Blog:: Craig Pringle

The fabulous folks over at Toshiba have loaned me a brand new M750 to help with my early testing of the Windows 7 pre-beta.  While certainly not the lightest tablet I have used this is a seriously fast workhorse of a tablet.  It really is the whole package.

The unit I got came with:

• Intel® Core™ 2 Duo P8600 (2.4GHz, 1066MHz FSB, 3MB L2 Cache)
• 12.1" WXGA 200NIT CSV Display(1280x800)
• 2GB DDR2 (800MHz)
• 200GB HDD (7200rpm) SATA
• DVD SuperMulti Double/Dual Layer Drive
• 1Gbit LAN + AMT 4.0
• WLAN (802.11a/g/n)

The screen is a Wacom dual mode digitizer, supporting both the active stylus and resistive touch.

Lets have a look at the outside of the device.  As we go through click the images for a larger view.

Down the left hand side we have

A - Venting.  This blows out a little air but not much and not very warm.

B - Lock port

C - A combination eSATA or powered USB port.  This particular USB port is suppose to be able to charge your USB devices while the tablet is asleep, but I've not put that to the test yet.

D - A normal USB port

E - PCMCIA slot

The front bezel has...

A - a plathora of indicator lights - including ones for optional components such as a second battery or a 3G WWAN radio.

B - Hardware switch for the radios.  This is a nice touch.  I never remember to turn my wireless off before I get on a plane :)

C - IEEE1394 port.

D,E - Headphone and mic jacks

F - hard to see in the picture but a volume control wheel.

Down the right side and we have

A - The stylus dock.

B - A multi card reader

C - A slimline DVD dual layer recorder

D - A modem port (I can't remember the last time I used a modem - seems like a waste of space to me!)

The back side is fairly sparten.

A - Another USB port.

B - VGA Output

C - Power input

D - Gigabit Ethernet port

The top of the screen sports an inbuilt web cam and microphone.

There are also a host of buttons at the bottom of the screen - or on the front bezel when in slate mode.

And a fingerprint reader on the other end of the same edge, which is also well placed for ease of access in both laptop mode and slate mode.

Speaking of slate mode the M750 has the same locking hinge that we first saw on the R400 and have since seen on the M700 as well.  This eliminates the floppy head that some other convertibles suffer from.  Basically you can only rotate the screen when it is roughly 90 degrees to the base.  The rest of the time the bottom corners lock into these latches on the corner of the base.

Another nice feature - no doubt aimed at eliminating a common cause of breakages - are the indicator arrows by the hinge that tell you which way to twist the screen.  These are located front and back of the hinge.  The former is visible when in laptop mode and the latter when in slate mode.

Another great feature the M750 shares with many of its predecessors is the emergency stylus.  I used it a couple of time when I had a M400 and wished for it many times with some of my other tablets.  Basically if you flip the unit over there is a panel by the docking station connector.

To open this you push a pen in the hole on the right end (ironically - if you have lost your main stylus) and pull the other end to slide the cover to the left.  You can then flip the cover over and - hey presto - a little mini stylus clipped into the lid!  Very cool.  Note there is even a little button on it - this is a real active digitizer stylus.

Over all I am pretty impressed so far.  The M750 is a really nice device to work with.  I have put Windows 7 on it and it runs very fast and so far pretty stable.  I'll have more to say on that as I get into it.

I've been playing with Windows 7 as time permits (which has not been a lot) over the last couple of days.  While I am not yet in a position to do a full review, but as I scratch the surface I am starting to uncover some cool features.

Here is a of a feature I found by accident.  As you drag a window to the edge of the screen it will turn into a transparent window and "snap" to a certain pre-defined position.   If you drag it up to the top it will snap to full screen view.  If you drag it the the left or right edge it will snap to that edge and take up half of the screen area. 

Very nice.

Once I had Windows 7 (the Milestone 3 build) up and running one of the things I decided to try was to hold down the Windows key and press all the letter keys to see if there were any new keyboard shortcuts exposing new features.  And guess what - there was!

Pressing Windows+P shows the dialogue below...

...which lets you quickly choose an alternate display output method.

Running left to right the options are:

• Laptop only
• Clone display to projector
• Extend desktop to projector
• Projector only

I love the Mobility Centre in Vista, but this takes the cake!  What a great feature.

I was lucky enough to be one of those invited to preview the Windows 7 Milestone 3 build that was released at PDC this week.  I downloaded it last night and installed it on an Acer Ferrari 1000 notebook I had lying around. 

The install experience was remarkable - for such an early build the install was really smooth.  I did not sit and watch it build but it had finished the bulk of the install and was waiting for me to enter my name inside of an hour.

Another interesting event during the install was being given the opportunity to enter my wireless settings during the initial setup routine. 

After the install completed I logged in.  Again it was remarkable.  For such an early build the it looks pretty good.  At this stage very Vista-like, but it actually looked fairly nice and seemed at least as responsive on Vista on the same hardware.

Next up I checked Device Manager to see what hardware had not been installed.  This was my next surprise.  A generic display driver was being used.  The inbuilt webcam and the multicard reader did not have drivers.  Everything else was detected. 

Contrasting this with my first experience with an early Vista build - that was very different.  It looked unfinished.  Driver support was awful and it ran like a dog.

There are fewer "under the hood" architecture changes in Windows 7 and as such application and driver support is pretty good even at this early stage. 

Overall I am happy and intrigued by this early build.  I've found some nice features already and there are some noticeable absentees.  That is a another story.  I've not even had a chance to check out the tablet bits yet.  I'm looking for some more hardware to test out this build on.  Stay tuned!

While it is possible to have two Outlook profiles on one machine and to configure these profiles to point to different Exchange environments it has always bugged me that you can only have one profile open at one time.  Until now.

Nick Randolph pointed out a really great little tool that allows you to launch a second, independent instance of Outlook in which you can open a different Outlook profile.

So, without further adieu, we are proud to present you with our "ExtraOutlook" tool that allows you to launch as many Outlook instances as you want. All you have to do is configure the profiles you want, and then type: ExtraOutlook.exe "C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\Office12\OUTLOOK.EXE"

ExtraOutlook is available from HammerOfGod.  Groovy.

I was just doing an overdue Inbox cleanout when I came across a comment notification I got ages ago that I should of posted about before now.

Folks: if you are a TabletPC developer or user please join us in the Linkedin TabletPC Enthusiast group: http://www.linkedin.com/groups?gid=66744

This is an official Linkedin.com professional networking group. Sole purpose is to identify TabletPC developers and users and grow our community. No cost. See Linkedin.com for more information about how Linkedin.com and groups work.

Sounds good - I've signed up. If there is one thing we all need it is more people writing cool tablet applications!

I am going to be co-presenting a session on OCS Edge Services with my good friend and fellow MVP Derrick Buckley.  The session is on Friday the 5th of September at 11:45.  Here's the details.

UNC316

Office Communications Server 2007 Security: Architecture and Edge Services

One of the core value propositions for Office Communications Server (OCS) 2007, is the fact that unified communications can be used anywhere - at work, at home, or on the road. In this session, we discuss the edge aspects of OCS 2007 for voice, media conferencing, remote access, public internet connectivity and federation, along with the edge server roles. We discuss various edge server deployment topologies. We also discuss NAT and firewall traversal with discussion on how OCS 2007 uses ICE, STUN and TURN for audio and video.

If you are coming to TechEd in Sydney this year then make sure you get it in your session builder now!

When the first generation iPhone was released I looked at it and thought it was cool, but I said at the time there was no way I was going to give up push email.

When the 3G version has released with Exchange ActiveSync support I decided to buy one and try it out.  Initially it looked like I was going to have to wait a while as the Telcos in Australia were only selling them on a plan, except for Optus which had a pre-pay option available.  That is they said they had a pre-pay option available but if you went into an Optus shop and tried to buy one you would be told that they did not have enough stock and were only selling them on plan. 

Then - the week before last - I got word that some Telstra dealers were selling the phones "outright".  I put it in quotes because unlike every other phone you can buy from Telstra outright the iPhone comes locked to the Telstra network and you have to pay AU$150 Telstra Tax to get it unlocked for use on any network.  None the less I trundled down to the local JB Hi-Fi and picked up a 16GB iPhone.

So why have I not posted about this before now?  Well suffice to say that I have had a few issues.  In fact I am now on my third unit in a week and a half!

The first unit I got looked fine, but when I got it back to the office I found that it could not see or connect to any wireless networks.   It would just constantly search, even if I was standing within inches of the access point.  A colleague had also bought one and had no issues.  I tried the usual troubleshooting steps such as soft reset, hard reset and flashing the firmware, but to no avail.  Then next day I returned to the point of purchase and uttered the magic words "not fit for purpose" which under the local trading laws means they have to refund or replace it and got unit number two.

Unit number two functioned brilliantly - for almost a whole 24 hours.  Then on the first day I actually carried the device in my suit pocket it developed what appeared to be a small crack in LCD.  Not the glass over the LCD, but the display itself.  This manifested itself as a vertical line of dead pixels a few millimetres long surrounded by a cluster of off colour pixels around it.  this was centred in the bottom right corner of the display roughly where the "9" key sits when the phone keypad is up.  The real bummer is that I noticed this late on Thursday afternoon and I was leaving the next morning for a family holiday, so I was not going to be able to take it back again for more than a week.  The phone was still functional - so I took it with me.  Over the next week horizontal lines of dead pixels slowly crept across the screen from the original vertical line, eventually reaching both sides.

So today I took iPhone II back to Sydney's Apple store.  This is where the story improves greatly.  The service I got was excellent.  I approached one of the greeters at the door and asked how I submit an iPhone for warranty.  He said the best way was to make an appointment with one of the geniuses and walked me over to one of the Macs and booked a session starting in about 20 minutes.  I went up to the genius bar about 10 minutes later after grabbing an espresso and my pre-booked guru (Roger) was already free and waiting. 

Roger was brilliant. He didn't accuse me of dropping the phone, trying to fold it or using it as a hammer.  He just took me at my word that I had not abused the phone (which was true, btw) and said "it shouldn't do that - I'll just check stock and see if we can swap it out now for you."  It was in stock, he did swap it out and because I had already unlocked phone II from Telstra he unlocked phone III on the spot as well.  He even took the time to ring me to ensure that the unlock had gone through and gave me a sticker with the new IMIE number on it to stick on the original box.

This iPhone is the first Apple product I have ever bought.  Had they not handled my screen issue so well it may well of been the last.  While it has not been smooth sailing I am willing to write this off as bad luck, especially since everyone else I know who has one has had no hardware issues at all.  The good service I received as a decidedly unhappy customer has gone a long way making me a happy camper again.