Sony Vaio Tap 11 takes Win 8 tablets to a whole new level of thin and light

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Full HD Tap 11
We don't know what Microsoft will be doing with the design of the Surface 2, but it better be prepared to beat Sony at its own game. Almost as thin as an iPad, the lightweight Vaio Tap 11 features a 4th generation Intel Core i5 or i7 processor, 4 GB of RAM, plus your choice of SSDs up to 512 GB of capacity. It might not be a fanless design yet, as the 4.5 watt Haswells aren't in consumer devices yet, but at sub-10mm thickness and less than two pounds of weight, the Vaio Tap 11 is still a remarkable engineering achievement.

The black or white chassis actually reminds of the Z Ultra phablet or the Tablet Z, though this one sports a 1080x1920 pixels 11.6" display with Triluminous technology. You also get a full USB 3.0 port, microSD slot and microHDMI port for TV hookup. Speaking of, when you need to watch movies on the tablet, there is built-in stand on the back, which can be adjusted at different angles - the tablet-in-bed puzzle solved.

Sony solved the tablet-for-work conundrum, too, by simply providing a detachable keyboard towards the tablet, which serves as cover when attached to the screen with magnets, and juices up from the slate itself in the process. It is aluminum-clad, with chiclet keys and trackpad, so you can get some serious work done when you detach it from the tablet. Sony has also provided a stylus, with accompanying apps for taking notes, drawing and annotations.

The company touts this Vaio Tap 11 as the "world's thinnest Windows 8 tablet," and with every right, showing us that you can have your slim tablet cake, and eat it too, with full Win 8 and Intel Core power at your disposal. With such a thin chassis, something had to give, and here it is the battery capacity, with Sony reps citing up to six hours of battery life, which is rather low for the Haswell standards.

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Pricing for this beauty is yet to reveal itself, but it should be hitting stores next month, so we'll know pretty soon what the first elegant yet powerful Windows 8 slate can set us back.




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