You can imagine that the convertible's whiz-bang technology will translate into costs that go beyond the typical notebook. A brief survey of a few hardware vendors at TechXNY confirmed this. "Dramatically more expensive," said a tier one vendor.

While pricing hasn't been announced, all you have to know now is that corporations are already skittish about shelling out money for notebooks. Those same companies will likely be doubly hesitant to spend more for tablets. The return on investment will have to be well quantified, quickly realized, and guaranteed money in the bank. Otherwise, I don't see CFOs signing the checks anytime soon. That, of course, raises the issue of just exactly what a tablet can do for you that a notebook (or desktop) cannot and whether that adds up to a worthwhile ROI.

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There's no doubt that the Tablet PC is cool. All I had to do was handle a prototype of Acer's convertible unit at TechXNY, and I wanted one. The handwriting recognition is impressive (unlike Jot or Graffiti, no special keystrokes are required). Unlike the Palm or PocketPC, the Tablet PC doesn't need to recognize handwriting for instant conversion. But it does recognize handwriting, thus enabling searching through your notes. I absolutely loved this feature, because I take a lot of handwritten notes and can never find them later without thumbing through several notebooks. Although my colleague Dan Farber had difficulty getting a Tablet PC to recognize his handwriting, the system had no trouble with my script.

The ink in these documents is also easily manipulated. Have you ever taken a bunch of notes as you listened to a speaker, filled up your page, only to have the presenter backpedal and add some new information that pertains to the notes you already took? With the Tablet PC, you just pick an insertion point, stretch the page, and scribble away. The continuity of your notes will be greatly improved.

But can great usability features like these offer a bottom-line increase in productivity the way something like the spreadsheet or word processor did? So far, I don't think so.

Still, I can't help think that some people will buy the Tablet PC. IT staffs with some discretion over their budgets are likely to bring a few in to play with. If the batteries can hold out, this could be the ideal note-taking device for students in classroom situations. The clickety-clack of keyboards is also eliminated. Notetaking speed may be an issue, though.

Tablets may address a specific need in some vertical applications. But, in most of those cases--the overnight shipping companies, for example--Windows XP in the slate-based form factor will have to compete with the lower cost of task-specific tablets that require fewer system resources and don't come with additional software that the workers in the field will never need. Software development issues may be eased due to better availability of development tools for a mass market platform like Windows, but it still will be a tough sell.

For the past nine months, ViewSonic has had a product on the market that is very much like a Tablet PC. According to ViewSonic's Tom Offut, the $1,795 Windows 2000-based Viewpad 1000 (which has lower-end digitizing technology and comes in a slate-based form factor) has met the company's sales expectations, but has sold primarily into vertical applications for healthcare, insurance, real estate, and automotive service.

Finally, home users and enthusiasts with money to burn will really love these things, especially if they have a wireless network floating around them. Tablet PCs are perfect for doing what those people do more of than anything else--cruising the Web. No one really needs a mouse or keyboard for that.

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