Compal’s DualFlip laptop design has two screens that can be stacked or used side-by-side

There are a lot of ways to make a dual-screen laptop. Some models we’ve seen in recent years have a second screen where you’d normally find a keyboard. Others have one on the lid. Some put a screen above the keyboard. And a handful put a screen next to the keyboard.

Compal’s DualFlip laptop design is something different. It’s a notebook with a special hinge that allows users to flip out a 13.3 inch display and position it either above the primary 13.3 inch screen or to the side of the primary display.

The Taiwanese electronics manufacturer recently won an iF Design Guide award for the design, which pictures show is really more like a dual-screen tablet with an adjustable hinge, a built-in kickstand and a detachable keyboard.

If you unfold the screens to a 115 degree angle and place the keyboard on top of the bottom screen, the computer looks and works like a notebook.

But if you remove the keyboard and extend the displays to a 180 degree angle, you can extend a kickstand from the back and use the wireless keyboard to interact with content across both screens, stacked vertically.

Or you can adjust the hinge so that the screens are positioned one next to the other in a horizontal arrangement.

Or you can like both screens flat and use the computer like a tablet with support for touch or pressure-sensitive pen input.

It’s unclear if you’ll ever actually be able to buy a laptop based on the DualFlip design. Compal is an ODM (Original Design Manufacturer) that builds products for other companies and doesn’t sell devices based on its own designs directly to consumers. And some of the company’s older award-winning dual-screen laptop concepts never actually made it to market. But maybe this one will be different?