I’ve had a Gigabyte Touchnote for four months and so, as it’s now making it’s way over the the US, now is the right time to give you some thoughts on the device having used it and played with it as my only netbook/notebook since I bought it.

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Liliputing and Netbooknews.com both have Gigabyte Touchnote T1028X’s in their hands and videos and first thoughts are starting to appear.

Certainly the price is the main point of note with the T1028X. It looks like a netbook but has a low-end notebook price. In reality, it isn’t really a netbook. With the touch-capable high-res screen, convertible form factor, upgradeability, smart manager and gesture software, multi-touch mousepad, fast SATA drive, N280 CPU and pre-wired 3G antenna you’re getting way more than with the average netbook. Gigabyte would have done well to at least make the device look a bit more stylish though. There are more stylish options out there and if you’re going to spend money like that, you want something to show off right?

Here is the initial hands-on from Liliputing.

Expect a Touchnote T1028X video from Netbooknews.com in the next few days. I’ve spoken to Sascha already and he seems to really like it so far.

More information on the Gigabyte Touchnote including my reviews and tests. I’m writing up some long term testing notes today too.

‘The T1028X is available and nobody seems to notice it’ says Hellion151 in a recent forum entry.

He’s right. The Gigabyte Touchnote T1028M appears to have been superseded (my netbook is officially ‘old’ now) by the newer version of the Touchnote. The T1028X. Key features of the new model are:

• Increased resolution to 1366×768 which reduces finger usability but increases screen real-estate.
• N280 processor. Slightly faster at 1.66Ghz (faster FSB too.) There aren’t many netbooks out there with this processor option.
• 6-cell (54wh) battery as standard.
• Increased Price. Mobilx have it for 497 Euros before tax (that’s 622 Euros for anyone buying it for private use in the EU.) Mini-Laptops.nl have it too [thanks Dave]

You still get the ExpressCard/34 slot, the fast 160GB SATA drive, the battery meter (check battery levels when turned off) and the built-in 3G antenna and easy access to RAM but there’s one other feature too. Increased screen contrast. The T1028M has a slightly milky finish to the screen when you’re in bright ambient light so if the increased contrast is significant then it will work well for video fans and outdoor fans. I’ve seen the T1028X in flesh but it was on a stand at Computex. I didn’t notice any difference but I didn’t really take the time to compare with the T1028M. I have a few pics here.

At 622 Euros, its not a cheap netbook but to be honest, it’s not really a netbook. With the upgrade capability (I have 3G with excellent reception and a Runcore SATA drive in my T1028M) and the touchscreen features you really get far more than any other netbook out there.

Have you bought a T1028X? What are your thoughts? We’d love to hear them. Were you waiting for the ASUS T101H?!

Footnote: Despite having written a lot about the T1028M, I have never written a full review. Would people be interested in a full review of the T1028M based on long-term usage or would you prefer that I get hold of a T1028X and do a quick review and live session?

Specifications and article links for the Gigabyte Touchnote T1028M.

The Gigabyte Touchnote T1028M [details] is a great convertible netbook. I’ve been using one as my main laptop for nearly 4 months now and I’m very very happy with it. Of course I’ve retro-fitted one of the new Runcore Pro IV SSD drives and added a 3G modem which connects to the pre-wired antenna turning it into more than your average netbook but even without the SSD and 3G it’s a great convertible netbook. The only niggle I have is with the 3hr battery life. My Ultimate Netbook U20 battery pack does a good job of back-up power duties but to make things a little more compact I bought the 6-cell battery pack option.

At 68 Euros plus tax, I wasn’t too exited about the price but it turns out that its more than just another 2 cells. The 6 cell pack has 170% the capacity of the standard battery and is returning 5.5 to 6hrs on-net working time. As I write this I have over 2hrs left with 36% battery remaining with the Wifi on and the backlight at 70%. With the standard battery as a spare, I have a full day’s computing available without having to worry about mains power.

The sizing is good too with no noticeable increase in height and only a small section jutting out from the rear.

Unfortunately the 6-cell sticks out too far for it to fit into the supplied case but if you attach the standard cell and put the 6-cell in the case pocket you’ve got up to 9 hours of netbooking!  Total weight of the T1028M with the 6-cell attached is 1450gm. (3lb 3oz)

If you’ve got the M912 or T1028M and need enough battery power for a full days work, the extended battery is the answer.

With the addition of the extended battery on the Touchnote I’ve run out of ideas for improvement. I honestly can’t think of anything that I don’t like about the device now. Agreed, it’s cost me way way more than any netbook available but there’s nothing out there that comes close. The T101H would be the only competitor but there’s still no word of a release date for that. If you’re waiting for the T101H, you might want to take a closer look at the T1028. (Note: The high-end version, T1028X, with the N280 and 1366×768 screen is available in the U.S. from the 2nd August)

T1028 M Product page.

I bought the extended battery at Mobilx.eu.

One element of the Gigabyte Touchnote that I’m starting to get used to now is the gesture support. It’s built into a special set of eGalax drivers that have been included on the device. Originally I wanted to turn them off as they were interfering with selecting text and Grab and Drag under Firefox but after tweaking them a little, removing a few that were clashing with other on-screen actions and getting used to new ones that I have set up, i’m really liking them. Here’s a video showing them in action on the standard XP build. The only thing missing is being able to register your own gestures. Graffiti recognition would be great.

As a side note, the Touchnote has been performing flawlessly. I’m currently restoring it to out-of-the box build using the built-in recovery partition and will copy that over to my Runcore SSD. With the 3G, Draft-N, BT and reasonable battery life (I plan to pick a 6-cell in Taiwan next week to bring it up to 5hrs) I can’t ask for any more. The Asus T101H is tempting me a little but I can’t imaging the 3G antenna being as good as it is on the Touchnote and I won’t compromise on that.

More details on the Touchnote including links to reviews and testing notes, are available in the product database.

I’ve just installed the new Runcore Pro IV SATA-2 SSD drive into my Gigabyte Touchnote. I think we’re looking at one of the fastest disks ever to be seen in a netbook and one of the best CrystalMark scores we’ve ever seen here. (*1)

22864 is about 4x what we normally see on a netbook or UMPC with an HDD.

127MB/s read speed is twice as fast as the original 160GB SATA disk.

Theoretical figures don’t translate one-to-one to changes in user experience though and as the SATA drive in the Touchnote was already fast at 60MB/s read, real-world differences won’t be as extreme. Booting up was quicker (at about 30 seconds, 40 seconds including POST for this heavily loaded, 1 month-old installation is 20-seconds quicker than normal) and applications are starting almost instantaneously.  IE7, Movie Maker, Adobe Reader, Windows Live Gallery, Chrome, Paint Shop Pro all start (first run after boot) in 1 second or less. Hibernation wasn’t noticeably quicker and standby is, understandably, the same. As far as battery life and heat are concerned, I’ll have to do some more testing.

There were a few issues with duplicating the disk but none of these can be attributed to Runcore. I have a pre-release prototype drive without the USB port so I had to use True Image to copy the original 160GB and squash the partitions into 64GB. The second problem is that the Gigabyte install uses a Grub (or Lilo, I’m not sure which) boot loader which allows access to the restore partition. On copying the disk, the boot loader didn’t work so as a fix, I tried an XP and Linux CD image in order to re-write the MBR. Unfortunately FixMBR on XP didnt work and my CDROM isn’t playing well as a boot drive with the BIOS on the Touchnote so after messing around for a few hours I had to download Ubuntu Netbook for USB installation and install Ubuntu just to fix the boot loader. It fixed the boot loader but the recovery partition is now inaccessible. I’ll have a play around with Ubuntu 9.04 for a while and then clean it up next week. I’m sure other netbooks are going to much simpler than this one!

The question now is, is it worth it? I’ve lost about 80GB of drive space that I was using to carry around some media and as the SATA drive was already fast, the end-user difference isn’t that great. The 64GB drive costs around 50% of the cost of this, already high-end netbook, and with such a low-powered platform, there are obviously other bottlenecks that will come into play so at the end of the day, its a tough call. I’ll run with it for a week and report back then but with the Gigabyte Touchnote performing so well with it’s 3G, Draft-N, multi-touch pad, BT2.1, ExpressCard/34 slot and touchscreen, it’s tempting to keep it installed just to highlight how far the netbook platform can be pushed.

In the meantime, I can definitely say that if you if you have a year-old laptop that needs a refresh (this drive is going to work well with HDD-happy Vista) or if you simply want one of the fastest drives available, the RunCore Pro IV is fantastic value.

Stay tuned for a video over the next few days. Check out the Runcore press Release and if you want to be early in line, pre-order form here. The Pro IV will be shipping in just a few weeks.

(*1) A fast 1.8” SSD in the Everun Note UMPC beats this by a big margin due to the relatively powerful CPU. and GPU [See an example here.]

There’s an interesting line-up in the top 5 on the product portal today:

This is how the list of top 5 most-viewed devices looks on UMPCPortal today. Two UMPCs/MIDs and three low cost. lightweightm touchscreen notebooks.

The Viliv S5 has been #1 for a long time now and looks like it will stay there if recent reports are anything to go by. jkOnTheRun, Pocketables, JKKMobile, UMPCFever and yours truly have all filed positive reports based on testing experiences. Much the same is true of the UMID too. I’m guessing it would be #1 if you could actually buy one outside the Ebay channels because it seems to fit a more popular ‘microblogging’ niche than the Viliv S5. I could well be wrong on that one though so we’ll have to wait to see what the price is.

Positions 3-5 are interesting though. Over the last year, netbooks have totally dominated the UMPPortal charts with the Aspire One and MSI Wind taking the most viewings. These two both still appear in the top 10 but it’s these three new convertible touchscreen devices that are creating more buzz now.

Of the three, I personally think that the ASUS EeePC T91 is the most interesting for readers here. I was reading an advertising supplement from Stuff Magazine a few days ago and there was a lot of focus on the T91 as a Mobile Computer. They’re calling it the smallest, lightest TabletPC in the world which is actually incorrect but you can see where the marketing people are trying to push it. ‘Up to five hours’ battery life, 32GB SSD, fanless, multi-touch trackpad and GPS, 3G and DVB-T (options) in a very small sub-1kg package and an (expected entry-level) sub-500 Euros price has to be worth looking at.  The same goes for the EeePC T101H although it’s not going to be as portable. Bigger disk, screen, keyboard and CPU will increase the weight, size and price up out of the cheap netbook space. I suspect it might even come in at a higher price than the Gigabyte Touchnote T1028M that I have myself. Both are excellent choices though and if the extra size, weight and price is not a consideration for you, they will be more productive than the T91.

Bubbling under in the mobile convertible space is, to my eyes, an even more interesting mobile produtivity solution though. The Viliv S7 would go head-to-head with the T91. It will weigh even less, come with a range of CPUs up to 1.8 or even 2.0Ghz and have a similar battery life and keyboard. 3G and GPS will also be options. I tested a working model at CeBIT and was impressed.

It’s fair to say that all of these devices are new, all are getting a lot of press and that their appearance on the top 5 may not be long-term but touch is moving into mainstream computing very quickly indeed and it’s good to see sub 1kg options appearing at great prices. I feel sure that these devices will be around in the top 10 for quite a while and that we’re going to see more and more devices taking touch and mobility cues from the UMPC and Tablet PC world.

I’m sitting on the ICE high speed train from Amsterdam to Düsseldorf on the return journey of a combined 6-day business and pleasure trip that has been a big test for the GigabyteT1028M. Gigabytes newest netbook has been in backpakcs, friends houses, in exhibition halls, in cafes, trains and hotels. It’s been used for email, blogging, photo editing, video editing and website administration connected via both WiFi and the retro-fitted 3G module (a Mobilx extra) that uses the built-in SIM slot and 3G antenna.

Right now, as I think about how I’m going to write about how the Touchnote performed this week, I’m really struggling to think of anything that’s wrong with it. Maybe a sharper, matt screen would help and if I’m honest, I don’t like the handbag style case. I’m also struggling to get used to the mouse pointers on the side of the mouse pad but it’s hardly a major complaint. The only significant point to mention would be the battery life which comes in at between 3.25 and 4hrs depending on WiFi On or Off usage. The 6-cell (or a battery pack similar to the one I use) is recommended for anyone wanting to use it for more than a few hour-long sessions between charging.

Nothing much has changed since I gave my first impressions but let me quickly give you the important points again….

• 3G (module retro-fitted by Mobilx) uses built in SIM and antenna and provides excellent reception. Having a built-in antenna is always an advantage and letting the reseller or end-user choose the 3G module  is exactly the right thing to do. I hope other OEMs learn from this. 3G quality on the Touchnote is one of the high-points for me.
• Miminal Noise. if you’re in bed of in a very quiet office you’ll notice it, but not in normal use.
• Minimal heat, as above, you might notice it if you try.
• Touch layer works extremely well. Fast, fun and accurate on the 10” screen.
• SD card slot is fast and reliable. Great for transferring photos.
• Battery life is a consistent 3.25hrs with WiFi on, 4hrs with radio’s off.
• Keyboard accurate. Small amount of ‘click clack’ on this device but it doesn’t affect typing accuracy.
• Brightness and sharpness good but not the highest quality available
• SATA hard drive noticeably faster than my Medion Akoya Mini. (Same as MSI Wind.)
• Resume, standby quick and reliable (Note: One or two hung hibernations.)
• Rotation used once for a photo slide-show. 180-degree fold-back used a few times for laid-back browsing.
• Style, nice, different. The brown color is tasteful.
• Size and weight acceptable. 1KG would be a lot better but it is no heavier than the average 10” netbook.
• No scratches. (Case is good for protection despite it’s looks )
• Solid screen hinge (better than the M912)
• BT 2.1 and Draft-N wireless support  (Draft-N tested ok with Apple Air Port.)
• Good quality on-screen control panel  and access button on left-hand-side of device.
• Overall build quality good (no creaking plastic. finishing good.)
• Uses lightweight power supply unit at 12VDC.

Overall, the Touchnote delivers a quality experience and given its touchscreen and upgradability, is usable in more scenarios than the average netbook. Its a definate upgrade on some of the earlier netbooks. For me, it’s a significant step up from my Medion Akoya Mini and although I’m interested in the Asus T101H, I don’t see a reason to wait for it. The T1028 has everything I need in a netbook/notebook/laptop and so I’ll be handing over my money to Mobilx.

More information on the Gigabyte Touchnote T1028M information page. (Images, links, specifications, guest comments.)

Thanks to Mobilx for the loan of the Touchnote T1028M with fitted 3G module.

Over the last 48hrs I’ve been focusing on the Gigabyte Touchnote T1028M that has been sent over by Mobilx. 48hrs isn’t a long time but having done the unboxing, a full 3hr live test (recording) with viewer feedback (thanks to the 500+ people that dropped in during the live session) and Q&A along with a full 2-day use as my main PC, I feel that I’m a position to be able to give you the highs and lows.

The Touchnote is a device that falls between, or rather overlaps, the netbook, tabletPC and notebook categories and I have to say, I’m quite impressed with it. It’s a very unique and enjoyable device with some excellent features and very few issues.

The images above sum up some of the features that make it unique. Convertible screen, touch layer and 3G-ready. The Touchnote follows in the steps of the M912M, the 8.9” convertible and in my opinion, fixes all the problems that existed with that device.

Let me quickly run down the main points of note.

• Intel Atom 1.6Ghz ‘netbook’ platform with 1GB RAM and Windows XP Home.
• Large, relatively fast 2.5” SATA drive. (61 / 57 MB/s read/write) split into two (80/65GB) partitions with an additional recovery partition.
• Quite and cool operation (an important improvement over the M912M)
• Average 3.25hrs online, active battery life. (about 30 minutes improvement over the M912)
• Minimum 2.5hrs online batter life with high screen brightness and 3G connectivity.
• Maximum 4hrs battery life (50% screen brightness, radios off)
• Solid screen hinge (better than the M912)
• BT 2.1 and Draft-N wireless support
• Good quality on-screen control panel
• Device-off battery indicator
• Expresscard/34 slot
• Easy access to Wifi and spare PCI-Express-MINI slots, RAM and disk.
• Pre-wired antenna (good quality) and SIM card slot.
• Multi-touch mouse pad (Elantech)
• 3xUSB, VGA, 4-in-one memory card slot, Ethernet, mic and headphone ports
• Bright LED backlit screen with soft touch layer (great for finger operation, not great for handwriting input)
• Touch driver has basic built-in swipe-gesture support for Pg-Up, Pg-Down forward and back.
• Speakers loud. Reasonable (WRT netbooks) quality
• Glossy screen will be an annoyance for outdoor use. (see image below)
• Overall build quality good (no creaking plastic. finishing good.)
• Uses lightweight power supply unit at 12VDC
• A two-pocket neoprene ‘hand’bag’ is included.
• Spare batteries are well-priced. 6-cell battery (150% capacity) is available.

Medion Akoya (same as MSI Wind) next to Gigabyte Touchnote showing slightly larger form factor and glossy screen.

Full Gigabyte Touchnote Gallery available in the gallery.

The Touchnote has been loaned to UMPCPortal by Mobilx who are also taking advantage of the built-in SIM slot, easy PCI-Express Mini slot access and, unique for any device I know of, pre-wired antenna. I’ve done 3G upgrades in the past but antenna reception has always been an issue. With the Touchnote, Gigabyte take all the worry away. The reception on the antenna is excellent. For the first time ever on any device, including a smartphone, that I have owned, I was able to get UMTS connectivity in my cellar studio!

CrystalMark performance test.

In order to highlight the disk performance I’ve run through the CrystalMark 2003 performance test. The result of over 28000 is one of the best I’ve seen for a stock netbook and is attributable to the disk which really does make a noticeable difference in operation.

Summary.

The Touchnote offers a lot more than the average netbook and offers significant improvements over the groundbreaking M912M that came before it. Convertible touchscreen, draft-n WiFi, BT2.1, fast 2.5” drive, easy upgrade possibilities, Expresscard/34 and the well-prepared SIM card and 3G Antenna are a a feature set you won’t find on any other device. The glossy screen and average battery life are really the only two points I could highlight as issues. Oh, and perhaps the fact that an advanced N280-based model is coming soon! Currently Gigabyte stands alone in offering a 10” touchscreen notebook at this price point but they may not have the playground to themselves for long. The ASUS T101H is an obvious competitor and many will be laboring over the choice between the two. Until we get hands-on with the T101H we won’t be able to make a decision but until then, we can certainly say that the Gigabyte Touchnote T1028M is a unique, good value and well thought-out choice in both the prosumer end of the netbook market and the budget notebook market.

Price approx 480 Euro (export price. European price including tax, approx 580 Euros)
More information, specs, links and images in the Touchnote product page. Compare similar, popular devices here.

The Gigabyte T1028M Touchnote is likely to be here on Wednesday this week (thanks Mobilx) which means the live session, as stipulated in the bloggers lawbook, will have to be on Wednesday evening rather than Thursday or Friday as I mentioned before. Keep watching though as I’ll be updating on the delivery status. In preparation, I’ve been checking out detailed specifications, updating the product page and looking at some downloads which include the manual [PDF Link. Other links have been added to the link-list.]

Stand-out specs for me are the fast, 160GB SATA disk (power drain may be high on it though,) Draft-N Wifi support, Bluetooth 2.1 support, 4 or 6-cell battery options and pre-wired 3G antenna (according to Mobilx.) It’s almost a bonus that it’s got a swivel touchscreen! I also note that it’s got an ElanTech SmartPad which should have multi-touch support. I’ve been trying to find another netbook with draft-N, Bluetooth 2, multi-touch pad, battery options and a SATA drive but I can’t find one yet.

The unit comes with handwriting recognition software called ‘Pen Power’ although this appears to be focused towards Chinese input. There’s also a smart manager UI:

Note the inclusion of easy screen rotation and an on-screen keyboard. (Likely to be the XP built-in OSK)

…and there a nice battery check feature that you can use when the device is off.

Overall it looks like there are some very interesting features on the T1028M so I’m looking forward to checking it out and taking it to Amsterdam with me next week. I’ve updated the specifications and added a couple of videos to the product info page so check it out for the latest.

Don’t get too excited yet as the T1028M needs a good testing session (planned for Wed or Thursday. Keep watching.) before we mark it up on the shortlist but these early CrystalMark results, just in from Mobilx, indicate a very fast hard drive. It’s a 160G SATA drive.

We saw an impressive 26500 on the Gigabyte M912M so to reach nearly 28000 with the same CPU/GPU platform means the disk is even faster under this test condition.

Full specifications in the product page.

When I think back to the M912, Gigabyte’s first touchscreen netbook, I think about fast hard drive speed, a fun form factor and easy upgrade capability. Unfortuinately I also think about the noise and heat. [M912 Video]

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Mobilx have just informed us that they’ve got a sample Gigabyte T1028M TouchNote in and have already upgraded with 3G because the antenna is pre-wired. There’s also a pre-enabled SIM card slot.

They also have prices. The T1028M will come in at 573 Euro (inclusive tax) and is expected to ship out in about 5 weeks.

mobilx webshop – Gigabyte T1028M TouchNote.

Prices are also up for the S1024 Thinnote, the 890g lightweight 10″ netbook. 528 Euro inclusive European taxes.

For more info, check out Mobilx. We’ll get these devices in the database ASAP

All three 10″ Gigabyte Netbooks are now in the database. T1028M S1024 Thinnote M1022 Booknote Thanks Brett.