Photo gallery: HP TouchSmart IQ505aDesign & Features
This is HP's second generation touchscreen PC, a great improvement on its first iteration. The new form factor, for a start, pushes into panel PC territory, and looks a treat. HP's byword for the TouchSmart seems to be "simplicity". Mounted around the front of the 22-inch, 1,680x1,050 screen is a built in webcam, as well as a speaker grill along the bottom edge, and a single "home" button above this which launches HP's custom touch interface. Set-up is just as minimal — simply plug in the power adapter, sync the 2.4GHz wireless keyboard and mouse and you're away.
One minor niggle is that the keyboard is too simple. We'd love to see an indicator light on the keyboard — any kind of light, whether power, caps lock or otherwise — as when there's issues connecting to the PC it's difficult to ascertain whether it's a battery issue, or a wireless synching issue. To confuse things further, even when the keyboard is not connected to the PC and the batteries are removed, HP's system tray tool will happily tell you that your keyboard is at 100 per cent charge.
Otherwise both keyboard and mouse are fine, the five-button mouse in particular is pleasant to use. The integrated speakers are significantly better than normal fare too, which considering the thinness of the unit makes us wonder why monitor manufacturers have had such issues incorporating decent ones, while HP doesn't bat an eyelid. It's most likely a costing issue in the case of the monitors; however, if that's the case, you'd think they'd cut the feature and focus on improving quality elsewhere. But we digress.
On the left-hand side of the panel arises a curiosity — a button that lights up a white fluorescent tube under the monitor so you can see in the dark when you type, and can be switched off, or cycled through three levels of brightness. Underneath this button is two USB ports, a headphone and line-in jack, while further back under a removable panel are three more USB ports, an Ethernet jack, digital audio out (in the form of an RCA jack) and audio line out. The opposite side features the power button, a DVD±RW drive, volume controls, SD/MMC/MS/xD card reader and a FireWire port, while internally Bluetooth and 802.11n are offered.
The screen is raised slightly off desk level, allowing the keyboard to be neatly tucked underneath and effectively hidden from sight. Unfortunately, it's not quite high enough to admit a keyboard that has had its legs extended — you'll have to tuck them in before pushing it through.
Software
A point of annoyance — upon first load, the TouchSmart continuously made the Windows "Start navigation" noise (the click sound that's made, for example, when you open a page in Internet Explorer). While we worked around it by switching off the Start navigation effect in the Sound control panel, we had less luck finding the rogue application that was the cause of the noise, something that's hopefully fixed soon.
While the TouchSmart uses Windows Vista Home Premium 64-bit for its operating system, it also has HP's own touch interface available for use — and is quite enjoyable to use. While it only understands basic multi-touch, it's otherwise quite fun and for the most part, well thought out. Things can get a little laggy, especially when using the calendar for booking appointments, and we can only assume this is either because it features a completely underpowered Intel GMA 3000 as the graphics card, or doesn't support GPU acceleration at all.
The touchscreen beeps whenever you touch it — a low pitch for one finger, a higher one for two. This can be turned off if found annoying, and interestingly, doesn't beep at all when using HP's TouchSmart interface, only in Windows Vista.
The initial interface is broken up into two rows, one "large" set of scrollable application tiles for your frequently used programs, and a smaller strip down the bottom for lesser used ones. You can drag and drop using your finger to reorder these icons either in the one strip or between them, and a simple tap of an icon loads that program. The bottom row features a number of links to Windows games, a clock, weather, RSS feeds, and an embedded version of Internet Explorer, whereas the top strip gives access to Music, Videos, Calendar, Pictures and Notes, a Post-It note style application that allows you to draw with your fingers, use handwriting recognition for text, or keep voice notes.
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