Lenovo to Release Dual-Head Laptop

Terry Olaes

Terry Olaes

I Used to be the [H] News Guy
Joined
Nov 27, 2006
Messages
4,646
No, I don’t mean that it supports two screens – that’s no big deal. Lenovo’s ThinkPad W700ds actually has dual LCD screens built into it. Now that’s funky.

The ThinkPad W700ds appears to be the first laptop ever to sport two LCD screens -- a 17-in. primary and a 10.6-in. secondary screen. The souped-up "mobile workstation," as Lenovo calls it, also comes with customers' choice of quad-core Intel Core 2 processors and Nvidia Quadro mobile graphics CPU with as many as 128 cores. It also comes with as much as 8GB of DDR3 memory and a pair of hard drive/solid-state drive bays for up to 960GB of storage.
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What in the world could you do with a 10.6" screen? I mean, you couldn't even pull an email client over there to make it usable.

It's all in an 11-lb. brick
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:eek:

starting at $3,600.
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:eek:

I guess I shouldn't complain. Apple's revision would probably be like 10 grand :p
 
Missed this...
16 inches by 12 inches, and is 2.1 inches thick.
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Holy cow. 2.1 inches thick? I think I could carry around a couple bricks and they'd be more portable. This definitely isn't design for portability I guess, in which case begs the question: why not keep a desktop with two REAL and BIG monitors?
 
Make one with a 7" screen that slides out of the 10" and I'll buy a dozen!
 
TechieSooner said:
Missed this...

Holy cow. 2.1 inches thick? I think I could carry around a couple bricks and they'd be more portable. This definitely isn't design for portability I guess, in which case begs the question: why not keep a desktop with two REAL and BIG monitors?
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Well, it's still portable within the house, which is a big deal for my wife. She's a work-at-home mother and translator who could really use the extra screen real-estate and the ability to change locale quickly.
 
I want one so my e-peen can grow large. ZOMG 128 CORES
 
srangara said:
Well, it's still portable within the house, which is a big deal for my wife. She's a work-at-home mother and translator who could really use the extra screen real-estate and the ability to change locale quickly.
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Niche market then, I'd see. I just don't see this as something that will take the market by storm.

And my question still stands though, on a 10.6" screen, what the heck could you put over there? An IM client or two?
Word docs would be smushed together. Email clients would be mostly the menus, not the actual content. Internet browsers would be too small. I just don't see much in it.
 
TechieSooner said:
Niche market then, I'd see. I just don't see this as something that will take the market by storm.

And my question still stands though, on a 10.6" screen, what the heck could you put over there? An IM client or two?
Word docs would be smushed together. Email clients would be mostly the menus, not the actual content. Internet browsers would be too small. I just don't see much in it.
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I dunno, ask anyone who uses a netbook what they do on it :rolleyes:
 
I think the second screen will be useful to designers who like having brush panels, settings, etc. on a cheap second screen, leaving the main one for full screen editing. Surprised no on made a laptop (if you can call it that :eek:) with this before.
 
mad3d said:
I think the second screen will be useful to designers who like having brush panels, settings, etc. on a cheap second screen, leaving the main one for full screen editing. Surprised no on made a laptop (if you can call it that :eek:) with this before.
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That is exactly what I was thinking. infact they stole this idea from me, I had this all planed out in my head.

Anyway a small 2nd screen is great for having a reference image or tools on.
its way to heavy to be portable though, I would just buy a mini to go with my laptop before I got that.
 
i actually thought about making something like this and putting a patent on it.

it would be useful for students studying in the library for example, on one screen you could have your notes and on the other you could have wikipedia open. although if you had a laptop with a 17" you could probably just do that on there.
 
I can see how this would be useful for people who travel a lot and need a mobile workstation-type machine. It may not be as portable as a traditional laptop, but it has power and capability more comparable to a desktop machine and is a lot easier to transport.

Also, it really irritates me how nVidia refers to their GPUs as having so many "cores". It's a grossly inaccurate claim.
 
Zero82z said:
I can see how this would be useful for people who travel a lot and need a mobile workstation-type machine. It may not be as portable as a traditional laptop, but it has power and capability more comparable to a desktop machine and is a lot easier to transport.

Also, it really irritates me how nVidia refers to their GPUs as having so many "cores". It's a grossly inaccurate claim.
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But to most folks bigger numbers = better
 
Well it is listed as a WXGA screen which is the same resolution as most 15.4" laptop screens. I think there is plenty of room to have an extra document open or browsing the web. Too bad the symmetry is gone. They need to add a third 10.6" monitor on the other side. :D
 
TechieSooner said:
Niche market then, I'd see. I just don't see this as something that will take the market by storm.

And my question still stands though, on a 10.6" screen, what the heck could you put over there? An IM client or two?
Word docs would be smushed together. Email clients would be mostly the menus, not the actual content. Internet browsers would be too small. I just don't see much in it.
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Ironically, I'm sitting in a hotel reading this on my EEEPC 1000H (10" screen). You shouldn't be so quick to take issue with the screen size - it's fine. I do everything on here that I would do on a normal laptop, but I will sometimes fullscreen my browser to claim extra real estate :)

Cool idea though, I like it. I don't see it taking the marker by storm so much either, but at least someone came out with something pretty innovative like that for those that would take advantage of it.
 
shit this is only the start. once oled becomes affordable youll see screens slide on on both sides, without adding weight, size or battery drain.
 
That looks solid to me - I can't work without dual screens.

If I'm developing I simply can't function without putting an IDE on the main screen with my API or a DB console on my other screen... with a few google/reference tabs... you know.

Anyway, I think it looks sharp, and worth it... I'm certainly not going to poo-poo on good innovation.
 
spacetrader said:
shit this is only the start. once oled becomes affordable youll see screens slide on on both sides, without adding weight, size or battery drain.
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And before too long we'll have curved displays that would just fold up. You can always say" this is only the beginning".
Before too long after that we'll also have holographic displays.

Raptor_007 said:
Ironically, I'm sitting in a hotel reading this on my EEEPC 1000H (10" screen). You shouldn't be so quick to take issue with the screen size - it's fine.
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I'm really not. I use my 13" all the time. My point was for this to be labeled a "mobile workstation", 10.6" is too freaking small.

I couldn't stand using 13" as a workstation. In a pinch, if I need to edit a spreadsheet or something, it's fine (When away from the office). But it'd kill me to have anything smaller to do frequent work on.
 
It's a really neat idea but it begs the question... you have this fragile screen sticking out the side of the laptop, how long until someone moves something on a table and wipes out he secondary display or possibly both since the leverage could conceivably damage the primary LCD as well...

Really cool Idea and I'd love to see it in action but it does look like it's asking to get accidentally ripped off by the way it's sticking out from the main machine
 
I imagine this is primarily to be used as a portable CAD worksation. The model could be viewed on the secondary monitor while you could make changes on the primary.
 
spacetrader said:
shit this is only the start. once oled becomes affordable youll see screens slide on on both sides, without adding weight, size or battery drain.
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Actually there are already some laptops with screens on both sides, just not that large. I remember seeing a video of it awhile back. I wish I could remember it a little better. I want to say it would display certain information such as email or media player controls. That way you could use that stuff without having to open the laptop. I want to say the back screen was only like 5" or something like that. However that doesn't have anything to do with the size, weight or battery drain that you mentioned.
 
spacetrader said:
shit this is only the start. once oled becomes affordable youll see screens slide on on both sides, without adding weight, size or battery drain.
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I wanna see a screen that can be folded up like a roll of paper.

and it has to have a keyboard on it as well.


hell, just make a whole laptop that can be rolled up like a map.

mark my words, in 20+ this will happen.
 
I could definitely use this machine. 16"x12"x2.1" and 11 lbs is much smaller and lighter than my current "portable" workstation. (Shuttle XPC and monitor both with carrying cases). I would much rather take a laptop to client meetings instead of my Shuttle, but up until recently, no laptop was powerful enough for my needs. Now with the release of the Dell m6400 and the Lenovo w700, I finally have some options.
 
this would be great if they made a beefy version. If you could get a field rated version Id kill to have a few of these in my unit, they'd make my job and others so much easier. Its not designed to be pulled out at star bucks or on the train, but rather use it to set up a mobile base of operations that can be transported easily. Of course, a "beefy" version would be crazy expensive like the toughbooks we use now.
 
lol if someone really wanted dual monitors on the go, there you are!
 
srangara said:
Well, it's still portable within the house, which is a big deal for my wife. She's a work-at-home mother and translator who could really use the extra screen real-estate and the ability to change locale quickly.
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For the price of this laptop, she could just buy a few computers for the home. A few low end desktops with 24" monitors and a 1 TB NAS. Rather do that then buy a $3k USD laptop with tiny monitors for home use. Not to mention when you aren't using one machine, someone else can be using it.
 
I havent graded my laptop in 3+ years for one reason. 1900x1200 WUXGA. Find me a tablet with that resolution and I'd pay thousands.
 
krotch said:
For the price of this laptop, she could just buy a few computers for the home. A few low end desktops with 24" monitors and a 1 TB NAS. Rather do that then buy a $3k USD laptop with tiny monitors for home use. Not to mention when you aren't using one machine, someone else can be using it.
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then than then than then than then than then than then than then than

It makes all the difference.
 
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