Gates: Still Passionate After All These Years

Say what you will about Bill Gates, the guy clearly loves his technology. While sticking mostly to the script during his WinHEC keynote (as laid out in advance media briefings), Gates displayed real excitement about the next generation of Windows, code-named Longhorn. "It's a very big deal for us," he told an audience of some 2800 engineers, enthusiasts, analysts, and reporters.

At one point, after a particularly eye-catching demo of Longhorn's graphics capability, he seemed particularly enthusiastic: "Whenever I see these demos, I just think, 'Let's get Longhorn done!'"

The graphics demonstrations were indeed impressive. An effect called aeroglass allowed for semi-transparent window frames through which you could see video from another window. Longhorn's graphics system, which offloads a lot of work to the PC's graphics board, also addresses a longstanding problem with high-resolution displays: Some applications just look too small. In Longhorn, however, you'll be able to resize the application (the example used was the Windows calculator).

Speaking of eye candy, here are images of the current and future portables Gates showed to demonstrate the increased importance of mobile computing:





The first two are tablet PCs from HP (top) and Toshiba (bottom). They aren't particularly earth shattering but Gates noted that they cost only about $100 or so more than the same notebooks without tablet functionality and the Tablet PC operating system.



This is a prototype from Acer of a convertible notebook. What's interesting is that instead of having to swivel the lid and then flatten it in order to convert it to a slate, you simply slide the screen forward and down. No swiveling required.



This next notebook from Asus isn't a tablet--it's a concept design for a Longhorn-based portable that will take advantage of the OS's support for auxiliary displays, which are somewhat reminiscent of the exterior displays on some clamshell cell phones. With Longhorn, you'll be able to use these displays to access information such as datebook entries--or perhaps to play music--without having to boot up the OS.



Finally, here's a photo (also courtesy of Microsoft) of Gates showing off another concept design, this for a slate-style Longhorn portable that had a 7-inch screen and was thinner than my finger.



And here's a close-up of the slate, which would have no keyboard; you'd either use pen or touch input. There's also a small camera embedded in the bezel.