On top of all the other announcements, Alcatel also showed off a “smartbook” concept at the on-going MWC 2014 show. So, what’s a smartbook? No, it’s not an electronic book or ebook reader, rather, the smartbook from Alcatel is a notebook that is powered by your smartphone. The image above features a aluminum laptop from the company (yes, it looks like a MacBook Air), and is “brainless”.
The smartbook comes with a 11” 1080p IPS display with 5,000 to 6,000mAh battery on board. It looks like your typical laptop with the keyboard, built-in speakers, multitouch glass touchpad and such in an aluminum body. It relies on a smartphone as the operating system (any octacore phone from Alcatel).
Using Hotknot technology from MediaTek, all users need to do is pair the smartbook with their phone simply by placing the capactive touch display on to the HotKnot area of the laptop. It will get connected immediately and a familiar Android tablet layout will be displayed on the smartbook. Sounds familiar? The concept is pretty much similar to Asus PadFone, but instead of having to dock a smartphone onto the bigger device, everything here is done wirelessly, it doesn’t even require NFC.
Unfortunately, it’s still a concept. According to Engadget, the representatives from Alcatel says that the project is far from ready for the public, so I guess we’ll just have to wait and see if it comes to the market. Android powered smartbook anyone? Visit the source link to check out the hands on video.
(Source: Engadget)
