Microsoft Is Already Planning The Second Generation Touch

According to an outside developer, Microsoft is already working on the second generation of its multi-touch Surface computer, although the first is barely out.

Developer Joe Olsen, whose company Phenomblue writes applications for the Microsoft’s multi-touch Surface computer, has said he’s been told that a second generation of the device is in development and about two to three years away.

The first generation has barely been released commercially – it arrives in the UK next week, in fact. Microsoft was unable to confirm any release date for a second generation version.

The Surface is a flat-screen computer like a table that’s able to interpret multi-touch gestures, using cameras within the machine.

The second generation Surface has supposedly been dubbed Second Light, and will take the concept further by adding a second projector in the unit that can project a layer of images above the screen, the BBC reports. That would, for instance, allow one map to be superimposed on another.

The computer will also use infra-red sensors meaning users won’t have to actually touch the screen. Olsen said he’d been told by people at Microsoft that the new generation device was being worked on by the company’s R&D people.