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Motion Computing and Intel are looking to carve out a spot in the health care market with a new tablet PC.
The Austin, Texas, tablet PC maker announced Feb. 20 that it has teamed with Intel to produce a new mobile computer, dubbed the C5 MCA (mobile clinical assistant), that will be targeted strictly at health care professionals, such as doctors, nurses and other hospital workers.
The new tablet PC, according to the joint announcement, was developed during two years of trials at the University of California Medical Center in San Francisco. The new tablet was also tested at other hospitals in Singapore, the United Kingdom and California.
In addition to its Intel-based architecture and tablet design, the C5 will include a number of features specifically geared toward the health care market. These include a magnesium-alloy internal frame, a faceplate and backplate composed of disinfectant-resistant material, RFID (radio-frequency identification) technology to keep track of patients, a digital camera and Bluetooth wireless technology.
Inside, the C5 uses Intels Centrino mobile technology platform with a Core Solo U1400 processor, which runs at 1.2GHz and offers 2MB of L2 cache memory and a 533MHz front side bus. The tablet also offers an Intel 945GM chip set with an Extreme Graphics controller, which allows the image to rotate with the screen, a 10.4-inch LCD display, 512MB of DDR2 (double data rate) memory and a hard disk drive with a maximum memory of 60GB.
The tablet, which weighs 3.1 pounds, also has built-in 802.11 wireless connectivity. In addition, the C5 will come with Microsoft Windows Vista operating system or the Windows XP Tablet PC edition OS.
Unlike previous versions of its operating system, Windows Vista is also designed for tablets and be installed directly onto these PCs. Vista, according to analysts, might help the sales of tablet PCs, which have traditionally been designed only for niche markets.
In addition to Motion, other PC makers, such as Lenovo and Toshiba have also introduced tablet PCs in the past six months.
The C5 tablet, which has a starting price of $2,199, will be available in May.