Not too long ago, netbooks were the next big computing trend…for about five minutes. Then tablets came along and everyone forgot all about the weirdly-sized, low-powered mini notebooks. If you’ve still got a netbook lying around that isn’t being used, Popular Science has the very best idea for making it useful again. Following their few simple steps, you can turn that old netbook into a spiffy new tablet computer. It’ll cost you around $100 and you have to have some technical skills, but if you’ve got the cash and the know-how it only takes about a day to complete the transformation.

(image via: Popular Mechanics)

According to the instructions, you’ll need to procure a touchscreen overlay, which will run around $80, and a silicone clay known as Sugru. After a bit of disassembling and reassembling, installing a driver, calibrating the screen and reveling in your awesome tech skills, you’ll have a custom tablet for way less than an iPad would have cost you. It probably won’t look nearly as slick, but what it lacks in style it will make up in bragging rights.

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In just a few years, portable computers have changed so much that they hardly resemble the large, clunky machines of just 15 years ago. But technology never stands still, and this conceptual design from Niels Van Hoof may in fact be the next step in notebook evolution.

The small notebook is called Feno, and it is a surprisingly graceful little device. It utilizes a flexible OLED display to allow the screen to fold around the keyboard. The result is a far smaller folded size than has ever been possible before.

The truly wonderful part of this design, though, is the pop-out mouse that eliminates the traditional touch pad on most netbooks. The wireless mouse cuts down on the size of the keyboard component and eliminates the headaches that come with trying to type on a small keyboard without activating the touch pad.

The designer doesn’t indicate the side of the Feno, but judging from the pictures and the size of a standard CD (4.75″ diameter), it looks like it would be around 5 inches X 12 inches when folded, making it small enough to slip into your backpack or purse easily. This incredible concept gives a bright new vision for the future of portable devices.

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As far as laptop concepts go, it’s hard to find something truly new. The form remains basically the same, no matter how it functions. But designer Tommaso Gecchelin has come up with a surprising new configuration that combines the best of a notebook, netbook and tablet. His MacBook Touch design can go from the basic screen-and-keyboard layout to a full-size tablet to a two-sided tabletop display with ease. It’s not a dual-screen setup; rather, it’s one flexible touch screen integrated with the as-yet not invented technology called iSpine that will allow it unprecedented flexibility. The designer compares it to the flexibility of the human spine, though we’ve never seen a human spine bend like this.

Although it wasn’t commissioned by Apple and may never end up seeing production, the design is truly a thing of beauty. Imagine having all of these configurations at your fingertips without having to buy multiple devices. When fully extended, the display is the size of a sheet of A4 paper but doesn’t have any “dead” space in the middle; you can even bend it all the way “backwards,” making it an ideal ebook reader. OLED technology is making this type of of device more and more possible.

The Magic Dock, a thin external device that houses the power and USB ports, twists to create a stand on which the computer sits when it’s fully extended. The MacBook Touch would also come with an iPen, an input device that would work much like the stylus of any tablet PC. When in a notebook configuration, the “keyboard” would be an on-screen touch keyboard, much like the one currently in use on the iPhone and iPod Touch. A wireless full-size keyboard would be available as an accessory, also.

Of course, Apple doesn’t typically pick up ideas from third-party designers, but much of what Gecchelin proposes seems to be in line with the way notebook technology is moving. We are increasingly demanding machines that are more portable, more adaptable, and more multi-functional. The bendy, completely customizable display of Gecchelin’s design would allow the sort of freedom that it’s hard to find on any existing laptop, tablet or desktop computer. Even if Apple doesn’t produce it, it seems pretty feasible that we’ll be seeing this type of notebook sometime in the near future.

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