exist. Even with painting and photo retouching, portable. The Modbook’s touch-sensitive screen responds well to the we constantly had to reach for palettes and menus, when we’d included stylus, making it a great digital sketch pad for artists. With normally rely on muscle-memory, tapping out keyboard shortcuts the right software, the Modbook makes a useful in-the-field device to zoom, change tools, and otherwise adjust settings. A few user-for doctors, insurance representatives, and other specialized mobile programmable buttons would have vastly improved our experience users. A built-in GPS module even tracks the Modbook’s location. But and productivity. efficient work, even in graphic and other media applications, often One workaround for the somewhat limiting interface is Apple’s Ink requires buttons—or the keyboard that this tablet lacks. A narrow handwriting recognition. The software digitizes clean handwriting segment of users will find the Modbook ideal; it’s the only tablet and uses gesture motions to activate often-used commands. The computer that runs OS X, after all. But we wish it had just a few more Modbook also includes a floating onscreen keyboard, which we features. often pecked at to enter URLs, passwords, and other critical text.

The Modbook offers a spec sheet identical to that of the current One of the two stylus side-buttons comes preset to toggle this Apple MacBooks. At press time, the Modbook ships with either 2. 1 window. or 2.4GHz Intel Core Duo processors. It has the same camera, the Although the stylus interface gives new control options a same ports, the same amount of RAM, and the same performance. mouse can’t replicate, it also has shortcomings. Accuracy is

In a mad-scientist move—and aren’t they the best kind?—Axiotron impressive over the vast majority of the Modbook’s surface, but removes Apple’s LCD and grafts its own onto the touch-sensitive the mouse pointer can drift away from display that sits where the MacBook’s keyboard would ordinarily the stylus tip near the screen’s edges. be. The resulting form factor is slightly thicker than the MacBook There were also plenty of occasions that donated its guts, but the Modbook essentially looks like a where we just wanted to tap the screen

MacBook with an inside-out display. The screen is sharp and clear, directly with a finger, but the Modbook’s sharing the same size and resolution as Apple’s LCD. Unlike the screen only responds to the stylus. For

MacBook screens, however, the Modbook sports a matte display. tasks like launching videos, scrolling

The screen is noticeably dimmer than Apple’s stock display, but, through webpages, or entering details hey, it’s a touchscreen. Thankfully, the viewing angles on the in a custom database, fingertips would

Modbook screen are better than those on Apple’s MacBook be a more convenient option. display, making it possible to use the tablet while it’s flat on Mac users might be glad to have a table. a tablet laptop at all, but some

Powered by the same technology that’s built into all of Wacom’s Windows-based tablet PCs include all pen tablets, the Modbook’s touch-sensitive surface responds of the Modbook’s missing features accurately to its stylus, fluidly moving the pointer around the screen. at a similar price: hard buttons, a

In Photoshop and Painter, we scribbled and brushed creations with keyboard that lives behind the screen greater ease than is possible with a mouse—or even a drawing tablet. and is accessible by pressing a button

Because the ModBook’s touchscreen and stylus can respond to 512 and swiveling the screen around, and levels of pressure, you have almost unlimited flexibility working on fingertip recognition. And the 5.5-pound it in graphics apps, and you can easily change the size and shade of Modbook feels heavy and a bit clumsy, strokes. A light touch creates thin, wispy lines, while a more forceful especially compared to keyboardless hand results in dark, thick lines. And, as with Wacom’s other tablets, Windows-based tablets. the battery-less stylus flips over to turn into an eraser—just like a The bottom line. The Modbook is traditional pencil. a competent drawing tablet and Mac

Other creative programs (audio editors, for example) feel snappy laptop mashed together. But the lack of and new with the stylus input. We had fun tuning GarageBand songs any physical buttons, a keyboard, or a and tapping the onscreen piano. finger-readable touchscreen limits its

Still, despite the fact that the tablet is designed to leapfrog a audience.—Zack Stern ^{S O L I D}

MODBOOK

Axiotron

www.axiotron.com

Price: $2,279 or $2,479 Specifications: 2.1GHz Intel Core 2 Duo, 1GB DDR2 SDRAM,

5,400-rpm 1202GB hard drive, Combo Drive, Intel GMA X3100 graphics processor with 144MB of DDR2 SDRAM shared with main memory, 13.3-inch TF T LCD display with Wacom touch-sensitive digitizer, two USB 2.0 ports, mini-DVI port, analog audio-in & out, iSight, 802.11n AirPort Extreme, Bluetooth 2.0+EDR.

2.4GHz Intel Core 2 Duo, 2GB DDR2 SDRAM, 5,400-rpm 160GB hard drive, SuperDrive, Intel GMA X3100 graphics processor with 144MB of DDR2 SDRAM shared with main memory, 13.3-inch TF T LCD display with Wacom touch-sensitive digitizer, two USB 2.0 ports, mini-DVI port, analog audio-in & out, iSight, 802.11n AirPort Extreme, Bluetooth 2.0+EDR