There is no way to optimize it as the matter is out of their hand. Its just the delay for input events to go from hardware to kernel to user land.
MS Research had a neat demo on this very topic some time ago.
Edit: never mind, it seems they use their own hardware. In that case, it would be interesting to know if iOS allows fast raw access to the external periphery.
Ah yes, I remember this. Worth noting that his device is a projector putting the image on a screen, and I think it's got a lot more computing power behind it than an iPad has available.
The current latency isn't a CPU issue though. I'm not sure of the refresh rate of the iPad (60Hz?) but the hardware has no trouble updating the display in a single frame.
It should be noted that unless Microsoft had a 1000Hz display running, there was something fishy going on with their 1ms update.
From Collusion: Hi All just in case didn't catch my reply, I'd like to direct your attention to what i posted elsewhere on hacker news:
Paraphrased from our Kickstarter page: Thanks to those that have identified an issue with our drawing video clips, they were shot with a high fps camera and included in our video at HALF SPEED. In response, our video will be adjusted to demonstrate the drawing at normal speed.
Additionally, we have identified areas to further optimize our algorithms for you to ensure that any latency is fully minimized. You can consider drawing speed to be equivalent experience to the iPad touch interface; if not better.
Cheers,
Rob (CEO) Collusion
By the way we are now 'de lurking' as we have finally got some sleep after the marathon lead-up to the kickstarter launch - 53 hours and no kip is not pleasant! Feel free to ask us questions directly. There is a LOT of work going into Collusion to address many of the existing fundamental issues of pen on tablet computing (many raised right here on hacker news inc latency, accuracy, palm rejection etc) we kindly ask you do this before reaching for the nearest pitchfork:) Talk to us.
MS Research had a neat demo on this very topic some time ago.
Edit: never mind, it seems they use their own hardware. In that case, it would be interesting to know if iOS allows fast raw access to the external periphery.