Lenovo’s concept laptop is real, transparent, and ready to impress::Lenovo’s ThinkBook Transparent Display Laptop is a 17.3-inch notebook with a transparent screen and a built-in tablet for you to doodle on.
It’s definitely a concept, but I can’t for the life of me envision the use case.
I can envision plenty of use cases, none of which are laptops.
This is something I’d really want, but I couldn’t justify spending money on it.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
A year after flexing its R&D muscles with a rollable laptop that expanded its screen with a simple button push, Lenovo is back at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain, with another somehow even more sci-fi concept device.
“I am not a good artist,” Lenovo’s executive director of ThinkPad portfolio and product, Tom Butler, admits to me in an interview, “but I can bring something behind and I can trace it.” In the room we’re sitting in, that means pulling a bunch of sunflowers behind the laptop screen, but Butler pitches the idea of an architect being able to sit on location and sketch a building without taking their eyes off the environment in front of them.
Although the 17.3-inch display in this concept is only 720p, AG Zheng, Lenovo’s executive director of SMB product and solutions, tells me that going with an OLED would have limited the company to a resolution as low as 480p.
When images of this device first started leaking, I assumed this was meant as just another sci-fi flourish, but it’s actually part of Lenovo’s pitch for artists.
But Butler says he has “very high confidence” that its technologies will make it into a real laptop in the next five years and hopes that revealing this proof of concept will start a public conversation about what it could be useful for, setting a target for Lenovo to work toward.
Halfway through my interview, I pulled my (decidedly nontransparent) MacBook’s screen forward to double-check my phone behind it, and Butler leaped on it immediately.
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More like ready to show everyone what you’re looking at. I’m sure businesses will love having their confidential documents broadcast to the entire coffee shop.
In the article Lenovo says that if/when they go to production it will absolutely have the ability to enable/disable the transparency
But then what’s even the point?
“We need to find a way to block the transparency on our transparent displays!”
“…You mean like a regular screen?”
Not to mention it’ll work terribly in most light conditions.
I always loved looking at transparent screens in movies and shows. Everything on the screen is bright and colorful, and the camera is able to pan to a view where the background provides a flat color so everything is legible!
Can’t see these working theat well in the real world. How would it do a dark mode? What about bright sunlight and a busy background? The example images already look like the background is going to be extremely distracting, and those are the ones they chose to show it off.
And in regards of text and graphs: everything is mirrored from behind. I am not sure what transparent screens may be used for.
That’s kind of a cool secondary use though.
A one button screen flip to present to someone on the other side would be marginally useful.
Ironically the first thought I had looking at this was “this would make a really great prop for some scifi movie”. My second thought was “this looks horrendous to actually use as a laptop”. Non-physical buttons suck as car manufacturers recently discovered, and aside from looking cool there’s virtually no positives to a transparent laptop screen and a whole raft of negatives.
So yeah, very cool concept, utterly crap product.
A lot of people are complaining about it’s use case for laptops, but I think a display like this on cars or glasses/goggles could be interesting.
Doesn’t this already exist since half a century? https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Head-up_display No need for a transparent display at all.
HUDs on cars rely on a screen on the dash that reflects onto the windshield and into your eyeballs. They’re good at night, but during the day they can be pretty hard to see unless the screen is absurdly bright. Maybe this wouldn’t have that issue?
As an additional data point, I’ve never once had trouble seeing the HUD on my Mazda even while driving into the sun.
Same here. It’s always been excellent
On the other hand, they’re also focused at infinity so it’s easier to glance at than a transparent screen.
AR Tablets for technicians
I am so not interested in transparent screen for consumer use. At least not in this shape.
You prefer a curve?
Circular laptops, I think you’re onto something here.
Where are the privacy wonks when we need them?
This would be cool expanded to fit window panes in your home. I know I’ve enjoyed putting on the youtube Yule-tide fireplace on my TV to make the home more cozy in the winter, it’d be even cooler to turn “winter” mode on in your windows, really complete the hygge feeling
Just stick with the fire for all the windows too. This is fine.
Uhm, cool I guess. Why should we use this? Does it have any advantage over classical displays?
Put a paper drawing behind the transparent screen and draw on the screen to digitize it.
Or, you know, use a scanner app?
Nah, that’s too affordable and easy to use for a True Artist.
Some very novel jobs where you need to be at a computer but also like to see the person in front of you?
For the sake of transparency so the client can follow a bit?
I am just guessing. Transparent screens as tech are very promising for AR, imagine a technicians tablet with this? But a laptop… more a novelty.
One person would be looking at a reversed image though, so that’s not going to fly.
Why not simply have a double sided monitor?
Only and only use I can think of is tablet mode without relying on screen flipping somehow away from keyboard.
So you can proudly watch porn in public and make not just people behind you uncomfortable, but also people in front of you!
Everyone in the circlejerk can look at the same screen.
Yes. The advantage is it’s really cool.
You can get done damn near everything you need with super basic products, but is that how you roll?
Even if it does, it has a ton of disadvantages too.
Great! Now you and your best buddy dont have to sit next to eachother when watching porn and you can instead sit across from each other and make eye contact
“I love masturbating to porn with my bro”
Lenovo failed to impress me with their laptops. Brand isnt worth dick anymore
Their tablets also fail to impress.
That is because you got the wrong dick. You need to buy the Lenovo® Certified© Dick™ from Lenovo® directly for double the price, or, naturally, your hardware won’t POST.
Alternatively, you can firmware disable the non-lenovo dick in the UEFI options, so that the laptop boots, fOr YoUr SeCuRiTeH.
Try to claim a warranty with them too.
The last 2 Lenovo laptops I purchased both caught fire and died same day I purchased them. That officially scared me away forever as a Lenovo customer.
They were so busy asking if they could that they never bothered to ask if they should.
Exactly. There’s a market for that tech. Laptop ain’t it.
Sometimes you just gotta build a thing.
Immediately lost me at non-tactile keyboard. Who wants this.
So what’s the benefit of it being transparent?
It functions more like a drawing tablet, with the ability to put something behind the screen allowing you to easily trace it.
so nothing most users would use. It sounds more practical for kids.
That’s all?
5 year old me would love it
