Tablet PCs have not yet been adopted widely by consumers or by industry and have remained a niche product. There have been many attempts to explain this, including the higher cost of the hardware and even that pen input is a novelty and does not provide enough utility. The cost of the hardware will continue to fall over time, but it may never reach the same level as a traditional laptop computer because of the added complexity in the device.

While the adoption of touch screen interfaces has broadened widely in recent years, this is in the embed device market where the application consists of a single use. The penetration into the general computing market is limited to specific business use cases and educational institutions who are paving new ground with the use of technology in teaching students.

Windows 7

Windows 7 has made major strides at elevating the Tablet PC functionality of a computer to the same level as a keyboard and mouse. While it still is treated as an additional feature, the integration into the operating system makes the experience more transparent to the user.

The new territory being explored is the use of touch on a general computing device. The iPhone started a love affair with touch and the general consumer, but this has not translated over to a full sized computing platform. Windows 7 introduced native support for both single point and multi point touch including gestures that allow the user to more naturally interact with their computer. It is expected that more and more computers will include support for touch as consumer demand increases.