Tablet PC: A Rare (These Days) High-Tech Success Story
Sales Figures Topping Expectations; Manufacturers Struggle to Keep up with Demand
Acer TravelMate C100 Series
The Tablet PC has been out for only five months, but we don't think it's too early to proclaim the success of the platform and the devices on which it runs. Sales figures for 2002 show 72,000 Tablet PCs sold in the seven weeks they were available.xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />

That may not sound like much, but it is a lot more than most people thought would be purchased, including the manufacturers of the computers, most of whom were sent scrambling to meet the demand for the systems.


There were seven brands of Tablets at the launch, and since then others have joined in, most recently NEC with its 2-pound, four-ounce LitePad 933, the lightest Tablet PC on the market.


Fujitsu Stylistic ST4000
Prospects are just as promising for 2003. Microsoft has predicted that 500,000 Tablet PCs would be sold in 2003, and so far, sales figures show that to be well within range.

Early Naysayers Were Speaking for Themselves
Before the launch pf the Tablet PC platform, input from many in the industry who  had the opportunity to use the pre-release Tablet PCs were critical. Their reports said that Tablet PCs were too heavy and too slow. The handwriting recognition isn't accurate enough and the battery life is too short.

While to a degree all these criticisms are accurate, none of this has kept those who "get" the Tablet PC from buying them up as fast as they appear on store shelves. More than a mobile computer in the Road Warrior sense, Tablets are great for intra office use: taking notes at meetings, making quick sketches or notating mockups in collaborative sessions, and inputting data into forms-based applications anywhere.