HP Introduces TouchSmart PC as the Family Hub

The winner of our online Last Gadget Standing Contest during the 2007 Consumer Electronics Show hits the market this week. Hewlett-Packard touts its TouchSmart IQ770 PC as much more than a desktop computer. It is designed to be the center of family activity, taking its place in the kitchen (if you've got the room), the family room—anywhere the family gathers.

With a calendar that displays on a 19-inch screen, family members can each add activities with a stylus, finger, or via a keyboard, and leave each other notes on onscreen Post-It-style squares. Kids can get homework done, then pop in a DVD, download and listen to music, or watch TV. (The TouchSmart also has a high-definition TV receiver.) 

AT $1,700, the TouchSmart offers a computing and entertainment family hub, but it will take up a lot of space to do it. It's big, and it would not fit in my kitchen, unless I could cut vegetables on it too. I'm hoping to test it out in a central area of our house just off the kitchen, where we all come and go.

Let me know what you'd like to know most about TouchSmart, and what would make it stand out as kitchen PC hub over a portable laptop PC. In the meantime, here's what we've written about the TouchSmart on Yahoo! Tech:

HP TouchSmart: The Social PC
HP Aims to Organize, Back Up, and Entertain Families