After foldable phones and rollable TVs, it looks like foldable laptops could be the next device thrust upon us.
Now, before you say "But my laptop already bends!" I'm talking about full-screen foldable devices, essentially larger versions of a foldable phone, rather than traditional laptops that have a top half with a screen connected to the bottom half with a keyboard and trackpad.
During Intel's keynote address at CES XNUMX, the company showed off some really great technology that got us really excited about the new laptops coming out in XNUMX and beyond, but also talked about foldable laptop screens. , and left me less impressed.
While Intel hasn't actually revealed any foldable laptops, it has announced that it has updated its Evo platform to cover foldable-screen laptops, which Intel says is going to be a "new factor. Developed to accommodate new cases of employment and experiences", and which are beginning to appear this year.
Intel Evo is essentially a set of criteria that laptops must meet to achieve 'Evo' certification, such as being thin and light, waking up instantly, having 9+ hours of battery life, and running Intel XNUMX or better. twelve generation. central processors.
All of the Intel Evo laptops we've tested have been pretty awesome (and pretty expensive), and Intel is also considering a line of Intel Evo laptops with folding screens coming out this year, with all the goodies of Intel laptops. Standard Evo... more in this new foldable form factor.
These new laptops are fundamentally going to be a long, elongated screen. In some cases you can fold it in half and use it as a tablet, or in other cases you can fold it into an L shape and use it as a normal laptop, but with an on-screen keyboard.
What is?
Well, I can see how there is room for such devices, and I am never against companies trying new things. However, I don't see how this is going to improve on the laptop form factor. Laptops have remained fundamentally unchanged for over 3 decades, and while that may sound jaded, I think it's because the design, with a physical keyboard and screen, was pretty much defined from the start. They are comfortable to work with and are easily transportable.
With a foldable-screen laptop, you lose that physical keyboard to begin with. Although some people don't mind, for many of us, a physical keyboard is considerably more comfortable and accurate for typing, especially over long periods of time.
When you unfold a foldable laptop, you have a huge touch screen in your hands, like a sizable tablet, and I don't know, but that's not a thing that particularly interests me.
I am also not convinced of the quality of folding screens. There have been well-documented issues with foldable phone screens being damaged or showing imperfections with regular opening and closing, and while foldable screen technology can progress, these issues don't fill me with confidence.
Ultimately, laptops with folding screens seem like a solution to a problem that absolutely no one has raised. They don't seem to manage many improvements over standard laptops, and for those of us who write a lot, they actually remove some useful quirks.
I'm more than happy to be wrong and can't wait for these new foldable laptops to change their minds. But there are already so many new and exciting technologies coming to laptops this year, not just from Intel but also from AMD and Nvidia, that devices like foldable screens will need to truly impress to stand out.