Shanghai Daily | 上海日报 -- English Window to China News

PANASONIC'S latest PC offering is small enough to cradle in one hand, yet strong enough to handle the rough and tumble of extreme environments.

Japan's Matsushita Electric Industrial Co, whose Toughbook series of rugged laptops is used by United States police, military and utility workers, yesterday unveiled a compact "ultra-mobile" version.

It's nearly as easy to handle as a PDA but boasts all the features of a standard PC.

And like other Toughbook models, it's made to survive.

The CF-U1 mini-tablet emerged unscathed after demonstrators yesterday dropped the device 1.2 meters face down, then dunked it in 8 liters of water.

Its batteries last 10 hours, in part because it runs on Intel's new low-power Atom microprocessor. It measures 184 millimeters wide, 151mm tall and 57mm deep.

Shigeo Okuda, general manager of Matsushita's marketing group, said the CF-U1 broadens the reach of rugged laptops, which have been too bulky until now to carry directly on site to warehouses and construction zones.

The tablet features a 5.6-inch touchscreen display, a thumb-operated keyboard, Bluetooth and wireless Internet. With a strap in the back, the CF-U1 is held like a flat camcorder.

"This will be used in different ways than the Toughbook now," Okuda said. "This is a completely new category of rugged PCs."

Through its Panasonic brand, Matsushita holds a leading 61-percent share of the rugged-PC market worldwide, said the company. It sold 574,000 units in 2007, and hopes the CF-U1 will extend its dominance.

The company will launch overseas sales of the 1-kilogram device in August, and begin sales in Japan in October for an unspecified price. It aims to sell 90,000 CF-U1 units overseas and 10,000 units in Japan in a year.

Matsushita's strategy in the competitive PC market has been to focus exclusively on laptops for business and field use. It does not make standard desktop models or those targeting the average home.

Its Toughbook line is primarily sold to companies and governments, and includes models offering multiple levels of ruggedness to withstand the harshest of conditions.