Always Innovating Touch Book enters production

Always Innovating has begun manufacturing the first batch of its Touch Book computers, and the company expects it to begin shipping in July.

The Touch Book is a mini-computer with two modes. You can use it as a laptop or as a touchscreen tablet. But unlike other convertible tablets including the Gigabyte Touch Note and Asus Eee PC T91, the Touch Book doesn’t have a swivel for folding the screen down over the keyboard. Instead, it has a detachable screen which can be used as a standalone device. When you want to use the keyboard, you just slide the screen into its keyboard dock.

The Touch Book has an 8.9 inch, 1024 x 600 pixel display, a TI OMAP3530 CPU with 256MB of RAM, and two internal batteries, a 6,000mAh and a 12,000 battery. There are 7 USB ports, including three external and four internal ports, with three of those internal ports reserved for the WiFi, Bluetooth, and Keyboard. The Touch Book uses an 8GB SD card for its primary storage and includes a USB 802.11b/g/n WiFi dongle. The keyboard is described as being 95% the size of a full keyboard, which is unusual for a machine with an 8.9 inch display.

Always Innovating says the machine’s Linux-based operating system is still a work in progress and that anyone who pre-ordered a Touch Book and receives one in July should expect to be working with beta software, although support and updates will be available.

The Touch Book tablet is available for pre-order for $299, while a tablet and keyboard will set you back $399.