http://www.theverge.com/2016/8/31/12...ndroid-windows
Honestly it looks both innovative and well executed. It has two screens, one acts as a display while the other is for typing or being used as a drawing pad. The device can also translate pen ink into digital. It is available with Android or Windows. Toshiba and Acer released similar products but they didn't work quite as good.

Honestly, I find it something that as a creative, it has my attention. I'm quite sure folks will dislike the choice of OS's on either option but it definitely is a cool thing that I'm glad exists.

It certainly looks good on the pictures; I like the design of the device a lot and Lenovo does produce very solid devices.

However there's the same catch as with tablets in general; the "touchscreen like" lower panel which is supposed to act like a keyboard... Typing on a touch-surface is such a pain, you cannot do it for more than a few minutes in row and it starts to feel like hell.

I get the idea of drawing on the surface; maybe that experience is good, I wouldn't know since I cannot draw a stick figure of a man.

This definitely is not a laptop replacement... I type hours and hours in row and need a solid mechanical keyboard.

Acer had something like that a few years back. And AFAIK it was on off, so it didn't gain much success.

Exactly. And don't forget another thing. Some people like keyboardless devices because "the keyboard takes up the useful space" that could otherwise be used for more screen area. Now you have more screen area and use it for what? A keyboard.

In other words, a compromise that will appeal to neither those who want a proper keyboard nor to those who don't.

but it might be great for donkey kong

I don't really use laptops. For me this would replace a pen and paper. I would prefer if both panels were proper screens so that it could be used like a book.

This technology from Tactus could make a device like this more useful. Tactus plus stylus gives you way more productivity.
http://www.cnet.com/videos/keyboard-...een-on-demand/

Possibly, altough I am sceptical until I can try that myself.
I fear the actual feel of the bubble keyboard is not that different from a touchscreen.

There's a real reason for good keyboards on a computer and that is because text entry is the most important function for a lot of people.

The main point of a proper keyboard is that you feel touching the key before you activate it. I do not see the point in haptic or similar feedback telling me that I pressed the key: I know I did, I can see the letter on the screen. What a shame it is the wrong letter though, because I did not feel it and could not make a correction before the OS decided to take my searching for the right key as a key press.

A bubble keyboard has a potential to address that issue. Of course it also has a potential for screwing it badly but let's be optimistic.

But there is another issue. I have yet to see a good on-screen keyboard. By that I mean one with a good layout. The Sailfish keyboard is downright horrible. The default Android one is a lot better and the hacker's keyboard on Android is even better (I do not know about iOS) but they all suffer from the same thing: none of them have a full set of keys. Ctrl, Alt, Alt Gr, cursor keys, numeric pad, function keys... They are all of the "let's make the best out of the bad job" kind.

Can a bubble keyboard fix that? Not unless you can pop up the bubble anywhere on the screen, allowing you a virtually any layout under the sun. And of course not activate the button until I damn pressed it. Fumbling around over the bubbles should have the same effect as doing the same on a real keyboard: absolutely none.