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Hands on with the HP Pavilion tx2000

Hands on with the HP Pavilion tx2000

Dan Ackerman Editorial Director / Computers and Gaming
Dan Ackerman leads CNET's coverage of computers and gaming hardware. A New York native and former radio DJ, he's also a regular TV talking head and the author of "The Tetris Effect" (Hachette/PublicAffairs), a non-fiction gaming and business history book that has earned rave reviews from the New York Times, Fortune, LA Review of Books, and many other publications. "Upends the standard Silicon Valley, Steve Jobs/Mark Zuckerberg technology-creation myth... the story shines." -- The New York Times
Expertise I've been testing and reviewing computer and gaming hardware for over 20 years, covering every console launch since the Dreamcast and every MacBook...ever. Credentials
  • Author of the award-winning, NY Times-reviewed nonfiction book The Tetris Effect; Longtime consumer technology expert for CBS Mornings
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Dan Ackerman
2 min read

We mentioned this new HP tablet briefly last week when it was first announced, and now we've gotten a chance to get our hands on the HP Pavilion tx2000.

We don't actually know too many people who use a convertible tablet PC, but everyone's always asking us about them, and the tech press likes to cover new tablets extensively. While most of these systems are meant for industrial use, in hospitals, industrial sites, and occasionally by note-taking students, HP hit on a novel idea last year, introducing a tablet aimed strictly at movie-watching consumers, called the tx1000.

Watch the HP TX2000 video on CNET TV.

When we first saw the original tx1000 at 2007's CES, we liked the media-friendly options, such as a credit-card-size remote control, and glossy 12.1-inch screen--plus it turned out to be the very first Windows Vista laptop we had gotten our hands on.

No other strictly consumer-targeted tablets have crossed our path since then, but HP still believes in the concept, revamping the unit as the Pavilion tx2000 for this year's CES. From the outside, it looks almost exactly the same, and it includes the same (fairly useless) HP QuickPlay media playing software, plus a Webcam and touch-sensitive screen. Inside, the main difference is the addition of Wacom digitizer support to the finger-sensitive 12.1-inch touch screen, something missing from the previous tx1000 model.

We got a chance to play around with the new tx2000, and like its predecessor, it's an impressive portable media laptop. It earns points for the media-friendly controls and included remote, but it's still a bit on the heavy and bulky side for a system with a 12-inch screen--the entire system's nearly as large as a 13-inch MacBook. Shaving a couple of inches or ounces from it would make it that much more impressive.

Available later in January online, and at retail outlets in March, the tx2000 will start (just like last year's tx1000) at around $1,299.