Albatron Makes Any LCD A Multi-Touch Panel With EM215

We figured it would only be a matter of time before this happened, and now that touch panels are really taking off, Albatron is looking to take advantage of a huge market opportunity. Today, the only (easy) way to enjoy a touch experience is to totally upgrade your machine; you either have to buy a new touch-ready all-in-one PC, a new touch-ready notebook or a new touch-ready LCD. Basically, you're looking at a new investment in hardware at the very least.

But Albatron has a solution that's far cheaper than any of those other options. The EM215 is expected to launch in a few weeks at Computex in Taiwan, with this External Multi-Touch Module allowing consumers to make their existing monitor touch-ready "within one minute." 60 seconds may be a stretch (or maybe not, we suppose), but at any rate this should do the trick pretty quickly.

It's reportedly tool and driver-free, and it supports standard Windows gestures. The only catch is that you need a 21.5" LCD with a 16:9 aspect ratio, but that's generally a fairly common size. We also think the company could eventually ship multiple sizes of these devices if there's demand, since the technology should be scalable. No pricing details were mentioned, but if you're interested, keep an eye out for news to come straight from Computex.

Albatron, Taipei 2010/05/15 – Do you wanna experience touch monitor in the fastest and economic way? Albatron Technology is going to launch an External Multi-touch Module – EM215 during Computex 2010. EM215 adopts with optical technology, and compatible with Windows touch structure; furthermore, you can easily install EM215 within 1 minute.

Windows 7 supports touch technology perfectly; however, most users cannot enjoy touch technology unless they buy the new PC or monitors that are “touch ready”. In order to make more users can enjoy the benefit of touch technology, Albatron, the optical touch monitor manufacturer designed the “External multi-touch module – EM215”.  By hanging EM215 on existed LCD monitor, you can upgrade your LCD monitor to touch monitor easily.

To compare with others touch module, EM215 has the advantages of the following features:

1. EM215 is the first external touch module that designed for multimedia LCD monitor by its 16:9 aspect ratio.
2. Tool & driver free; easy to install.
3. Supports Windows standard gestures.
4. No need to use specific stylus, user can input touch signal by finger, pen or ruler as stylus. Even when wearing glove, user can still use touch function.
5. Optical touch structure; ultra durable & extreme accurate.
6. Covered with tempered glass, scratch free.

EM215 is designed for all 21.5” LCD monitor with 16:9 aspect ratio and compatible with all 16:9 or 4:3 monitors that have small display area than 478mm*269mm. with EM215, even children and elders can operation PC with intuition.

Specification

Principle	Optical structure
Sensor refresh rate	120 frames/ sec
Touch resolution	32767*32767
Tempered glass thickness	1.9mm +0.1/ -0.2mm
Calibration	In-factory calibration, user calibration free
Interface	USB HID multi-touch digitizer
Power	Operation <1W Suspend <60mW
OS	Microsoft Windows 7 (multi-touch, driver free) Windows XP/ Vista(single touch)
Compatible monitor	Best for 21.5”/ 16:9 LCD monitor Compatible with all 16:9 & 4:3 LCD monitor that display area smaller than 478mmx269mm