~1300 BCE: The Ten Commandments The historical tablets of yore were hewn of rock or precious stone, and were generally rectangular in shape, with sharp corners. Perhaps most notably among these non-electronic slates were the Ten Commandments sent to Moses in the Book of Exodus. Paramount
~1300 BCE: The Ten Commandments The historical tablets of yore were hewn of rock or precious stone, and were generally rectangular in shape, with sharp corners. Perhaps most notably among these non-electronic slates were the Ten Commandments sent to Moses in the Book of Exodus.
Paramount
1888: Gray's Tablet Patent In the more modern era, electrical engineer Elisha Gray filed a patent in 1888 for an electronic stylus-type device that would capture handwriting. Piggybacking on the development of the telephone, the device would relay handwritten messages using telegraph technology, like a precursor to iMessage.
1888: Gray's Tablet Patent In the more modern era, electrical engineer Elisha Gray filed a patent in 1888 for an electronic stylus-type device that would capture handwriting. Piggybacking on the development of the telephone, the device would relay handwritten messages using telegraph technology, like a precursor to iMessage.
1963: RAND Tablet The RAND tablet was a low-cost graphical computer input device described as having "great potential" in digitizing map information as well as "more esoteric applications of graphical languages for man-machine interaction." It had a 10-inch square writing area that paired with a stylus. Rand
1963: RAND Tablet The RAND tablet was a low-cost graphical computer input device described as having "great potential" in digitizing map information as well as "more esoteric applications of graphical languages for man-machine interaction." It had a 10-inch square writing area that paired with a stylus.
Rand
1972: Dynabook Developed by Alan Kay, the Dynabook was designed to act as a lightweight personal computer for children of all ages. Based on the Smalltalk platform, the idea led to the development of a prototype Xerox Alto (one of the first general purpose PCs). The Dynabook was never actually built due to the technological limitations of the times. Dynabook
1972: Dynabook Developed by Alan Kay, the Dynabook was designed to act as a lightweight personal computer for children of all ages. Based on the Smalltalk platform, the idea led to the development of a prototype Xerox Alto (one of the first general purpose PCs). The Dynabook was never actually built due to the technological limitations of the times.
Dynabook
1989: GRiDPad While the idea of the tablet was firmly planted, Samsung was the first to actually execute a consumer-focused touchscreen slate, the GRiDPad, in 1989. Used by the U.S. Army, the tablet, which had a 640x400 resolution monochrome display operated by stylus, was bigger than a piece of paper, measured 1.4 inches thick, and weighed 4.5 pounds. oldcomputers.net
1989: GRiDPad While the idea of the tablet was firmly planted, Samsung was the first to actually execute a consumer-focused touchscreen slate, the GRiDPad, in 1989. Used by the U.S. Army, the tablet, which had a 640x400 resolution monochrome display operated by stylus, was bigger than a piece of paper, measured 1.4 inches thick, and weighed 4.5 pounds.
1990: Fujitsu PoqetPad The 1.2-pound PoqetPad, made by Fujitsu, followed the GRiDPad. This was a handheld touchscreen computer with a 7 MHz NEC V20 CPU inside. It ran DOS, and, powered by AA batteries, could achieve 16 to 48 hours of battery life. Fujitsu America
1990: Fujitsu PoqetPad The 1.2-pound PoqetPad, made by Fujitsu, followed the GRiDPad. This was a handheld touchscreen computer with a 7 MHz NEC V20 CPU inside. It ran DOS, and, powered by AA batteries, could achieve 16 to 48 hours of battery life.
Fujitsu America
1992: IBM 2521 ThinkPad You've certainly heard of the ThinkPad, IBM's (and now Lenovo's) long-running portable notebook brand. But the ThinkPad actually began as a pen-based PC with a 10-inch monochrome display, 20 MB Flash drive, and 2.4K modem. Eventually renamed the 700T, the slate ran PenPoint OS. oldcomputers.net
1992: IBM 2521 ThinkPad You've certainly heard of the ThinkPad, IBM's (and now Lenovo's) long-running portable notebook brand. But the ThinkPad actually began as a pen-based PC with a 10-inch monochrome display, 20 MB Flash drive, and 2.4K modem. Eventually renamed the 700T, the slate ran PenPoint OS.
1993: Newton MessagePad The iPad was not Apple's first foray into the tablet space. The Newton MessagePad, a two-pound, 20 MHz processor-housing slate, predates it by over a decade. It was operated by pen input; unfortunately, the handwriting recognition was terrible at first, and it never achieved widespread commercial success even after improvements were made. Rama/ Wikimedia
1993: Newton MessagePad The iPad was not Apple's first foray into the tablet space. The Newton MessagePad, a two-pound, 20 MHz processor-housing slate, predates it by over a decade. It was operated by pen input; unfortunately, the handwriting recognition was terrible at first, and it never achieved widespread commercial success even after improvements were made.
1996: Palm Pilot The Palm Pilot successfully picked up where the Newton left off, spawning the popularity of PDAs (personal digital assistants). Smaller and cheaper, with a 160 x 160 resolution display, a 16 MHz Motorola processor and 512kB of memory, it could "HotSync" to computers using a serial cable, and you could take notes using Palm's shorthand Graffiti alphabet. Jon Snyder/WIRED
1996: Palm Pilot The Palm Pilot successfully picked up where the Newton left off, spawning the popularity of PDAs (personal digital assistants). Smaller and cheaper, with a 160 x 160 resolution display, a 16 MHz Motorola processor and 512kB of memory, it could "HotSync" to computers using a serial cable, and you could take notes using Palm's shorthand Graffiti alphabet.
Jon Snyder/WIRED
2002: HP Microsoft Tablet PC In the early 2000s, Microsoft took a stab at the tablet genre with a tablet edition of Windows XP. Microsoft Tablet PCs were full x86 machines with handwriting and voice recognition. Then-CEO Bill Gates predicted they'd become the most popular PC form in America, but in reality, full Windows on a slate was too bloated to work well for most people. Janto Dreijer/Wikimedia
2002: HP Microsoft Tablet PC In the early 2000s, Microsoft took a stab at the tablet genre with a tablet edition of Windows XP. Microsoft Tablet PCs were full x86 machines with handwriting and voice recognition. Then-CEO Bill Gates predicted they'd become the most popular PC form in America, but in reality, full Windows on a slate was too bloated to work well for most people.
2005: Nokia 770 Internet tablet Riding high on its cellphone fame, Nokia released a Wi-Fi Internet tablet (designed to be an "Internet appliance") in 2005. It had features familiar to today's tablet users, including web browsing, email, an RSS news reader, ebook reader, and media player, which you could launch from its home screen. Nokia
2005: Nokia 770 Internet tablet Riding high on its cellphone fame, Nokia released a Wi-Fi Internet tablet (designed to be an "Internet appliance") in 2005. It had features familiar to today's tablet users, including web browsing, email, an RSS news reader, ebook reader, and media player, which you could launch from its home screen.
Nokia
On this date five years ago, Steve Jobs officially introduced the iPad to the world. Few guessed it would become as big of a hit as it actually did, heralding a bustling and competitive era for mobile computing. Back when it launched, we made jokes about the name (teehee, PAD!) and mused about how this oversize iPod would never succeed.
Reasoning for the latter wasn’t necessarily misguided: The tablet was not a new idea. A slew of tablets came and went in the decades prior to the iPad. While some were confined to research laboratories, a variety of consumer options also dotted the electronics landscape in the ’80s, ’90s, and 2000s. From these devices, Apple was quietly able to learn what worked and what didn’t, so that its 2010 tablet release wouldn’t bow to the pain points of its predecessors. The iPad succeeded for this reason, and because of newer, lighter, and more powerful mobile technologies that had never before been available: the right place, the right time, the right execution.
The first tablets started arriving in earnest beginning in 1989. Early devices like the Samsung GRiDPad and Fujitsu PoqetPad offered small touchscreen displays you could operate with a stylus in a portable (but not necessarily diminutive) size. The GRiDPad, the first consumer-focused tablet device, was even adopted for use by the U.S. Army.
The second wave of consumer slates, like the Newton MessagePad and the Palm Pilot, started to gain wider acclaim and adoption as both their size and their prices dropped. Palm’s PDAs (personal digital assistants), as they would be called, featured handwriting recognition, a shorthand alphabet for quicker touchscreen note-taking, and organization features like a date book, address book, and to-do list—things that would make their way onto cellphones, and then smartphones.
Then in the early 2000s, Microsoft tried to kickstart tablet computing with a handful of Windows XP tablets. These devices ran a full version of Windows in a slate form factor. Unfortunately, the OS wasn’t optimal for touchscreen use, and the software was too bloated to run smoothly on a tablet’s relatively paltry hardware. They didn’t end up revolutionizing the computing space as Bill Gates had originally expected.
In 2000, the nut cracked. The iPad arrived after years of rumors (indeed, Apple had been working on a tablet long before it decided to embark on the iPhone). The company had learned from the shortcomings of earlier tablets: the OS was lightweight and designed for touch input from the beginning; the size and weight were slim enough for it to be a convenient travel companion; and the battery life and processor power were robust enough for all day of use. One major change from nearly all earlier tablet models was the lack of a stylus—Jobs wanted you to use this device’s capacitive touchscreen with your fingers.
Now after five years, it seems that another tablet era could be coming to a close as chips, battery technology, and displays have become so powerful that large-screened smartphones can fulfill the needs of both a smartphone and a tablet. The iPad may be the apex of modern tablet technology, but it is also a major stepping stone in the evolution of mobile computing.
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