2499?!

In the words of the great Garth Algar of Aurora, Illinois.... 

"When did you become a nutbar?" 

Are you guys smoking crack? Okay, the Multi-touch is nice but it is not worth almost $600 over Lenovo's X61 which has a faster CPU, higher resolution and more memory capacity...

You dropped the ball DeLL!

$2500?!?

I'd like to add a few more question and exclamation marks there, but I'll refrain.

Dell, you've come all this way, after continual delays and disappointments, and after so much smack talk (the whole sawing tablets in half business), you end the race by just shooting yourself in the foot.

 $2500 STARTING price... 

 What's that gonna get me? A 1GHz single core processor, a gig of RAM, 40GB 4200 RPM HDD, 802.11a/g, MAYBE bluetooth...

I have a Dell 700M with 1.6GHz Pentium, 1GB RAM, 60GB HDD, 802.11 a/g, and I bought it 3 years ago for $999 (worth about $500 today). Are you telling me that 3 years later you're putting worse specs in a machine, and charging $2000 premium for tablet functionality?

Give me a BREAK.

This is on the heals of Toshiba, who announced today a tablet that is not only has better base and fully loaded specs, has pen and touch capabilities as well, but also is a full GRAND cheaper.

Let me say it again just to emphasize: One THOUSAND dollars cheaper. It's slightly larger, and of course doesn't have multitouch, but is that extra cubic inch of volume and half pound of weight worth a thousand dollars to me Dell?

Honestly, when I saw that price I literally laughed out loud. Honestly, I don't know who you think you are, but you're not HP because they're getting my money and you aren't.
 

$2499 sounds more like an ending price, not a starting price. Looks like there are several options that should be standard, like Bluetooth, Core 2 Duo, bigger hard drive, stronger battery, 2GB RAM with Vista that most people will want to include on a new PC that should last for years.

I was ready to dive in at release, but $3000+ for a nicely equipped machine is going to make me rethink this a bit. Too bad, really. Let's hope that this is a typo!

I agree. My first reaction when I saw the pricetag, was,"yeeouch".

 Adunno how to tell you this guys, but finally putting something like this out in the market behind all of the other big guys, and right before Xmas with a price like that, don't make you guys look good for the season. I mean, even Toshiba has a "barebones" yet respectable version of the Convertible PC for around 1500.

 
Putting your left foot out first, with a backbreaking pricetag like that puts you guys behind everyone else, even finally having the Convertible laptop.

Disappointed,

Ron  V.

Jeez! I waited 6 months only for them to price it at $2500!

If that's entry-level pricing, then by the time I'm done it'll be $3000. I can get a x61, a Windows Home Server, an HD_DVD drive for my Xbox, and have cash to spare in that much.

Freaking nonsense..

Well, I was going to buy one, but not for $2500.

Nicely done. You still make crappy overpriced computers.
 

Hey... maybe it comes with the extra battery slice and docking station...

and a Nintendo Wii :)

and an Xbox 360 ...

This release is a JOKE! 

$2500. Ouch! I love my samsung Q1 Ultra. Only paid $749.99 at Bestbuy for it. It goes on sale from time to time. Weighs only 1.5 lbs, decent touch screen (not multi touch), 40 GB drive, 1GB RAM, 4 hour standard battery, wifi. Did I mention - highly portable. I was hoping to see a Dell tablet under $1000.

Ronnie: The video is posted here.

DELL: 

DID YOU READ ANY OF THOSE COMMENTS ON THE POST?

HAVE YOU CHECKED OUT ANY OTHER TABLET PCS (WELL CHECK THEM OUT BEFORE YOU SAWED THEM IN HALF)?

THIS IS CRAZY!! 

I'm kind of disappointed: that kind of price combined with currency hedging silliness means that if it even makes its way over to Australia it'll sell for over A$3000, at least based on other products in the Dell range with similar starting prices.

I'm disappointed because I could really use a lightweight tablet in my job, but there's no way that I would be able to justify spending this much when an ASUS Eee PC will achieve the same result with a similar level of performance for around twenty percent of the price, albeit without the touch screen (which is merely a nice-to-have, and certainly not worth four times as much as the rest of the hardware to this user).

I can totally understand not providing a fast CPU and so on in the name of battery consumption.  However a low-specced system such this is likely most useful for people as a second system; there's no way that anyone in Australia is likely to be able to justify A$3000 or so on a machine unusable as a primary workhorse.  And if they can, I want their job, but not for the reasons of this tablet. ;-)

Having said that, do you want this little experiment to fail, Dell?  Because if so, this is surely the way to achieve exactly that result, thus "proving" that tablet systems have no utility.  I hope I'm wrong.

While I recognise a need to recoup the considerable engineering costs involved in making a lightweight tablet with a decent battery life, there's always the approach of using volume, rather than unit margin, to achieve this.  I don't know what your margin on these units would be (obviously), but if it's small even over a few hundred thousand sales then I suggest you need to find alternative component vendors.

About time this came to market. But why doesn't it have Ubuntu as an OS option? If Linux can't run on it I won't buy it. Especially for that price which with a rough conversion is £1,220 (UK).

 I'm just not interested in Windows Vista. Period.
 

Ouch that price is high. I could get two Gateway tablets for that price! I'm  glad I gave up waiting on Dell and bought my C-120x.

Wow

$2500

I am a BUSINESS owner, and waited patiently for months for the Dell tablet. I finally gave up and bought an X61t

 Lets see:

The Lenovo had a faster processor

1 GB Ram

Vista

3 year onsite with 3 year protection

100 GB 7200 RPM Drive

and on and on..

Price: $2,000

Dudes, I dont need a Dell with that kind of pricing!

Perhaps it is a bogus price so they can give big discounts to corporations and look like heroes.

For a small business like mine, where I have to watch every penny, it is a JOKE.

I was ready to quit buying regular notebooks for my staff and only buy tablets. At this price point, if I want to do that, Lenovo, HP, or Toshiba will get all the business whereas we have been a Dell only shop

Alot of different reviews out there are saying that this model does not have multi-touch, I'm sure todays expected vlog will help settle that for right now. They're saying it's coming out next year. Way to go, Dell. Your head honcho and major pitchman gets up at a conference to show off the tablet, you show off multi-touch capabilities on the tablet, and then you make no mention that it's actually NOT going to be on the tablet coming out in just a few weeks. It's like a Steve Jobs announcement, if Steve Jobs was mentally retarded.

Given the price, I see one of three options now:

1. Maybe you'll actually have a substantial discount for students on this tablet. $2499 is more than my housing costs for one semester. Bring it under $2000 for us. 

2. I could easily snag an HP tablet in the next few weeks at my local CompUSA for under $1000 since the price will probably be liquidated into oblivion shortly. It's not multi-touch but it would be cheap since they're going out of business.

3. I could wait for Macworld in mid-January, when it seems almost certain that Apple is going to be unveiling a 13.3 inch, ultraportable, potentially multi-touch tablet, that will most likely dual boot some form of Windows. I wouldn't be surprised if it sells for below $2499. 

When I first heard about the Dell Tablet, I was excited. I have waited for pricing, being told it will be competitve. The wait is over and the pricing is far from competitive. Toshiba came out yesterday with a 12" multitouch tablet with internal DVD and much better processor offerings at a much better price point. You may BM and Toshiba when they are offering better tablets at lower costs.

I thought only Apple could get away with a 50% premium over the compitition.

Wow!  $2499 plus options.  I wonder what the taxpayers will think...

Starting price $2,678!!??  Found this link on "engadet.com"

http://www.dell.com/content/products/results.aspx/latit?~ck=anav&c=us&l=en&s=bsd&cs=04

"Product Details" link works; however, "Customize it" is not yet operational.

 So far I can not find a reference to "multi-touch" in the Product Details.

Never again: Sorry to hear are not removing you from our mailing list. Feel free to e-mail me directly here—I'll be happy to make sure we get it done.

 Sorry for the frustration this has caused.

Yup,  I told my Dell Rep to call me first thing this morning so I could order two.  We're switching to the D430.  Way overpriced (and not a very sexy design)

 LOWER PRICE IMMEDIATELY!  Or have reps discount the heck out of it.

Hmm... The starting price at the Dell web site is $2678 but it won't let me configure one to see what is included.

Quite honestly, the price doesn't bother me; my priorities are weight and screen size.  All the other tablets I've looked at are much too heavy.  From what I can tell though, the XTs screen may be a bit too small for my needs so I'll probably sit tight and wait for the next generation.

Lionel,

Would you mind explaining Dell's reasoning in overpricing this underpowered machine?

Thanks You.

Sincerely,  

A Dissapointed ex-Dell Customer who will now be ordering the far superior Lenovo x61t and saving $1,000 at the same time.
 

Hi,

Will we see a rugged version?

Wow. That's all I can say. $2,500 - to start?!?

I have an HP 2710P on loan from HP right now. Fully loaded with the slice battery and media base with DVD burner, 2Gb of RAM and 120Gb HD, and I'm still below $2,499. I don't know who Dell is shooting for with this, but if the discounts aren't huge for businesses, education, and healthcare industries then they'll completely miss the boat on this one.

The one thing the HP doesn't have is a way to scroll when in slate mode and multi-touch. I'd like those features, but it's not worth the nearly $1,000 price difference.

Is Dell even listening to these rants anyway?

 

An absolutely outrageous price for pitiful specs.  I waited four frustrating months thinking they were going to release this thing any day or at least publish the specs, and now that we finally have specs and starting price, I'm more than ticked at Dell.  The only silver lining is that since I waited now I can get the new Toshiba Portege M700.  $1800 gets you 2.2GHz Core 2 Duo processor, 2MB RAM, 160gig hd, integrated webcam, and an LED backlit touch screen that also works with an active digitizer pen. 

Like Manifold said, 1/2 a pound isn't worth over $1000!  Between the M700, the Lenovo x61, and the sundry offerings from HP and Gateway, I'd be suprised if anyone buys this junk.

Worst. Tablet. Ever.

But but... The Compaq 2710p has very similar specs and it starts at $900 less! And, it's hardly any heavier.

This is disappoitning!

I haven't dealth much with the Thinkpad X61, but if the X41 is anything to gauge by, I'd stick with Dell's tablet offering.

Dell seems to understand something that Lenovo doesn't - the keyboard better be awesome since there's no other reason to waste money on a convertible tablet in the first place.  Thinkpad X tablet keyboards are crappy!  (And the X41 performs like a beached whale on tranquilizers.)

In a nutshell, if you need a notebook, get a notebook.  Otherwise I'd recommend embracing the tablet UI and avoiding a convertible - you can always hook up a compact USB keyboard (and even a nice optical mouse) if you're in a pinch to do some hardcore data entry.  In other words, go with one of the excellent offerings from Dell's well-established and very capable tablet subsidiary, Motion Computing.

Why does Dell screw up so much???

A sub $2000 (pref $1500)  tablet would have been a killer!! 

After the sticker shock and the shocking lack of support for multitouch, I'm considering waiting for the upcoming Mac. And that is a shock. I was expecting something a $1000 less.

As I want to develop a multitouch application, this is just too disapointing. Too expensive to buy for development; and worse, too expensive to buy for application deployment.

And no support for multitouch. Yes, I know it's difficult to provide software development support for your customers to develop applications on. That's what I do for a job. But suck it up and get it done. Do you even have a plan for providing developer support?

Now I get to wait for Apple to come out with their offering. If their offering doesn't look good, then I'll just go develop for HP, Lenovo, Fujitsu, or Toshiba tablets and scrap multitouch.

It's so sad. Dell scrapped their Dell Axim PDA line, and I'm still developing an app using an Axim 50v bought of craigslist. Killing Axim was a bad move. Pricing and support on this tablet doesn't look much better. sigh.

 

Lionel it's good to see you're taking an interest in helping customers solve problems. But you've just passed by a whole page of disgruntled Dell customers without so much as a woopsy-daisy.

 
What's your take on peoples opinions to this product so far? I've waited a long time for this product to come to market. I'm in the UK which means I'll have to wait a bit longer. And I'm already disappointed. Very disappointed in what Dell has offered.

 Please tell us the price is a joke right?
 

aikiwolfie: I am reading comments and do see the reaction about the pricing. I continue to share this feedback with appropriate teams.

If and when we have new details to share, we will do it here.

Please don't forget to show off the pressure sensitivity of the Tablet.  I suggest a program such as Autodesk Sketchbook Pro (they have a free trial available) -- it emulates pencil, felt pens, ball-point pens, etc.

I had an opportunity to play with one and it felt just as sensitive in Sketchbook Pro as my Wacom Graphire 3, but I wasn't putting it through it's full paces.  The fact that you can see it while you draw right under the pen was a huge plus.

Not sure I'd ever use the actual touch part of the screen, fingerprints are a bummer.  But the pen part worked pretty darned good.

I think the artist market (especially the college art student market) is one that this Tablet would really shine in -- but perhaps I'll wait a few months for the price to go down, or for it to hit the Dell Outlet.

I also wonder if we'll ever see an Inspiron or Vostro Tablet.  For everyone complaining about the looks -- the Latitude line is the base business line.  They need to look professional, not "slick".  That's what the Inspiron and XPS lines are for.

HP's tablet PC, the tx1000z configured with 2GB RAM, 160 GB Harddrive sells for about $1124. Whoever came up with the price at Dell is out of their mind.

I have been waiting 6 months for this to come out and I put off buying my tablet. I'm sorry I waited. $2500 is way too much to spend on this when there are many comparable products out there. I guess I'm going back to buying what I should have months ago. What a disappointment dell.
 

I cancelled the x61 I had on order last summer when it looked like the Dell tablet would soon be a reality. After months of patient waiting, getting hit with the $2500 starting price was a real slap in the face.  I’m a corporate buyer looking for my second tablet.  I haven’t ruled out the Latitude XT yet, but I’m going to have a hard time justifying a purchase price that looks like it’ll be well north of $3000 for a reasonably equipped unit with accessories. That’s why I ruled out the R400.  Please, please, rethink the pricing or offer some really substantial discounts.  Obviously, the sub-$1000 people aren’t being reasonable, but you’ve got to find a way to get the Core Duo unit’s start price under $2000, otherwise I’m going to be forced to do some serious comparison shopping – or wait for the Mac.

My guess would be that the multi touch is causing the price to be so high.  Any plans on offering a tablet without the multi touch?  Another thing that bothers me is it only has 1 speaker and no DVD drive.  Where is the money going, there isn't even Vista SideShow?  For $2500 I expected a system that will blow me away, I'm disappointed to say the least. 

Hopefully Dell will produce a 13.3 inch Latitude hybrid like I have suggested on IdeaStorm.  More processor power, video and sound in a portable package.  Its all about options, pricing and quality.

 http://www.ideastorm.com/article/show/66820/Put_some_attitude_into_the_Latitude

I waited and waited for the release of this tablet and planned to order one the day they were released. However, from what I've read it seems as though this tablet is half as good but priced twice as high as other tablets currently on the market.  Yes, there are a few redeeming qualities (namely the weight and battery life), but nothing even close to justifying a $2,500 STARTING price.  I hope Dell comes out with a tablet that actually lives up to all the hype and is reasonably priced, however after one like this I'm guessing Dell's days in the tablet market are going to be short lived.

 I'm disappointed beyond words.

When I heard of Dell's tablet, i was completely thrilled. Knowing that dell will be offering a tablet to the education market and what not. So I held off buying one, as i figured Dell wouldn't screw me, the price will be the best there in on the market. Then as the specs rolled out, I thought to myself man dell is really getting it, low specs and great technology, they can't possibly charge more than a thousand....

Now here we are on the release date of dell's latitude xt. Only to find that dell  fell off the deep end!! $2500 for base specs are you guys seriously blind?!?! Did you guys anticipate a huge amount of love because it was light weight and portable?! If you're going to slap a price like that on a laptop like the latitude xt I demand you make some huge improvements!

 Low end specs for a high priced tpc?! What kind of a moron would buy a laptop like this? Not only would I not buy this tablet I would mock any rtard who buys it! How in the world are they going to justify the price? I'd rather dish money out for hp's tz and laugh at the idiot who spent that much for a crap out laptop like that.

 If I don't see any major major student discount by christmas I'm going for hp's tablet going for 900 with some kick ass specs.

At least then I'll know that i'm getting a bang for my buck!
 

I'm on my 5th tablet, my 6th most likely will not to be dell. 

If you are on your fifth tablet, there's a good chance that you've had a number of hardware problems and that's a big reason why Dell stayed out of the tablet market as long as it did.  Warranty costs for tablet PCs are extremely high; a lot of those convertible hinges break and the repair pretty much wipes out any profit on the unit.

I don't understand all these messges from people who think they know more about pricing than the folks at Dell.  This is a business.  Dell doesn't care whether or not you personally buy one; the unit is priced at a level that they think will result in enough profitable sales for Dell, not to make you happy,  

With the move to Electronic Medical Records coming up, the Tablet PC has been the way to go. I had been researching many of the tablets on the market and spoke with my Sales Rep at Dell telling him that I really wished you would make your own Tablets and that I didn’t like only of the units you had for sale from the other companies at that time. We run all Dell PCs and Servers and I have liked the way you design, build,  and support your machines.

I was ecstatic the day I called to place another order for some new PCs and he gave me the news that you were finally joining the Tablet band wagon.

After many months of waiting the verdict was out and I read that this tablet had just about everything we were looking for and then some. Unfortunately I just about fell out of my chair when I saw your starting price for a Single Core Powered Tablet at $2600!

How is a company supposed to justify a large order of tablets where the base price is almost $1000 OVER the competition’s fully loaded Tablets?

The others I had configured had Core 2 T7300 processors, 2GB Ram, and larger hard drives.

I could see a Latitude XT fully loaded with a Core 2 Processor, LED screen, Solid state hard drive, and 2 GB Ram for maybe $2500 but not a base model Core Solo!

Thanks for listening and please don’t ever get rid of the Ultra Small Form factor OptiPlex case, they are the perfect size and design for keeping an area clean and clutter free!!!

I really think you guys made a big mistake making the price so high... i was going to buy one but your offering is very underequipped for the price tag and cannot compete with what is already in the market.

I heard you were targeting the education sector with this... I hope you are offering education pricing thats 60% off because no student has that kind of cash! 

I thought this was Dell, not Apple.  I guess Jobs and Co. aren't the only ones who make overpriced, overhyped hardware. 

@Karen

1) Is it not possible for Andrew to have had 5 tablets because they have gotten old and obsolete, or perhaps he just likes them and likes to own differet versions? I know the folks at gottabemobile.com have owned a variety of tablets - many more than 5 - not for hardware problems at all.

2) That's all fine and well that Dell wants to make a buck. I have no doubt that this number came from some pricing model formula which takes into account all R&D, manufacturing, distribution, and marketing costs as well as projects sales based on demographic figures devised by some marketing research team somewhere in Texas.

But if Dell is paying attention at all they would realize that 100% of the press this product has gotten has been extreme shock over how expensive it is followed by a declaration of intention not to purchase. Nobody is talking about how light it is. Nobody is talking about how thin it is. Nobody is talking about how it's the first tablet on the market with multitouch. They're just talking about it's an anemic, over priced piece of hardware.

As a company, you have a sincere problem when all your product does is make the competition seem like a better, more appealing deal. When I look at the XT the first thing I think is "Wow, I can get a comparable or more powerful machine from HP or Toshiba for $1000 less."

If Dell released this tablet in a vacuum it would be impossible for any of us to comment on the price, but the fact is Dell released the XT in with firm competition already in place so in order to gain some perspective I have to use that competition as a reference, and what the competition tells me is that Dell has severely overestimated their impact with this offering.
 

$2500 is simply to high of a starting cost. I cannot even put into words how disappointed I am at Dell for making us wait so long for a their version of a tablet and now to find out it starts at a price of $2500...it very much angers me.  I feel like they have no idea of what their average customer wanted in terms of an affordable tablet. 

For shame Dell.

At a minimum the starting price needs to be comparable to HP's offering, at $1600. It would be excellent if it were lower. From Dell, I expect excellent pricing.

Well I just read the comments and some of them are constructive while others, sound like Dell is Santa Claus and should offer the best for the lowest possible price. Also I am starting to have doubts about the integrity of the comments as they could be all from Lenovo fanboys :D The decision is yours to make, dont buy it if you think the price/features are not right or make suggestions as some people have. 

No need to cry and reply in an uncivilized way folks. I dont think you all dance and take couple of days off work to celebrate when Dell offers better laptops than so called Lenovo or HP at a better price. You know where to find cheaper laptops than Dell? Circuit City or Best Buy Sunday Ad..Laptop for $299..thats right..and it will last for 299 days too :D

Hey Guys - Just realize, that the Dell people most probably cannot take the price down to a reasonable level...

My guess is, that supply of the essential parts (Screens?) is not sufficient.

So what would you do? The release date is postponed over half a year, the masses are waiting for the product.... Solution: Bring it to the market and make a price tag only a few are willing to pay

This is called "skimming" 

So it might be disappointing, but lets see how long it takes to ramp up the production...

In Germany we get this specs/price (students only):

Für den Produktlaunch bieten wir folgendes Einführungsangebot an:

• Intel Core 2 Duo U7600 (1,2 Ghz, 2 MB , 533MHz FSB
• 1x 1 GB RAM DDR 533 MHz - onboard
• 12,1"WXGA TFT (1.024x800 Pkte)Backlight LED 
• ATI Radeon X2150 UMA
• D-Bay DVD-Brenner USB - extern
• Windows Vista Business 32bit
• 40GB Festplatte SATA (4.200 rpm)
• 42Wh Akku
• Dell True Mobile 1505 Wireless LAN (802.11a/n/g) Mini PCI Card
• 3 Jahre int. vor-Ort-Service, Business Support
• Preis: 1.799,00 Euro inkl. MwSt. & versandkostenfrei

 Greetz

Mic

The thing about this 2500 dollar tablet vs a sub 1000 dollar tablet is this one is actually USABLE.

You can throw a thousand dollars away on a pile. Or invest in something that will make you more productive and has the service and support backing of Dell.

Remember this is a latitude not an inspiron. 

Still everyone is focused on what's perceived as too high a price.  But the real deciding factor should be - should you buy a convertible tablet at all?  If you really need a keyboard, then you need a real notebook PC, of which Dell makes many worthwhile models - for far less money.

If you truly have a need for a tablet PC - that is, a dedicated slate, sans keyboard, then Dell's subsidiary, Motion Computing has been making very high quality tablets for several years and these will provide more bang for the buck.

So, if you're still left feeling that you simply must have a convertible tablet - knowing the numerous sacrifices inherent with that (IMO, pointless) choice - then you really can't moan & groan too much about the expense.

Passing by -  Are you saying that the XT is a good value at that price?  I think while there may be some here posting for other companies many are offering a comparison of other products to show that the XT is overpriced. 

Many people have waited on Dell's release of a tablet. While they may have shown loyalty doing so, they are expressing that loyalty only goes so far.  Dell needs to show why this tablet is worth so much more than the other tablets in the marketplace.

Lenovo has a reputation of building a solid system and having good support to back up their products.  HP has been doing well with selling cheap systems.    Dell on the other hand is trying to rebuild a reputation of quality products and support.  Just placing a high price on a product doesn't equate to better quality.  I am looking forward to more news from Dell to prove the value of the system as so far I am not impressed.

I looked at the other blog as Lionel suggested we do and I can't say I'm impressed with the "gestures". Scrolling through those 3D windows in Vista looked to painfully slow. I couldn't use a system like that. Is there an option to tweak the scroll speed?

 It should work something like this;

I don't know anything about the cost but just about every one I know with a convertible tablet has had to have it repaired at least once and some multiple times.  The users are satisfied with warranty coverage.  That doesn't make it a viable long run business line.

Dell disappointed its loyals with its lousy pricing for Latitude XT launched yesterday.  I waited for this as I needed two sets for us, thinking Dell would give us better specs and value as everyone thought.  With $2,500 starting price, nobody would be loyal to Dell as it is a rip off.  Dell's v1 tablet launch could not be loyal to its customers by giving them better specs and values than its rivals.This is not a competitive sign for loyal customers.  Now I am thinking of other alternatives but definitely not Dell Latitude XT.

Dell should justify its pricing strategy, to its customers.

jervis961,

Thank you for posting a constructive and polite reply to my original post. I am 100% sure the $2500 tag will be much less when its actually available and should be fully loaded. Also take into consideration the 3 YR Warranty and advanced exchange program available with the Latitude series. While a regular laptop does not always need warranty services, a tablet could very well need it depending on the User. Maybe Dell could offer a cheaper alternative with just 1 Yr Warranty. I know some people who work for Lenovo and it is no where close to the original IBM Thinkpad quality, trust me you are just paying for the label and think it has anything to do with IBM. I am willing to prove my point by buying 2 laptops for the exact same price and or specs and ripping them apart. We can then compare the quality of the components from the very basic case to the motherboard. Also manufacturers like Sony, HP and Lenovo (Not sure about Toshiba) charge you a kidney to repair a laptop or get the right part replaced at a reasonable cost. 

While this does not apply to the original discussion thread I must congratulate the engineer's at Sony for designing/inventing laptop's which die (Motherboard and LCD failure is the most common) shortly after the manufacturer warranty is over. This by itself is an innovation because it takes skills to design something that will go bad after a predetermined time. I have friends with their cute looking VIAO laptops coming to me with similar problems and most of the times its cheaper to buy a new laptop with better specs than replace the screen or motherboard from Sony Support.

aikiwolfie,

The fine video you have posted from youtube is demonstrating XGL on Linux and yes its very cool. I have it running on an old Latitude D610 at home.

Nice pricing, boys. Does it come with a delay or two?

Rob O'Daniel: 

If you have to ask why someone would need a convertible, you don't understand the concept. There are times when a pen interface makes sense, and times when a keyboard is essential. Part of the drive for tablets in general is the fact that people want compute in more places and in more ways, something which a convertible enables. A thin and light convertible like this device is indeed very sensible, and as light and smaller than motion's LE series with the convertible snap-on keyboard which many users carry. Also, users have every right to complain about the price when it is high compared to competing products - convertible vs slate is not the issue.

As an LE1600 user myself, I can tell you that the Motion devices don't really give you as much bang for the buck as they are hyped for. They have horrible battery life, and in three generations of the product nothing has been done to improve this. Mine can't even quite last through a two hour meeting so I'm always tethered to a wall. The keyboard options are large, clumsy, and fragile - the convertible breaks easily and takes too long to set up and dismantle, while the field kit is too large for a meeting and comes with the single worst trackball I have ever used. The LE1700 was released at a time when battery life should have been improved, express card added, weight decreased, etc., but instead the only real changes were CPU and (minor) cosmetics. Also, there is still no replacement for the aging LS800, which would have a serious chance in my business with a 1024x768 screen, a better CPU, and practical battery life. The C5 is a promising specialized medical product, but is taking months to get to the customer so we haven't even had a chance to truly test it (I know, I've been waiting).

I think the lesson Dell should take from this is it doesn't matter what new fancy technology you are introducing, there's only so much people are willing to pay for a notebook primarily targeted at the business community.

It would seem Dell has crossed that threshold and needs to rethink it's pricing. 

When I purchased my HP TC1100 I ponied up over $2800 for the system including the docking station and optical drive. It paid for itself within a year based on productivity gains when leveraging the Tablet UI.

I'm reserving judgement on the XT until I get my hands on one.

Passing by (and rob also)- Thanks for the reply.  I wish this site didn't take so long posting comments as it kills a good discussion.  I enjoy a good debate more than some of the other postings I've read here.  :)

 Anyway back to the XT vs Lenovo.  I understand your points and the Dell may be a fine product but the video does not do it any justice.  I was bored to death and cringed watching the Vista flip where he had to do a flick for each screen advance. 

People looking for a tablet online will not know the differences between them except for specs and price which make the XT seem overpriced.  I can put together a Lenovo with 3 year warranty, multi touch and much better specs for $1000 less than the XT.  I'm sure the XT touch screen is more expensive but over $1000 more??  Until Dell clarifies exactly what the price includes and can better express the superiority of the XT customers will be running to the competition. 

I personally wouldn't buy the XT not only because of the price and specs but because I do not need a touch screen.  I do want the swivel screen and smaller form factor though.  Hopefully Dell will make a product that fits my needs in the near future.  Here is a link to what I'm looking for, or at least what my dream system would be.

  http://www.ideastorm.com/article/show/66820/Put_some_attitude_into_the_Latitude

Boy am I dissapointed.

I'm a small business owner in health care and have all DELL computers and Dell servers.  I have a couple of OLD Dell laptops (Inspiron 8100) which I still use.  However when it come to the tablet PC market I have been very dissapointed with Dell.  3 or 4 years ago when I wanted a tablet for clinical charting, I bought an ACER TravelMate C300 Tablet PC (which I love) because of the 14" screen and the convertability of the screen.  I'm actually using it right now to leave this comment.  I have had no trouble with the hinge.  I only sent it in one time to have the backlight repaired.  A couple of years later when Dell still had no Tablet PC (and I don't like Motions tablets) I bought another Acer TravelMate Tablet PC (which I have never had repaired and works great).  Despite what other people think, I like Windows Vista.  My newer Acer, although designed for Vista runs really slow.  I'm ready for a Tablet PC that had a core 2 processor and can run Vista well.  Dell's new Tablet is a real disapointment.  Why would you build a laptop with no optical drive?  There is a huge difference in a 12" and a 14" display.  Acer quit making the convertable Tablets and now only offer a 12" slate (which I don't like).  Why can't Dell (or almost everybody else) make a larger screen Tablet.  Why are the hard drives so low RPM's?  Why can't the solid state drives be larger capacity?  I would really like a much faster processor.  I waited a long time for a Dell Tablet.

Now I guss I will have to wait a little longer.

yeah, Good luck with that.

 Glad my wife's taking the buyout package @ big D. With pricing like this it is evident that Dell has lost touch with their market and aren't going to be heading back up anytime soon.

It remains to be seen if this will be at all better than the Lenovo's. It definately isn't going to be $800 better than the lenovo. Just for persepective, I could buy a lenovo, AND a Gateway tablet (on one of their many sale days) for the price of this.

 Looks like the Marketing genius' just wasted untold engineering man hours on a product that will fail at this price point. Unfortunately, they aren't just a little bit off either. If they HAVE to sell at this price point to make profit, that means when it doesn't sell, and they try to have massive price reductions to sell them at cost, they still won't be able to get rid of them.

Wow, I'm just amazed at this. I had to post again. I was fired up to really evangelize this product at the UT business school, with my fellow students. Yes, In Dell's own town, but since it is a fairly highly regarded business school, I would hope that no one with the ability to get in, would plop down the $$$ for this at this price point. It just doesn't make solid business sense. (nor is it practical to expect the average college student to be able to afford one.) It's almost as if Dell doesn't realize that there are other tablet PC options available.

Yes, there are niche business markets that will want to use a tablet pc for their particular business, but the Killer "app" or in this case, demographic, is students. Think of how many high school thru Graduate students there are in the world, if you want to imagine the potential market.

I used a Compaq TC1000 slate for a semester, and even with that REALLY slow transmeta processor, it was the "Killer" Student tool. All I carried to school some days, was the tablet. I scanned in art history and Greek artifact slides from my text books, made Ink Flash cards. etc. With more and more of my text books also including the study materials on PDF on a CD included with the book, this becomes more practical every semester.  I think this is the market they really want, The educational user.

 There is talk about every student having a laptop, and wouldn't Dell want that to be one of theirs? Not at this price point. If this is the cheapest they could build a single core machine with no optical drive, then where is their supply chain breaking down? Unless they end up like Sony, with the price cutbacks that were made on the PS3, I don't see an "Out" here for Dell. They can't really take features away to allow price cuts, as the features listed are not putting them in the lead as Sony's technology is. 

Dell just doesn't  have the same reputation that they once had for quality and customer service that allowed them to price their product higher than their competitors.

 I would also be surprized if when Apple's tablet comes, if it prices above $2k. They will want, and likely get, the education market back. They have the reputation for quality, durability, and customer service that schools require when bugeting, and the coolness factor for the students purchasing them on their own. I think Dell just gave the education market back to Apple. It's going to be a very interesting two years I imagine.

just why is it so expensive...that is all I ask...is it a $1000+ premium just for multitouch, a feature that is completely useless in every way due to a lack of software?  If so, do you seriously think consumers will pay $1000+ for it?

It sounds unreal but it's real. I bought a special priced new Toshiba Tecra M7 for $1025 two days ago. I could upgraded it to 4G RAM for $89. It has equipped with everything I wanted.

Intel Core Duo T2400 (1.83G), 1G RAM, 100G S-ATA HDD, 14.1" (1440x900) WXGA,  Super-Multi-DVD Drive, NVIDIA Quadro NVS 110M Graphics TurboCache 256M VRAM, Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g Wireless LAN, Bluetooth with EDR, 56k Modem, Gigabit LAN, PC Card Slot, USB2 x 4, IEEE1394, 5in1 Card Reader, Windows XP Tablet PC Ed. 2005, 6-Cell Lithium Ion Battery, 2.7kg, 3-year Parts & Labor, 1-Year Battery International Limited Warranty.

If Dell could offer the same price I would give Dell a chance, but now may be next chance. :)</