Android On HP TouchPad

NicknamesAreStupid writes "As fast as you can say '$99 blowout sale,' PC World reports on an Android port to the now defunct HP TouchPad. 'Of course, it will turn out to be the best Android pad ever, making the iPad stink by comparison,' reports Muphy's Law Reports."

Comments

Logical contradiction

[gnasher719]

It can be an Android tablet. It can make "the iPad stink". But it can't both at the same time.

Re:Logical contradiction

[Anonymous Coward]

Go away spammer.

Re:Logical contradiction

[Dracos]

Mods, please irrevocably suspend user account MyCleanAss (#2444274) as an obvious spammer. Also, please pursue legal action against this person who is clearly violating the Geeknet terms of use.

Re:Logical contradiction

[Anonymous Coward]

mycleanpc.com is just about the only american company left that is able to afford to pay for a primetime ad... their revenue is certainly well needed by the stations...

so why is it that people like you always show up and criticise the efforts of such companies? isn't their spirit what made america great in the first place?

Re:Logical contradiction

[geminidomino]

isn't their spirit what made america great in the first place?

They're spamming scumbags, but yeah... their spirit has certainly played a part in making America what it is today...

Re:Logical contradiction

[MichaelSmith]

Won't help. The spammer continually creates new accounts.

Re:Logical contradiction

[maxwell demon]

Since when does a spam bot realize anything? Did spam bot technology advance far enough for the spam bots to get self aware?

Re:Logical contradiction

[maxwell demon]

But maybe the lameness filter could be adapted to reject any post which contains several links to the exact same URL. Any such post is obviously spam.

Re:Logical contradiction

[Inda]

Let him post his spam. Google will ignore his posts with the exact same links so close together.

Re:Logical contradiction

[Stormthirst]

Perhaps the mods should modify the script to auto suspend any account who links to MyCleanPC more than once in post?

Re:Logical contradiction

[Anonymous Coward]

N.B This advertisement has been brought to you thanks to Microsoft's shoddy operating systems.

* MyCleanPC requires Microsoft Windows.
* Most viruses require Microsoft Windows.

Re:Logical contradiction

[RobbieThe1st]

Yes.

Re:Logical contradiction

[Opportunist]

(*delivered in the best Clint Eastwood voice*)

You're really getting on my nerves, sonny. You better be careful, I've DDoSed people for less...

Re:Logical contradiction

[Opportunist]

Tricking people into buying snakeoil has made America great?

Now a lot starts to make sense...

Re:Logical contradiction

[DarwinSurvivor]

Perhaps the mods should modify the script to auto suspend any account who links to MyCleanPC?

TFTY

Re:Logical contradiction

[erroneus]

The only thing that might get their attention is retaliation. Just take their web site(s) down. And not just that domain, but all of them. I am sure there are many.

Re:Logical contradiction

[Mister Transistor]

Just a fucking pity they can't employ just as sophisticated of an anti-spambot on a tech-savvy website like, oh, say, HERE maybe?

It would be dead-easy to implement, any post with a link repeated more than twice in it cans the post, and 3 of them or more cans the poster. It's that fucking simple. It won't cure all cases but come on, this dickless asswipe has dozens of sock-puppet accounts here and spams nearly every thread here with 2-3 identical copies of his e-xcrement. I'm reasonably sure that the jag-off is doing this on other social media and tech websites too. What's the matter, not getting enough suckers to scam from the TV ads on basic cable?

I realize this forum is based on (almost) complete freedom of speech and not editing or moderating anything, but hanging's too good for this fuckstick.

Re:Logical contradiction

[ByOhTek]

As an owner of a Toshiba Thrive, and several IPad 2s, I'd have to disagree with you completely.

Can you expand the storage by 128GB with an SD card on the IPad[2]? No
Can you plug HDMI and USB into the IPad[2]? No
Does the IPad[2] have a user replaceable battery if yours dies, and you don't want the downtime of a standard replacement/fix? No
Does the IPad[2] have a 1280x800 or better screen? No
Can you get an IPad2 for $550, with 16GB of storage? No
Does the IPad[2] have more apps? Yes
-- Does it's apps contain a wider range of functionality? No
Can you get a large range of apps to give you most of the fun/functionality you need on an IPad[2], for free? No
Does the IPad[2] have flash? No

So, the advantages ot the IPad[2] are more apps (not necessarily functionally more, just more), and probably less malware (only a problem if you are ADD or a moron when downloading software), no flash, and it helps if your wallet is too heavy. Oh, and you get a device with a logo that shouts "I'm a pretentious prick!"

Yum.

Re:Logical contradiction

[ByOhTek]

So, post a MyCleanPC topic on the frontpage and slashdot their site?

Slashdot: The original, manual, Low Orbit Ion Cannon.

Re:Logical contradiction

[Anonymous Coward]

As an owner of a Toshiba Thrive, and several IPad 2s. Oh, and you get a device with a logo that shouts "I'm a pretentious prick!"

Yum.

So you are a pretentious prick by owning several iPad's. Thanks for clearing that up. Meanwhile, I'll continue to use the device because it is extremely thin and does everything I need for now. Why with the greatest of Android why do you not own many Toshiba Thrives? I could understand a iPad (nothing else out at the time) but an iPad2? Please take the hate for a device that is incredibly useful for many of us (and it never leaves the house or work..so it is not a status symbol for me) to some Android fanboy site...oh wait this is one, forgot.

Re:Logical contradiction

[Anonymous Coward]

Please provide a link to the post. I looked in his comment history and couldn't find it.

Re:Logical contradiction

[wjousts]

Damn. That sounds great. If only you'd included a link to the website for this miracle product. I don't know computers too good so I don't know how to find it.

Re:Logical contradiction

[cheekyboy]

You have to post a story saying that mycleanass is selling $49 samsung 10" tablets, 1M in stock.

email tablet@mycleanass.net

Re:Logical contradiction

[intheshelter]

Ha! That was funny. It is funny that the pretentious prick ripping on the iPad (and making innacurate statements) somehow fails to see the irony in his own post.

Re:Logical contradiction

[Mr0bvious]

Computers are like air-conditioners - they work great until you start opening windows.

Re:Logical contradiction

[toriver]

Grownup? Then why do you sound like a six-year old pottymouth?

Re:Logical contradiction

[CastrTroy]

Can you get an IPad2 for $550, with 16GB of storage?

No, unless you want to pay extra for it. The iPad2 with 16GB of storage is only $499.

Re:Logical contradiction

[sootman]

Can you name one 10" tablet currently on the market that has the same battery life (or better) than the iPad 2? Is it also as thin (or thinner), as light (or lighter), and the same price (or cheaper) than the iPad 2?

"Pretentious prick", indeed.

Re:Logical contradiction

[ByOhTek]

Typo, user of several IPad2s (which I've had to use for business reasons, and not being able to use my own device)

*sigh*

Re:Logical contradiction

[RulerOf]

This is the ASSHOLE that has all the sock-puppet accounts.

The stupid fucking bastard posted one of the spams under the "Opportunist" user accidentally. This is the account he uses when he wants to be taken seriously.

I sincerely doubt it. Someone with a UID that low, with a history of worthwhile comments, isn't fully retarded enough---barring any serious head injury---to think that posting that kind of shit here would do anything for his product.

Re:Logical contradiction

[Wannabe Code Monkey]

I don't know... I got a good chuckle out of this:

Everything was overclocking and running at maximum gigabits!

I might be in favor of just letting him ride if we continue to get gems like that.

Re:Logical contradiction

[S.O.B.]

It's not advertising to us. It's just trying to increase it's page rank.

That's why even after modding it down they still accomplish what they set out to do.

Re:Logical contradiction

[funfail]

It's not advertising to us. It's just trying to increase it's page rank.

And it probably can't because of the NOFOLLOW.

Re:Logical contradiction

[TheSpoom]

Google is ignoring the links anyway since Slashdot made all user-posted links ref="nofollow" a few years back.

Re:Logical contradiction

[binford2k]

Who's talking about a laptop? If you want a laptop.... buy a laptop.

Re:Logical contradiction

[scot4875]

Only one of the criteria you listed really matters.

You can't be bothered to pick up a tablet that's 2mm thicker and 0.1lb heavier? I think the "pretentious prick" label fits well.

--Jeremy

Re:Logical contradiction

[s73v3r]

Can you plug HDMI and USB into the IPad[2]? No

That's funny, my friend's office has a projector where he has an HDMI cable coming down so that he can plug it into his iPad 2.

Can you get an IPad2 for $550, with 16GB of storage? No

No, that's because the 16GB one is $499.

-- Does it's apps contain a wider range of functionality? No

Purely opinion.

Can you get a large range of apps to give you most of the fun/functionality you need on an IPad[2], for free? No

Again, purely opinion. And the answer is yes.

Re:Logical contradiction

[Anonymous Coward]

Let me know when you can cram your sub $499 laptop (including battery) into an 8.8 mm height.

I'll wait...

Re:Logical contradiction

[iamhassi]

He's not doing this to sell it to us, he's doing it for the SEO, since multiple links coming from /. makes it look like the website is legit since /. is a legit website. This helps improve the google rank.

Shame there's no way to completely block any /. post with a link going to mycleanpc.com

Can we get a "report spam" button and if a few hundred different IPs mark a post as spam the links in the post are permanently blocked from /.? That should do the trick, works for craigslist.

Re:Logical contradiction

[iamhassi]

isn't their spirit what made america great in the first place?

No, the chinese even beat the US with fake stuff

Re:Logical contradiction

[iamhassi]

As an owner of a Toshiba Thrive, and several IPad 2s, I'd have to disagree with you completely.

So, the advantages ot the IPad[2] are more apps (not necessarily functionally more, just more), and probably less malware (only a problem if you are ADD or a moron when downloading software), no flash, and it helps if your wallet is too heavy. Oh, and you get a device with a logo that shouts "I'm a pretentious prick!"

Yum.

Ah, which explains why you bought one Android tablet and several iPad 2s, because the Android is better than iOS, so you bought several iOS tablets.... wait, what?? Car analogy time: Ford sux! That's why I have several Fords and one Chevy, cuz Fords sux!@

Re:Logical contradiction

[Anonymous Coward]

Got some mod points did we? One of your sock-puppets has been hanging around long enough to get some, I see. FUCK YOU AGAIN, YOU SPAMMING FUCK.

best advertising post ever

[Anonymous Coward]

That is one of the best advertising posts I have seen in a forum.

Re:best advertising post ever

[ciderbrew]

Really? My friend told me MyCleanPC is malware. I am now worried MyCleanPC could be bad and make all my gigabits run slower if I use it. My computing has many gigabits plus lots of rams too. It is hard to trust MyCleanPC and other products when I see adverts in message boards.

Re:best advertising post ever

[jsm18]

It's worse than that. MyCleanPC ran over my dog. Twice.

"No ecosystem"

[EponymousCustard]

HP have inadvertently discovered how to create huge demand and massive customer base overnight: find the right price point and lots of publicity

Re:"No ecosystem"

[Anonymous Coward]

Too bad no one can afford to sell a quality tablet cheap enough. Fire sales excluded.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[Anonymous Coward]

So the right price point is over $200 below bill of materials? The 16GB TouchPad has a bill of materials estimated at $323. People are rushing to buy this due to perceived value. There are Android based tablets that retail for $75-200 right now, but no one wants to buy them. They're lower quality specs, screens, and builds. This is a rush to buy something that's supposed to be really expensive at an insanely low price.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[_KiTA_]

True. Unfortunately, they're selling these at Around a $100-$200 loss on each model sold.

Perhaps in 5 years the Touchpad could be profitable at $100-150. But not today.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[jawtheshark]

I know you are right, but the problem is as following:

• You either have to be significantly cheaper than the iPad to compete on similar capabilities. When I mean "cheaper", I don't mean $50 cheaper, I mean really much cheaper. If it's only 50€ difference, get an iPad, then you get something "known to work". This is the "perceived" value, you talk about. Capabilities includes quality hardware, so the cheaper ones you talk about are not competition.
• Offer something that that the iPad doesn't have and beat it on capabilities while matching the iPads price. That is very hard as the iPad has so much going for it: large installed base, great "walled garden" app store (Which is a "pro" for most people, I assure you) , quality hardware. You simply know what you get... It cannot something that only few people care about, as that will not give you a great install base.

The iPad has become the "Windows of Tablets". The two arguments above are exactly why Windows still rules on the desktop.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[Lumpy]

And being a guy who paid ipad prices for a real android tablet with the horsepower to run the apps smoothly, I still bought an iPad.

Why?

it's the apps man.

I can't get an app that will show me where the satellites are in the sky in a Augmented reality like I can on the iPad.
I can't get an integration app for Microsoft One Note on android.
I can't get a PDF annotation app that is as smooth and simple as the one for the iPad.
Only recently was I able to get an autocad viewer for android. but not an andriod honeycomb native, it's a phone app that scales.
And on and on.

Android falls on it's face with tablet specific apps simply because it has been around a short time compared to the iPad. Maybe in 2 years when the application base builds up I'll look at what android tablets are doing once more, but then I'll have to abandon all the software I bought for the iPad and re-buy all my software again.

the XOOM tablet is a nice piece of hardware and snappy... but it failed on the app front. I was lucky enough to have bought it early and chose to sell it early to get most of my money back on ebay.

I use a tablet for work. both my day job and my side photography business... and the iPad kicks android hard in the photography apps arena.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[EsbenMoseHansen]

Wouldn't that make you one of the tiny minority who actually uses his 'pad? ;)

Yes, I have been tempted, but I just cannot see what a 'pad can do that a notebook cannot do better. Except to hang on the wall as a picture frame that is.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[Tapewolf]

I use a tablet for work. both my day job and my side photography business... and the iPad kicks android hard in the photography apps arena.

Now I'm curious. How do you get the photos into it? AFAIK the iPad cannot read SD cards nor accept USB mass storage devices.

Aside from the cost the reason I've always written off the iPad is because I need something that will allow me to upload photos from an external digital camera and edit text files on an external media. Has the situation changed there?

Re:"No ecosystem"

[Anonymous Coward]

The "Tiny Minority" is anyone with an Android tablet. A few million Androids across all lines vs 25+ million iPads? Or were you talking about tablets in general?

Re:"No ecosystem"

[jcr]

AFAIK the iPad cannot read SD cards nor accept USB mass storage devices.

There's a dongle for that.

-jcr

Re:"No ecosystem"

[auLucifer]

I use an iPad at work and have since it was first released in .au. The best thing it does that a notebook (this is assuming pen and paper notebook) can't is get my notes on my computer. I write once in evernote/awesome note/whatever note application and it's then everywhere I will need it. Same for using dropbox and scibbling apps. I don't have to later scan or rewrite, it's all there on my desktop/phone/laptop for whenever I need access to it.

If you're talking about a laptop, I use the iPad for the same reasons above. Plus my macbook pro is heavy and my air is too big to easily carry or use in small areas like behind the sink when I work with recipes. I also can't use my finger to simply scribble diagrams or have others scribble notes from across the table. Also having the iPad gets rid of the 'wall' between me and my clients so it's useful for body language too, something I never underestimate.

As for everyone YMMV but those are the reasons I use an iPad. Next year I'll likely change to Android as I've had enough of the walled garden.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[metalmaster]

You had me right up to this point

The iPad has become the "Windows of Tablets". The two arguments above are exactly why Windows still rules on the desktop.

Windows is an operating system. It can be installed on anything with the right components. Do you remember the "Vista Capable" fiasco? Just because a box has a CPU, RAM, a hard disk and a video card doesnt mean those components have to be specced high enough to run the software smoothly. Additionally, Windows doesnt rely on a walled garden of apps. Its the exact opposite. If you wanna install the latest application from www.iwannastealyourbankinfos.net you are entirely free to do so.

The ipad took off for a few reasons:

1. - It was the first trustworthy tablet to market
2. - It had the familiar interface and functionality that people loved with their ipod touch and iphone
3. - It's got the developers behind it. As much as I hate to say "$x - theres an app for that" is pretty damned accurate. If you want something its probably out there. If not, you may be able to find a competent developer to write an app for you.

Im not a fan of Apple at all, but the above points are true for the most part. These are the reasons why i told my mom to return her touchpad and get an ipad.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[squiggleslash]

I'm not sure either are that hard, and I think people are over-thinking the whole thing.

Tablets are "selling" right now because... well, because they seem like they might be a nice idea, but in practice they don't really do a lot, and they're not that practical. Most people who get them don't really use them that often. And realistically, when they do, it's to browse the web.

Given that, virtually every tablet selling for above $250 or so (which, generally, are tablets that include capacitive touchscreen technology, decent sized screens, etc) is "better" than the iPad, in that 99% of them include Flash. You and I and the average Slashdotter can go in circles as to whether or not Flash is actually a good thing for the web, but there's a world of difference between whether a technology is a good idea, and whether having it available to a user benefits that user. A web browsing device that doesn't support Flash is, right now, a second class web browsing device.

So the question really is, given that, why are they not selling as well as the iPad?

Well, quite honestly, it's the marketing. It's an impressive device rather than a (right now) utilitarian one, and while Apple happens to have done a lot of good innovative work in the last decade and a half, they also have done an astonishing amount of marketing based upon brand image.

Remember that what restored Apple to profitability wasn't Mac OS X, or the iPod's scrollwheel UI, or Firewire. It was the rather weird decision to replace the case of their Beige G3 all-in-one with a retro-shaped translucent colored plastic, and to name the resultant product the iMac.

Like the iPad, the iMac - the first version - sold like hot cakes. It was bundled with Mac OS 8/9, which quite honestly was, at the time, an ugly, kludgy, unstable alien OS that only hard-core fans of the system had any love for. It required an Internet connection or external floppy drive (external hard disks weren't common at the time) to transfer files from it. It didn't even have an outstanding software base at the time, as most of the software world had given up on the Mac platform.

But it sold. It sold because Apple marketed the hell out of it, and concentrated on it as a device that looked nice rather than had some kind of specific functionality that you had to have.

Now, Apple's ads for the iPad do spend a lot of time concentrating on functionality, but it's notable that - step away from the RDF for a second - and virtually nothing it's advertised as doing is something it's particularly good at, at least compared to a comparatively priced laptop or a much, much, much, cheaper e-reader. Why do the ads look impressive? Because they concentrate on the look of the functionality rather than the functionality. Nothing you see is something that works better on an iPad, but virtually everything you see looks really slick and aesthetically amazing.

Beating Apple is going to be hard for the moment. The major decider will be whether tablets take off in general. Once they become things everyone's accustomed to, I think the importance of functionality will become more of an issue. Until then, if it's going to be a beauty contest, and right now it is, you can't expect the supermodel to lose against the greasy engineer.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[vegiVamp]

The main thing that the iPad is tempting me with, is the games. The portable internet and stuff is a nice bonus, but it's it's use as a portable games platform that appeals to me. The reason I haven't bought one, is that it's simply too expensive for a games platform.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[Anonymous Coward]

This is the iPad's only real weakness. The SD (or microSD since apple is so fond of "thinner and smaller") is the real reason why I wouldn't pick up the iPad on launch day, you defeat the purpose of thinner-and-lighter when you have to bring a bunch of dongles. Basically Apple's weakness in all their products is always being one step below the performance line and one step too high in price to get widespread adoption except by those with money to burn.

Now I do see where Apple is going with this, but other hardware manufacturers need to play along and stop being stupid about it. The Digital Cameras and Camcorders need to come with bluetooth as standard, even the cheapest throw-away models. I can't name any that have Bluetooth or WiFi. This also is a throw back to complexity issues, since how do you access the camera via BT or WiFi? Right now the closest you get are some WiFi devices that go in the camera's SD card slot that in turn only push photos to some predefined location. Wouldn't it be great to simply tap "connect my camera" on the iPad and then on the Camera you press a sync button or select "Send my Photos too..."

Remember Microsoft Surface? If the iPad2 or later has NFC, and cameras have NFC to establish a pairing relationship, this becomes so much simpler.

Same with the living room. Put the iPad in the AppleTV dock, and suddenly the TV is a giant iPad that can be controlled by a Wii-remote or Kinect gesturing.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[jawtheshark]

It was an analogy, and every analogy has its flaws. It was just to illustrate that the way Windows has the stranglehold on the desktop market, the iPad has a stranglehold on the tablet market. I'm not an Apple fan, but I have seen what iOS devices do to people that can't use a regular computer (They're not stupid, they just think in significantly different ways than we do) I agree with your points, those are the reasons the iPad took off... That and a significant amount of marketing plus the excellent reputation Apple has with regular people.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[crossword.bob]

[...] I just cannot see what a 'pad can do that a notebook cannot do better.

Ever tried using your notebook in "portrait" mode?

Re:"No ecosystem"

[Dog-Cow]

You really don't get it, do you? I am posting this from an iPad. I and my wife use our 'pads for browsing, email, gps navigation, reference books, games, note taking, calendar, and address book. Lack of Flash is a minor annoyance, but to claim people don't use their iPads sounds like the wishful thinking of a bigot. Why the iPad instead of a netbook? Convenience. Larger screen. A battery that lasts through a day Netflix (wife was on bed rest until last night due to pregancy). Windows on a small screen sucks and Linux is too painful for me as a desktop.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[EsbenMoseHansen]

No, why would I?

Re:"No ecosystem"

[AmiMoJo]

Not in the UK, they are still £400+ here :-(

Why do we always get ripped off?

Re:"No ecosystem"

[BigDogCH]

We have rolled out almost every type of tablet as a test to our users. They have claimed that they were needed, and loved them at first. A after a few weeks, the vast majority of the users have said that they rarely use it anymore....and now are back to their laptop. The biggest reason....."the tablet really needs a keyboard attached to it". The only users still using their tablet tend to carry a wireless keyboard with it. Others even carry a docking station around too. At that point, why not just have a netbook? The 12 and 13 inch netbooks seem to make our users far happier.

For the record, we have tried the HP slate, HP webOS products, ipad, blackberry playbook, and one other that I am forgetting. All end in the same results......."I wish it had a keyboard".

Maybe for sitting on the couch they work, but for productivity they seem to have been a flop around here. The only use they have left is for salesmen to put photos on....it is convenient for them to show photos to clients (and the pads look high tech for the impression factor).

Re:"No ecosystem"

[Anonymous Coward]

£115 for the 32Gb from Staples this morning. Going, going, gone though.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[multipartmixed]

> I just cannot see what a 'pad can do that a notebook cannot do better

I'd like to see you fit a notebook on a music stand.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[Anonymous Coward]

It also has (based on the two iterations so far) a ridiculously short shelf life for a portable console. This makes it an issue for higher end gaming (you'll always have to be buying the new pad to keep up) and if you're going to stick with the lower end gaming you might as well use your phone or buy a cheap Android which will handle the games just as well. Owning gaming is one area that could make the iPad as unassailable as Windows has been on desktops, but they need to work on making sure the AAA games are backwards compatible, not just screwing over a whole generation of hardware to sell the latest pad (which is Apple's traditional model). This all comes back to whether Apple want to be in the hardware or the software business, traditionally it's the former.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[jedidiah]

3rd party support is nice but it also helps if the core product doesn't kind of suck to begin with.

Despite of all of they hype and the media rooting for it, the iPad still has some inherent flaws.

It's nice that Apple has become the new Microsoft but not everyone wants to buy into that.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[jedidiah]

I get it. I am not posting this from an iPad. My wife that loves her iPad similarly would not post from it either.

iPad is the new TV.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[CastrTroy]

I'm not sure where companies come up with these numbers. If you can sell a full netbook for $229, there's no reason that tablets should cost over $400. The only thing they have that's more expensive is the touch screen, but they are missing a lot of parts too. Flash memory is expensive, but it's not like they are using high end solid state drives in these things. And most of them only come with 16-32 GB, which isn't all that much. They should be able to sell these things pretty cheap. If you can get Chinese knock-off tablets for under $100, there's no reason you shouldn't be able to get a nice tablet at the $200-$300 price point.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[EsbenMoseHansen]

Heh. Ok, I had not thought about that usecase, I freely admit. Though I wouldn't trust any of the music stands (except a conductor's) to protect the 'pad.

So, yeah, maybe that could work. If I were composing myself, or if music sheet publishers suddenly decided to get on to an electronic format that could compete with the paper equivalent (e.g., not Adobe's DRM epub monster). But now we are REALLY talking a tiny minority.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[cheekyboy]

Im still pissed off apple charges 5x retail price for the 16-32gig price difference.

Common apple, for that price diff, offer people a 32gig vs 96gig setup and a 256gig VIP option for real cashed up geeks/celebs.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[nhat11]

Uh yeah and kills HP from ever getting into the tablet sector again. Someone will always lose out to these deals and it is HP that loses out with the cost of resources and R&D on this. HP just had to find a better price point for this tablet, either use cheaper material or something else.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[E IS mC(Square)]

Dongle?? But that would spoil the looks of such a beautiful toy!!

Seriously though, after paying shitload of money, you still have to buy dongles and addons for basic functionalities?? Fuck that.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[UnknowingFool]

I just cannot see what a 'pad can do that a notebook cannot do better.

Think more about advantages of form factor instead of tech specs and you can probably come up with a few use cases. I've seen some business men discussing a report and passing an iPad around manipulating the charts and graphs. While you could do that with a laptop, it's a bit more cumbersome.

I know that some high end restaurants have started to use them for their wine menus. The advantages I can see is that their wine lists are up to date and a tablet is less cumbersome than a laptop and more readable than a handheld.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[intheshelter]

Wow, for someone who tries to come across as intellectually superior, you write a remarkably dumb post. No one really uses tablets? Really? And the iPad's success is just marketing? Really? Soooooo, everyone who bought an iPad doesn't really use it and only bought it because of some subliminal command in the advertising?

Jeez, quit wasting everyone's time. Say to everyone, "I hate Apple", and then just stop posting. At least you'd be honest in that post instead of making brain-dead statements.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[Anonymous Coward]

In the Divisoria district of Manila, Philippines they are already selling 10 inch tablets running Froyo for ~110 USD. Those tablets are presumably all from China. I haven't checked the quality. The day of good enough 100USD tablets are not that far away.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[Machtyn]

From HP's website:

We have received unprecedented orders as a result of the tremendous discount offered. This is clear confirmation to HP there is huge interest in building a webOS community. We apologize for any difficulty you may have had in ordering on the web or through the phone this weekend; it was as a result of selling out of our current inventory.

I'm not sure if that is confirmation of building the webOS community or people knowing that one cannot get such a capable tablet for less than $300 ... and they sold it for $99/$149! If they had sold it for $199/$249, I imagine it would still have been a fire sale and I know I still would have picked one up. (I missed it, though, because I suppose I'm not on the right mailing lists.)

It sounds like HP *might* revisit the webOS, but I wonder how they will implement it in the future. I doubt they would use the console gaming style of economy (sell hardware at a loss for higher costs on the software/dev tools). It's possible, I guess - they've not shown a lot of smarts. I think the best way to promote webOS at this point is not to overprice dev tools.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[EsbenMoseHansen]

I just cannot see what a 'pad can do that a notebook cannot do better.

Think more about advantages of form factor instead of tech specs and you can probably come up with a few use cases.

I don't even know the specs, I assume their are about the same as a notepad/small laptop.

I've seen some business men discussing a report and passing an iPad around manipulating the charts and graphs. While you could do that with a laptop, it's a bit more cumbersome.

Bit more cumbersome for the graphics, perhaps, but a bit less for the text and numbers. Throw in a mouse, and the notebook wins on both counts. That is a weak usecase.

I know that some high end restaurants have started to use them for their wine menus. The advantages I can see is that their wine lists are up to date and a tablet is less cumbersome than a laptop and more readable than a handheld.

Again, I suspect this is the show-off effect. A good printer and roughly the same software would give you paper-menus, which would be lighter, more durable, and disposable, while being up-to-date as of a few minutes ago. And lets not forget, cheaper. And again, this usecase is so special that I could draw upon my "tiny minority" argument again.

I actually have come up with a usecase: Inspectors might have a use for the form factor, using them to check off lists and stuff. When walking around, the lid can be a bit in the way, and the inspector would only need a limited amount of text input. But again, this is a really tiny minority usecase.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[Anonymous Coward]

Windows ruled the desktop even when everyone knew it sucked.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[duk242]

No. That's only for importing photos off a camera, nothing else.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[CastrTroy]

This has always been my opinion as well. The tablet is a good third device. Most people don't want to work all day long on a laptop, unless they hook it up to a full monitor/keyboard/mouse. And most people can't do everything they want to do with a tablet that they can do with a laptop. So most people who are happy with their tablets are the kind of people who own all 3. I do know a few people who are happy with just a tablet, but these people aren't heavy computer users, and are really just using it for facebook, and a few games.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[Lumpy]

"the iPad cannot read SD cards nor accept USB mass storage devices."

Yes it can. except that apple intentionally cripped reading from a USB hard drive or a thumb drive over 16gig in size.

I also have it grab low res (720P) shots from the camera as I snap the photos by using a wifiSD card that has storage as well. Nothing like taking a set of photos at a session and grabbing the ipad to show the client/model instead of the 1" screen on the camera.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm finding it hard to believe you wouldn't benefit more from a laptop than an iPad or an Android tablet (processing power, keyboard, programs etc.). Why would you use an iPad for work? Can you give examples?

Don't misunderstand, I think tablets are cool. I can't see them being useful in 99.95%+ of work environments though.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[multipartmixed]

> Though I wouldn't trust any of the music stands (except a conductor's) to protect the 'pad.

Actually, a regular stand works just fine -- assuming you have a decent one and not one of those flimsy pieces of crap. If it can hold a fake book, it can hold an iPad.

> if music sheet publishers suddenly decided to get on to an electronic format that
> could compete with the paper equivalent

'most every book I have in paper is available in torrent-land as a PDF. There is a decent tool to manage them, iGigBook, that lets me search and find songs fast enough that it's useful in a live gig.

You can also buy songs in Sibelius Scorch format, Hal Leonard has been e-publishing like this for years with a HUGE catalog, and IIUC there is now a Scorch reader for iPad. The Scorch reader is actually an improvement on PDF; it will transpose sheet music, play it, and print it. The print out is virtually indistinguishable from store-bought sheets (except for the paper quality and size, natch).

I bought my iPad for sheet music -- it replaces a 4' stack of paper right now -- but use it for lots of other things, too. Like watching TV, reading books, casual surfing (e.g. reading gardening websites, flickr, etc), surfing for chords/lyrics, checking the thesaurus, etc.

It's also useful in the garage when I have the service manual for the vehicle I'm servicing (and/or AllData) in electronic format; it's much more convenient than a laptop when you're under a car looking at a diagram or checking a torque spec.

It's definitely not a replacement for anything, it's a whole new device. Whether it suits you is largely dependent on what you want to do with it.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[UnknowingFool]

They were showing charts and graphs and manipulating them. A few things that they did were zooming, drilling, slicing, etc. They were not looking at text and tables. Could it be done with a laptop, yes. Would it be more cumbersome? Yes. I don't know what software they were using but if they hooked it up to a screen, it could have been a presentation.

As for the wine list, yes, a restaurant could print a new wine list every few minutes but how utterly impractical is that? Just like I could haul my desktop everywhere I want to do email but it's far easier to use my smartphone.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[Anonymous Coward]

Not actively importing photos? The dongle goes back in the bag. Not rocket surgery.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[marmoset]

I keep all of my O’Reilly books and my company’s own documentation on my iPad. Very handy in my line of work (I’m frequently onsite with customers and need quick access to technical documentation, and I often don’t have access to the Internet from a customer’s network.) Yes, I could use my laptop but the iPad is simple much more convenient in a lot of situations (e.g. I’m sitting at someone else’s desk and can comfortably read from it without having to clear any space on the customer’s desk)

Re:"No ecosystem"

[everydayotherday]

I actually do this with a laptop. I tilt the top of the stand back so that it is almost flat, then set the laptop in place. It seems to work well.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[garaged]

I am a hardcore linux guy, for real, not the average joe installing ubuntu to feel 1337, I actually sysadmin for living, and I brought my wife an iPad before the *Pad explosion, and I can't say I regret a bit, 1 year and a few moths later the thing keeps everybody at home entertained, mostly because of the apps, but the hardware is kind of nice too, it's mostly a toy/browser/book-reader, but it does the job.

I'm pretty sure an android tablet will be on the family's future, but for the recent past, the iPad was the right choice

Re:"No ecosystem"

[IrquiM]

That's how they make money.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[teh kurisu]

Dabs were selling them for £105 earlier today, which is the cheapest I've seen them in the UK. Even taking VAT into account, it was nowhere near as cheap as the ~£60 that Best Buy were selling them for in the US. That said, they've sold out despite the higher price, so there would have been nothing gained by going any cheaper.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[itsdapead]

Seriously though, after paying shitload of money, you still have to buy dongles and addons for basic functionalities?? Fuck that.

So which of the competing tablets comes with a full size SD card port (which you need for cameras) and a full-sized USB port as standard? The Samsung is just as bad as the iPad in terms of needing extra dongles, the Asus Transformer only has these in the optional keyboard/dock, the Xoom has microUSB (OK if you're camera also has a standard socket so you can use a standard cable, but you'd need an adaptor for a USB stick or SD card). Some have microSD slots, but those are intended for semi-permanent memory expansion & often a fiddle to remove (and didn't work when, e.g. the Xoom was first launched).

Its also sensible if you're trying to keep your tablet small: if you include dongles, the iPad has pretty good connectivity: VGA, HDMI, component, composite, SD card and limited USB (photo transfer or USB keyboard) not to mention iPod dock-compatible devices. Very few people are going to need all of those, so why bulk up the tablet with the connectors?

If the competitors were seriously pushing Apple on price then Apple might have to sweeten the deal by bundling more adapters - but they aren't , so they don't.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[Anonymous Coward]

I can't get an app that will show me where the satellites are in the sky in a Augmented reality like I can on the iPad.

There's an app called Satellite AR that does exactly that.

https://market.android.com/details?id=com.agi.android.augmentedreality&hl=en

Re:"No ecosystem"

[the_humeister]

The Nook Color is $250 (+ tax if applicable) and it's easy enough to install a different version of Android on it. No camera, but the screen is pretty nice.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[Sockatume]

As opposed to Android, where the hardware is built in but there's bugger-all software that you might want to use with your USB storage. It's kind of tragic really.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[nabsltd]

It's also useful in the garage when I have the service manual for the vehicle I'm servicing (and/or AllData) in electronic format; it's much more convenient than a laptop when you're under a car looking at a diagram or checking a torque spec.

I don't mind risking permanent damage to a $100 shop manual, but unless you have some sort of disposable cover over the iPad, I can't imagine putting a $500 piece of computing equipment into a place where it will get greasy, even if you are extremely careful. It would be different if it was a device that was intended to be used in that sort of situation.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[froggymana]

You realize that you could get a microSD card to use in any standard camera that accepts standard SD cards, right? All you need is a little adapter that could stay in the camera. When you want to transfer pictures to your android tablet (or phone) you simply take the microSD card out of the adapter and into your device at hand.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes. After spending a shitload of money on cutting-edge technology ($499, shitload?, really? I'm guessing a professional photographer doesn't consider $499 a 'shitload'), you should expect to have to buy dongles and add ons for OUTDATED functionality.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[EsbenMoseHansen]

They were showing charts and graphs and manipulating them. A few things that they did were zooming, drilling, slicing, etc. They were not looking at text and tables.

I wonder, were they avoiding text because text were not relevant, or because it was too cumbersome on the pad?

As for the wine list, yes, a restaurant could print a new wine list every few minutes but how utterly impractical is that?

Very practical. When a table is taken, you press a button, get a fresh sheet of wine menu, and puts it on the table when you greet/seat people together with the welcome snacks. Much better than having to log around a 'pad, and you can leave the paper with the customer without fear of someone stealing the menu, if they want to peruse the list a bit. I know what I would pick :)

Just like I could haul my desktop everywhere I want to do email but it's far easier to use my smartphone.

Ah, but the smartphone is significantly smaller. it fits in a pocket, unlike a 'pad or notebook, which fits in a small bag. I can see the point of smartphones, though I don't currently own one. 'pads, on the other hand, just seems like a notepad with a touchscreen instead of a keyboard.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[stewbacca]

Most people who get them don't really use them that often. And realistically, when they do, it's to browse the web.

You are talking about laptops, right?

Re:"No ecosystem"

[stewbacca]

Excellent point. I'd argue I use my wife's iPad for MORE things than my MacBook Pro. If you count the number of "things" I do with each device, the iPad is far more diverse, but the MacBook Pro is more powerful (obviously). Even though the MacBook Pro is far more expandable and flexible, I don't use it in nearly as many situations as I do the iPad. People who don't get this are the people who, well, don't get the iPad's success.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[tlhIngan]

Android falls on it's face with tablet specific apps simply because it has been around a short time compared to the iPad. Maybe in 2 years when the application base builds up I'll look at what android tablets are doing once more, but then I'll have to abandon all the software I bought for the iPad and re-buy all my software again.

That's not an excuse. I think the iPad *shipped* with more ipad-specific (and iphone/ipad "universal") apps than Honeycomb has now. And that was basically 5 months - from January 2010 (iPad announced) to April/May (iPad released). And for the majority of these 1000 apps or so, the developers had NO access to iPad beta hardware to test their apps. They only saw their apps running on iPad for the first time on release day.

Now, Android had an advantage that due to diversity, apps have to be scalable (no "2x" mode), but apps that took advantage of the extra space are still few and far between.

And that's what I don't get. All Jobs did in January 2010 was release the damn SDK. Surely Google knows this - and yet Honeycomb gets put out with such pitiful offerings. Given how enthusiastic the Android community is (especially at trying to out-do Apple), you'd think they'd take any opportunity to try to outshine Apple and do specific apps, rather than relying on "oh it'll be OK and run like a really large phone app".

Large developers I can undrestand - they get most of their money (usually) from iOS app sales. But given the majority of Android apps are free, is the "it's not Apple" and "open app store" values such a minority to not bother taking up the bit of extra work required to make it truly tablet-sized?

Re:"No ecosystem"

[Amouth]

Thanks for mentioning OneNote - i didn't realize MS had put that out for iOS.. very useful on my phone.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[Anonymous Coward]

Sweet! Can you play music/videos off of that SD dongle as well? What about viewing documents and saving important data to it? If so then I've been bias against iPad/iPhone for no good reason.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[tycoex]

They actually have laptop stands specifically built for this purpose.

They have a triangular base, a bit stronger pole than a regular music stand, and the top is a square piece of metal with a foam pad that grips the laptop.

There, I just saved you a couple hundred dollars (at least).

Re:"No ecosystem"

[Oakey]

The difference in manufacturing costs between the 16Gb and 64Gb ipad is something ridiculous like $30. Yet the price difference at retail is about $200. It's suggested on various sites that Apple make over $500 profit on their 64Gb models. Same with 3G, the additional hardware costs $17 but the retail price between 3g and non-3g is absurd.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[binford2k]

I wonder, were they avoiding text because text were not relevant, or because it was too cumbersome on the pad?

Try it before assuming that text is cumbersome. It's not.

Very practical. When a table is taken, you press a button, get a fresh sheet of wine menu, and puts it on the table when you greet/seat people together with the welcome snacks. Much better than having to log around a 'pad, and you can leave the paper with the customer without fear of someone stealing the menu, if they want to peruse the list a bit. I know what I would pick :)

Wow, what a waste of paper & ink. Besides, that would really alienate a vocal minority. I do see the theft argument though, I've had those thoughts myself. I wonder how they manage that. I'd assume that there's some anti-theft device, like the alarms at supermarkets.

'pads, on the other hand, just seems like a notepad with a touchscreen instead of a keyboard.

Precisely. And that makes them pretty awesome. My students love them.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[Oakey]

You're a day behind; Dixons, Comet, Currys, PC World, Dabs and Amazon all had them cheap.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[binford2k]

So you need an adapter either way. Why again is this a fault of the iPad?

Re:"No ecosystem"

[binford2k]

The fact that you call a keyboard a benefit means that you're missing the point of a tablet.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[jo_ham]

So, you *still* need to buy an adapter, but because it's an adapter for the camera, not the Android tablet that has the microSD port it doesn't count as a negative against the tablet...

The ranty McRanterson post up there was frothing about the iPad needing adapters to give it "basic functionality", and it has been pointed out that many Android tablets are in exactly the same boat. It's one or the other - either the argument is a bogus criticism, or it's an argument that applies to a large number of non-Apple tablets too.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[Anonymous Coward]

"basic functionalities"? How many people need to do this? I have card readers for sim cards, and unless I'm loading from my professional-grade camera onto my main editing station, I'm not constantly offloading the pictures onto another device.

So, for the percentage of people that need that functionality, they offer a dongle.

Also, a dongle is far smarter than something built-in. SDCards are the current standards. What happens in the future when something different comes out? Rely on adapters and an old bus?

A dongle and software updates allow you to make the bus extensible to new standards as they come out, increasing the longevity of the product. I'll pay for the adapter rather than have a device that can't keep up with newer standards longer.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[s73v3r]

Despite of all of they hype and the media rooting for it, the iPad still has some inherent flaws.

And all of the Android tablets don't?

Despite all of the haters hating on it, the iPad is one of the better choices for a tablet out there.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[chriso11]

Does it have to be an official iBag?

Re:"No ecosystem"

[s73v3r]

Bit more cumbersome for the graphics, perhaps, but a bit less for the text and numbers. Throw in a mouse, and the notebook wins on both counts. That is a weak usecase.

No, it doesn't. It's still far easier to pass around a tablet, and it's far easier to manipulate the graphics with your fingers. Typing is about a wash.

Again, I suspect this is the show-off effect. A good printer and roughly the same software would give you paper-menus, which would be lighter, more durable, and disposable, while being up-to-date as of a few minutes ago. And lets not forget, cheaper. And again, this usecase is so special that I could draw upon my "tiny minority" argument again.

And far less interactive. I can get much, much, much more information about the wine on the iPad than you could fit onto paper. Plus, the iPad is going to be updated in real time.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[s73v3r]

Very practical. When a table is taken, you press a button, get a fresh sheet of wine menu, and puts it on the table when you greet/seat people together with the welcome snacks. Much better than having to log around a 'pad, and you can leave the paper with the customer without fear of someone stealing the menu, if they want to peruse the list a bit. I know what I would pick :)

That's an awful idea, just from the amount of paper it would use alone.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[vlueboy]

They should be able to sell these things pretty cheap. If you can get Chinese knock-off tablets for under $100, there's no reason you shouldn't be able to get a nice tablet at the $200-$300 price point.

Sadly, yes, there is an important reason going against all 1990's logic: profit margins.

Companies no longer see the same first-time buyer volumes that propelled the PC markets in the late nineties because now nearly all developed country households have one multimedia, internet-ready PC at home. When volumes (demand) goes down, supply needs to increase to make the same cash. But this has the effect of creating more of a product that is already not selling very well, and then, lowering prices to attract sales.

Nobody is thanking the price drops of the $1200 PC's of the nineties to today's $400 levels, yet that's availability and cheaper tech. Profit margins have trimmed so low that nobody is giving those internet bundle discounts so common 10 years ago, where someone sold you a PC for a small fraction of the full price so that they could sign you up for a ... "dial-up data plan" multi-year contract of that era. All of that was possible because the economy was BOOMING. You can offer a lot and still make a lot of cash by sheer volumes of adoption alone. That explains why pad, android and other expensive tech is so profitable... since the tech is new enough that compared to netbooks and laptops, it is still very competitive in terms of first-adopter profits.

With the new normals in this economic world, the problem is that new "personal" computers appear every 4 years or so that everyone blindly starts accepting. That means ever-high prices for the newest gadget. Remember the mp3 players, then *video* iPods... then the iPhones (and android revolution in general,) the netbooks, the tablets... what will come in the next 3 years? If you follow this logic trend, you'll see the world has already had a full decade of "consumption" devices, and their launch prices have never been under $100USD. That's not a coincidence, and having moved from stored music, to video, to non-stored broadband internet means even more profit if you can sell a binding contract for monthly broadband access as a prerequisite to using your device. Eventually the devices will be cheap and maybe we'll reach a plateau, but perhaps the internet costs will keep rising as "4G" and fiber come of age and people demand to replace their disposables with future versions that integrate newer speeds.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[s73v3r]

And now we're back to needing an adapter again. Except this one's a lot smaller, and easier to lose.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[makomk]

The price of a MicroSD card + adapter is about the same as the price of a full-size SD card from what I recall... cheaper in some cases even.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[vlueboy]

True. Unfortunately, they're selling these at Around a $100-$200 loss on each model sold.

This is a "feature," not a "bug." Sales or no sales, they still have the same bills to pay. The artificial demand caused by this past weeked's blowout sale would have been absent without a sale:

Because selling those X million units at a $100-$200 loss generates more gross cash than selling zero of those same units at a $200+ gain :-)

Re:"No ecosystem"

[makomk]

And it was basically impossible to buy them - they had fuck-all of them in stock, the websites kept going down and cancelling people's orders, etc...

Re:"No ecosystem"

[BigDogCH]

I agree entirely. Laptops have even been reduced here though. In our office, 2/3 of the laptop users have undocked their laptop maybe once per year. They discovered they did not really need a laptop, and now they are discovering they really do not need a tablet. We have even had a few users request a tower, and one even requested switching to a thin client! They might be learning.......i will surely get a reality check with some support calls this afternoon however.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[rsborg]

I get it. I am not posting this from an iPad. My wife that loves her iPad similarly would not post from it either.

iPad is the new TV.

No, the iPad is the Microwave Oven of computing... designed for simpler uses, yes, but built to co-exist along the item it is functionally similar to.

The TV completely eclipsed it's spiritual predecessor, the radio. The iPad will not eclipse the PC (otherwise Apple would have made it far more functional - it's designed not to compete, and instead complement, for example, their Mac line).

Re:"No ecosystem"

[Anonymous Coward]

You really don't get it, do you? I am posting this from a desktop PC. I use my PC for browsing, email, navigation, reference books, games, note taking, calendar, and address book.

You see just because you and your wife do something doesn't mean the entire world does. I think the parent is just questioning whether tablets are going to become a basic necessity of modern life for most people, or if a lot of people will just browse the web on one and tire of it after some time. If you are so confident in the future of tablets that you have to berate a man for questioning it, go smell your own farts you smug bastard.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[Anonymous Coward]

Kindly explain what the new standard is for transfering images from cameras? Can't be Bluetooth -- not only is it too slow when it works well, and subject to deterioration from interference, but last I knew Apple hadn't implemented Bluetooth file transfers yet; AFAIK you still have to break into your own machine to do that.

It's not memory cards, since you just explained the dongles are for OUTDATED technology; likewise it's not USB.

So what, do all non-OUTDATED cameras in your world have a dock connector on them so you can stick your iPad directly on the top?

Re:"No ecosystem"

[Ryan McLaughlin]

Sounds like your users want the Asus Transformer with Keyboard dock. I have them and they are great.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[dgatwood]

The Digital Cameras and Camcorders need to come with bluetooth as standard, even the cheapest throw-away models.

For what? Viewing 320x240 thumbnails of the actual video data? You do know that the maximum data throughput of even EDR Bluetooth is only 2.1 megabits per second, right? And that typical AVCHD camcorders run at about 12 megabits per second? And that DV or HDV video is 25 megabits per second (or 50 megabits per second in some variants)?

Even Wi-Fi would work only if the two devices are close together and if no other devices are clogging the spectrum. Wireless data transfer has come a long way, but it is still nowhere near the point where it makes sense to use it as a primary means of connecting video gear. We need speeds that are at least an order of magnitude faster.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[multipartmixed]

> There, I just saved you a couple hundred dollars (at least).

Can you "flip" the page to turn it?

I find touchscreen/gesture navigation to be especially effective when the time to reach from the piano and complete the navigation needs to be in the sub 100ms range.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[multipartmixed]

> unless you have some sort of disposable cover over the iPad,

I keep it in a leatherette case and use a stick-on screen protector. I would *love* to have tear-away plastic or something, but haven't been using it heavily enough to need this yet.

(that's also why I was really hoping to get one of those $99 HP tablets, heh!)

For now, I navigate with my pinky after wiping off the nitrile glove on my coveralls. But you're right, if the garage was a common use place something *would* eventually happen to it. My paper shop manuals are well thumbed and full of greasy fingerprints, which illustrates your point nicely.

No big deal, though, the use-case is there, eventually tablets will get cheap enough that we won't care.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[tycoex]

From what I've seen you can actually get a foot pedal to change pages back and forth so you don't have to reach up at all... Although I don't think hitting the right arrow key takes any longer than swiping the screen personally.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[Anonymous Coward]

You forgot to note - you can't get Flash, and therefore YouTube and thousand of other web based applications - You go appleboy. The company that once declared in its famous ad that it would break Big Brother, has now become Big Brother with a legion of mindless drooling fanboys. (I would have said androids, but somehow I think the irony would be lost on a fanboy.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[Anonymous Coward]

>> And all of the Android tablets don't?

They do, and that's why it's not hyped as the next best thing to Steve Jobs' liver, unlike your favorite itoy!

Re:"No ecosystem"

[zmollusc]

How do you fix an ipad to the car dashboard? I use my droid phone for email, gps navigation, reference books, novels, audio books, radio shows, remote login to home pc and when i am using it for navigation I blu-tack it to the dash.
I would like a bigger screen for browsing but I wouldn't want to carry one in my pocket as it would just get crushed or scratched to hell.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[atamido]

In my office, we're heavy users of laptops because people take them to meetings, and because people want to be able to get real work done from home, and you can only VPN in with a corporate device. We're currently looking into Citrix to let our users access whatever devices they want from home. I suspect at that point most people will switch to desktops with a few tablets floating around to access stuff in meetings. A few power users need to be able to type substantial amounts in remote locations, but I suspect those will be few and far between.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[froggymana]

So you need an adapter either way. Why again is this a fault of the iPad?

But the difference is that the adapter can stay in the camera.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[froggymana]

And now we're back to needing an adapter again. Except this one's a lot smaller, and easier to lose.

And could stay in the camera, where if you lose the adapter is the least of your worries.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[froggymana]

So, you *still* need to buy an adapter, but because it's an adapter for the camera, not the Android tablet that has the microSD port it doesn't count as a negative against the tablet...

Well every microSD card that I have ever bought has came with this adapter, so I wouldn't need to buy it separately. Also, it doesn't add any additional bulk to the camera because it would fit inside of the camera just like a normal SD card.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes there is a dongle that you pay an extra $30 for. That dongle will not work on the iPod Touch. You will need to pay another $30 for that one. On top of that, it's not a universal host. So it will only work with some Apple approved device types. I bought the iPad primarily for transferring photos from my camera while on the road. It worked beautifully. Then I transferred the next set. Tried to create albums. Brick wall. The only way to do that is to sync up with a PC, re-organize the photos and sync back with the iPad. So much for a post PC device. Completely defeated the purpose of getting the iPad in the first place. I was lucky enough to sell it and get most of my money back. They certainly hold their value well. I bought the ASUS Transformer. Miles and miles better than an iPad for me. File system access, universal host, keyboard...excellent tablet.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[s73v3r]

Just about every SD/MicroSD adaptor I've seen requires the whole thing to be taken out of the camera in order to get the MicroSD card out.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[LateArthurDent]

The best thing it does that a notebook (this is assuming pen and paper notebook) can't is get my notes on my computer. I write once in evernote/awesome note/whatever note application and it's then everywhere I will need it. Same for using dropbox and scibbling apps.

I really wanted to use it for that purpose, but found it pretty much impossible to. I got a nice stylus, but the delay between sensing what I'm writing and actually writing something means that often there will be errors because it didn't pick up part of what I was writing, or I moved outside the dead palm area and it picked up the palm of my hand, or whatever. The stylus for that type of capacitive screens as opposed to the resistive types also needs to be pretty thick at the point of contact, so it turns out that you don't have nearly as much real estate as you would in a paper pad of the same size.

Since you're using your iPad for this purpose regularly, do you have any recommendations?

Re:"No ecosystem"

[auLucifer]

That is the only gripe I've had with it at work. Most scribbling I do is easy with a finger but sometimes more finite control, or just not having my hand in the way, would be nice. The newer, longer capacitive stylus' are suppose to be good to so I plan to place an order soon.

A larger screen would also be fantastic, another reason I'd like to move to android. The 10.1 are still very portable.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[Lumpy]

never touched an ipad have you.

I watch youtube videos all the time. on it.

Try again troll-boy.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[Lumpy]

You mean like how the next update will support XDHC cards... Yes.

Yet the Android tablet from last year that has a SD slot... you throw the whole tablet away and buy a new one to support XDHC cards.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[Anonymous Coward]

Your a sucker for having all those Apple products.. what are the pros of having it..oh wow you can sync it to itunes that constantly rip people off. Oh, is it the fact that you CANT do flash..or maybe the fact that it is not customizable at all,, and dont give me that jargon that you dont want to customize it because the fact that you can customize homepages to your liking full of interactive widgets to your liking is pretty badass and anyone would want it(android). Here is the break down- your Ipad cant perform flash, is not customizable at all, expensive and accessory's are expensive as shit, itunes is a rip off. Vs androids Iconia, or acer transform- Does flash-customizable-full usb port-faster processor-android market is almost as big with cheaper if not all the apps you need are free including apps to download unlimited amounts of music for free(unlike apple) and processing speed is lighting fast not to mention at 399.99 for a 16gb with expandable 32g memory for music videos vs apple 499.99 for just a 16g.. Apple= rip off Android= win

Re:"No ecosystem"

[Anonymous Coward]

Lack of Flash is a minor annoyance, but to claim people don't use their iPads sounds like the wishful thinking of a bigot.

Actually, defending your iPad usage by characterizing dude as a 'bigot' for claiming you don't use your iPad is pretty bigoted of you.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[bjb]

I was hoping that this is going to do one of two things:

1. 1. Dump (from an economics perspective) WebOS devices on the market with the side effect of generating interest and developers on WebOS. Then, introduce new WebOS devices for the sudden influx of applications that appear.
2. 2. Completely bail-out.

Unfortunately, I think if people convert these things to Android, #2 is more or less inevitable. I do think that WebOS is a real fine piece of work, but Palm screwed up early on with their developer relations (a good example here). I do hope something along the lines of #1 does happen, though...

Re:"No ecosystem"

[LateArthurDent]

That is the only gripe I've had with it at work. Most scribbling I do is easy with a finger but sometimes more finite control, or just not having my hand in the way, would be nice. The newer, longer capacitive stylus' are suppose to be good to so I plan to place an order soon.

If using your finger works at all for what you do, any stylus is pretty much going to be fantastic, so I highly recommend you buy one.

In my case, I often need to solve equations at work and would like to get rid of the huge amount of scratch paper at my desk, while maintaining the ability to save the useful portions. As it is, not only is writing on the iPad far too slow because of the errors, but the real estate issue is a big deal. I usually can't fit an equation in a line in the evernote app that would fit in half that space if I'm writing with pen and paper. So I end up using an entire "page" without getting far enough, which means I'd have to do too much back-and-forth between pages, and that's just both incredibly slow and super-annoying.

Re:"No ecosystem"

[PipsqueakOnAP133]

Apple dongle doesn't support writing from an app as far as I know.
On the other hand, you could toss videos onto it and import them into the camera roll to play if I wanted, I guess.

There some other manufacturer that had a dongle that does more:
http://www.gizmag.com/zoomit-sd-card-reader/14115/

android

[Anonymous Coward]

Android has still a long way to go. The graphics system is still like that of win xp and therefor very inefficient and that wow factor that the Ipad has is still not possible in andriod but it was in webos. Best thing hp can do is opensource webos and lets all forget about andriod and start over from there.

Best Android Tablet ever?

[biglig2]

Ah, so that's why Android tablets haven't been able to out-sell the Ipad, or for that matter the TurboGrafx 16 - no-one thought to try and port a non-tablet-optimised version of Android to a tablet that was designed for another OS, whose vendor has zero interest in helping. That's the secret sauce!

In fact, I hear Apple's plans for the iPad 3 are to try and get the Newton OS running on an etch-a-sketch.

Re:Best Android Tablet ever?

[neokushan]

No, it's obviously much simpler than that: Price.
When it comes to android tablets, there's a lot of high-end offerings that can compete with the iPad in terms on performance, the problem is that they cost as much as (if not more) than the iPad.
Then there's the other end of the spectrum - the "cheap" android tablets. They're cheap in every regard: resistive screens, slow processors and minimal memory, they're mere toys. The fact that the touchpad is flying off the shelves shows that people are waiting for decent tablets to come down in price and don't care if it's not an iPad.

Android's tablet offerings could learn from this (And yes, I know it would be impossible to produce this tablet at this price and make a profit).

Re:Best Android Tablet ever?

[AVee]

I've been thinking the same, however Apple does have a advantages over android vendors and others. The obvious one is their huge brand recognition and a few verdor lock-in tricks their dock connector. But mostly they have a pricing advantage, they can put lots of pressure on their suppliers, they have the advantage of scale while the android market is split between several players. But more importantly, they can afford to take a lower margin on the iPad sales because all those iPad's out there will generate revenue through iTunes and the app store. The android vendors will have to make a high enough margin on the sale of the hardware, because after that it won't be generating any revenue anymore. So I guess it might actually not be so easy to compete with the iPad on price without drastically compromising the hardware.
But who knows, if somebody does pull it off I'd be first in line.

Re:Best Android Tablet ever?

[neokushan]

I agree apple does have those advantages, but the same can be said for the iPhone, yet Apple would rather make huge profits than sell the most devices. I don't think their tablets will be much different, but who knows what the future holds.

Re:Best Android Tablet ever?

[bhtooefr]

There are a couple ways to sell a tablet for $99, at this level of hardware quality, and make a profit overall.

However, they all involve DRM, and treating the tablet as if it's rented, not owned - monthly service charges on the OS, mandatory minimum monthly app purchases, etc., etc.

Alternately, strap a 3G or 4G radio to every tablet, and subsidize the crap out of them with cell plans.

Another way to do it, I guess, would simply be credit - sell them at $99 down, $19.99 a month for 24 months.

Re:Best Android Tablet ever?

[gl4ss]

there's not that many high end android tablet offerings.
there's many ANNOUNCED high end android tablet offerings, but look what's for sale and it's not that many, it's almost just xoom and tab. anyhow.. a devices value shouldn't be determined on future sw updates - because that's always a lie, a stinky britchy lie. it's still useful for what you can do with it today, buying it on promises of future updates is like buying a xoom and expecting that it would run android 5.0. many of those high end android tablets are even announced by players who don't have early access to android, it seems like there's just two major manufacturers who do, motorola and samsung - which both bring biggest bucks to google and are the most visible on googles home turf usa.

and impossible to produce at that price and make a profit? well, blame their display and cpu suppliers - those could be produced with lower profit, the profit margin on them is pulled out of some guys hat, that's how hi-tech pricing works, it's not "well this takes this much ore so it's price is xxx" like with commodities. I'm betting they bought a batch of qualcomms stuff for a bad price originally. it's no good buying chips on steep "best of the best" premium and then letting them sit on shelves.

the hard part about the android port is probably going to be drivers, though I don't see why they don't just port alien dalvik over, no need for "full" vanilla android port, it runs on meego already so probably would be possible to port over to webos too.

Re:Best Android Tablet ever?

[jplopez]

> (And yes, I know it would be impossible to produce this tablet at this price and make a profit).

Then they could make the profit from somewhere else, e.g. subsidizing them like mobile phones are, with their data plans and all...

Re:Best Android Tablet ever?

[neokushan]

I don't think the drivers are going to be that difficult. The CPU/GPU/etc are from the snapdragon platform, there's plenty of source code for kernels out for that already. I'm not sure it has any components that can't be found in other tablets/phones either, it'll just be a case of gluing it all together. The main issue will probably making Gingerbread workable without the hardware buttons, but then once ICS comes out, it'll be a non-issue.

Alien Davlik has been mentioned as well, but as far as I can tell, the developers feel it'd be better to port to Android and ensure the device has a future upgrade path since nobody knows what HP is doing with WebOS.

Re:Best Android Tablet ever?

[O_Sleep]

That's just it. I have a feeling that these companies feel the market justifies a high price and so there is probably a ton of premium baked into these things. With the craze going around the hp touchpad, I wouldn't be surprised if one of the lesser manufacturers takes a hint and drops their price for high end tablet hardware to ride the same wave.

Re:Best Android Tablet ever?

[mwvdlee]

There's slowly starting to emerge a "middle-end" for Android tablets.
Basically tablet with similar specs to the high-end machines with the same components, but of lower physical build quality, usually less battery capacity and unknown brand names. Prices halfway between an iPad and the lowest-end tablets, at around $200-300.

Re:Best Android Tablet ever?

[Wingsy]

"But more importantly, they can afford to take a lower margin on the iPad sales because all those iPad's out there will generate revenue through iTunes and the app store."

Maybe they can afford to, but they don't. Their profits on iPads dwarf the profits on other tablets.

Re:Best Android Tablet ever?

[Anonymous Coward]

Already "out there": Barnes and Noble's Nook Color - well understood by hackers who have made it a highly functional Android tablet.

Re:Best Android Tablet ever?

[Anonymous Coward]

I wish there were more tablets with resistive screens. Capacitive sucks ass for writing or drawing on.

Re:Best Android Tablet ever?

[Anonymous Coward]

Add to your "short list", Asus Transformer (and Slider soon), Acer Iconia, HTC Flyer, Toshiba Thrive, and Viewsonic G. I have been checking them out at the local Best Buy/Office Depot/OfficeMax/Staples. So there are some choices available now (for those interested in the 10-inch netbook size market - for less money, I would rather have the greater freedom - Linux distro of choice - and function of a netbook if I am going to tote around that big a honker...).

Re:Best Android Tablet ever?

[erroneus]

I still think people who are curious about them have been holding off because the price/usefulness ratio is still not there yet.

Android in a phone is good. I can do lots of cool things with it. As WiDi gets more common, I would be happy to connect my phone to a display with a keyboard, mouse and even use my phone's touch screen as an additional input device. Tablets offer more display size, but that's about it. I am okay with a tiny touch keyboard on my phone, but when the touch keyboard becomes huge and still takes up most of the screen, I am at a loss to wonder what they are thinking.

I like Angry Birds on a tablet. I like running a picture slideshow on my tablet. That's just about it. Everything else goes on my phone.

I was curious about ebook readers. I'm not curious any more. I was curious about tablets. Not curious any more. I think the public needs to catch up a bit.

Putting Android on the HP Touchpad was the first thing I thought of hearing the news. But you know, if/when people are successful at doing that, it will soon be forgotten. Newer/better hardware is coming and soon people will lose interest in them. About $100 is the correct price-point for things like this.

Re:Best Android Tablet ever?

[DrXym]

Exactly. It's price. The premium manufacturers are competing on price with the iPad, when they should be competing with each other. It's stupid. Anyone prepared to pay silly money for a tablet has probably already bought an iPad. Manufacturers are being too greedy and it's hurting sales. There is no reason IMO that a decent 10" capacitive tablet with 16GB, dual core, wifi should cost more than €300. Stuff like GPS, compass, rear camera, 3G etc. is nice to have, not essential.

Archos are releasing a 101 G9 model in September and it's looking extremely promising from the specs. It's even expandable to 3G via an inexpensive expansion that doubles up as a PC usb modem. If it sells well it might act as the cluebat to beat some sense into the other manufacturers.

Re:Best Android Tablet ever?

[ch0rlt0n]

Something like the zMooth app which allows gestures to emulate the android hardware buttons could be a starting point for the lack of physical buttons on the HP.

Re:Best Android Tablet ever?

[rsmith-mac]

Indeed. Apple maintains to this day that the iTunes/App Store is largely revenue neutral - after paying developers and operational costs, they make little if anything on it. All that profit Apple is making is on the hardware; between the iPhone and the iPad they purchase parts in such a massive volume that they can get parts for cheaper than anyone else. There's no subsidy going on, Apple legitimately makes a killing off of the iPad in hardware sales alone and that's why it's so far been impossible to beat Apple.

Re:Best Android Tablet ever?

[phorm]

There are also cheaper android tablets that have capacitive touch screens along with decent processors and memory. The main issue is that you have to find a decent Chinese seller online and buy direct. Prices are around $200, give or take a bit.

Similar tablets exist in local B&M, but at about 2-3x the price.

Re:Best Android Tablet ever?

[Yamioni]

Android's tablet offerings could learn from this (And yes, I know it would be impossible to produce this tablet at this price and make a profit).

You clearly know nothing about business or economics. You make it up in volume. Duh.

Re:Best Android Tablet ever?

[neokushan]

The Bill of Materials for the Touchpad is $296 (Source: http://www.isuppli.com/Teardowns/News/Pages/HP-TouchPad-Carries-$318-Bill-of-Materials.aspx) and that doesn't include manufacturing costs. How on earth are you going to knock more than 2/3 of that price off? Volume will only get you so far.

Re:Best Android Tablet ever?

[teh kurisu]

Apple bungled the iPhone by going AT&T-only in the states. This meant that other device makers could sell to users on other networks, which provided a market for Android apps, which in turn made Android handsets a more attractive proposition for customers in other countries where iPhones were available on other carriers.

Simply saying that it happened with phones so it will happen with tablets, isn't good enough. Tablets don't need the mobile networks in the same way as phones, so Android tablet manufacturers can't rely on the route to market that was available to them when they were starting out with phones.

Re:Best Android Tablet ever?

[Yamioni]

I keep forgetting most people on the internet are jackasses, morons, or both. I was being silly. Sorry for not being more obvious, I thought it might ruin the joke. Of course you can't take a loss on every unit sold and still profit unless you're buying publicity to try to generate that profit elsewhere. But if you keep the scope narrowed to the singular product the old joke applies just fine: "Make it up in volume"

Re:Best Android Tablet ever?

[jo_ham]

Apple had little choice - they went to the carriers and AT&T were the only ones who said yes, but in exchange wanted an exclusive deal. No one other than Apple really believed that Apple's "iPhone, whatever that is" would take off - remember, the previous attempt was that Motorola disaster (the ROKR was it?) that was launched at Macworld and had iTunes integration and so on.

Once it was a success, AT&T were well placed with their very long exclusivity deal in the US. You can be damn sure Apple wanted to give it to other carriers (namely Verizon) as soon as they were contractually able to - they are a hardware company that makes the bulk of their money on hardware sales!

Re:Best Android Tablet ever?

[jo_ham]

App Store profits for Apple: ||

iPad profit on hardware sale: ||

Apple do not take a lower profit on the iPad because the App Store/iTunes is making hay for them - they have stated repeatedly (and in official earning statements) that the store is break even/small profit for them. The vast, vast bulk of their profit is in hardware sales of iPhones and iPads.

The App Store and iTunes Store are the things that they run at very low profit (for Apple - the two stores are very profitable for content owners like the music industry and software developers) in order to drive hardware sales.

Terrible article. Terrible summary.

[HumanEmulator]

The "summary" makes it sound like a port is available now, and then throws in an iPad comparison that's nowhere in the original article. From TFA:

"Figure this will take a good long while. Keep your expectations very low and for now enjoy WebOS..."

and my favorite...

"Further complicating the initiative, some of the developers don't yet have TouchPads."

So this is 3 guys planning a porting effort of an older version of Android. (Google hasn't released the source code to Honeycomb yet.) Also from TFA:

"Still, people who bought it took a risk, since it's not clear if HP will continue to develop the operating system."

Really, that's not clear? You think HP might be planning major OS updates for a tablet they just fire-saled?

Re:Terrible article. Terrible summary.

[Anonymous Coward]

Really, that's not clear? You think HP might be planning major OS updates for a tablet they just fire-saled?

HP has dumped its hardware business. But HP has indicated that they are planning on supporting WebOS for the moment. If they want to be a service company, I would argue that they should keep their software products. With HP's track records, I wouldn't be surprised if they drop WebOS in the future. But for now, it appears they are keeping it.

Re:Terrible article. Terrible summary.

[Kadagan AU]

I was thinking the same thing. How does this become front page "news", three guys are planning to port an old OS to a piece of hardware which has been discontinued. Who cares? I see that it's cheap, but so is almost anything else that has been discontinued.

Re:Terrible article. Terrible summary.

[Anonymous Coward]

Supporting WebOS and making a new version of WebOS -for the TouchPad- are not the same thing. I'd say the latter is very unlikely.

Re:Terrible article. Terrible summary.

[netsharc]

Indeed...

Hey PCWorld, I'm planning on porting Android to the iPad, no I don't have an iPad yet, I have no time and I have no idea how to do it, but I have a wiki. Why don't you write an article about me?

Well, it was fucking PCWorld. Should've expected that shit from them.

Re:Terrible article. Terrible summary.

[Anonymous Coward]

Really, that's not clear? You think HP might be planning major OS updates for a tablet they just fire-saled?

HP has said that they're ending production on WebOS devices, but they may continue development of WebOS itself and try to license it to others. I don't know who'd license it, so it doesn't sound likely to me, but who knows.

Re:Terrible article. Terrible summary.

[Timmmm]

Well actually there apparently is a port already:

http://www.reddit.com/r/Android/comments/jqyp3/one_of_the_guys_at_work_went_to_best_buy_saturday/

Re:Terrible article. Terrible summary.

[Anonymous Coward]

1) Android already was ported to the iPad
2) xda's project to port droid to HP is a pretty big deal, weather you think so or not. I don't care if it's PCWorld or Florian Mueller, this is news for nerds (at least ones that own a touchpad) and definately stuff that matters.
3) They actually already have a kernel from droid done and installed on some touchpads, they are working on userland, which would be apparent if you had read said wiki.

Now kindly please get down from that high horse before you fall.

Re:Terrible article. Terrible summary.

[Anonymous Coward]

Probably the new embedded OS - maybe for ATM's or in-store kiosks.

best Android pad ever?

[Anonymous Coward]

of course, since it has a lot in common with the iPad. Size, position of ports and buttons and I can even use the original ipad sleeve with it. What I like on the Touchpad is the swooshing of apps to the top to close them. I do not think it is a good idea to run android on it. WebOS is just fine.

Re:best Android pad ever?

[mwvdlee]

You plan on swooshing apps all day long, or do you want to actually use apps?
If the former is the case then sure, go ahead and keep enjoying WebOS as it currently is and will always be.

Worst "article" ever

[Anonymous Coward]

What an absolutely ridiculous article. Terrible writing. It reaks of nothing but fervent hate for everything Apple, instead of focusing on software, availability etc. Waste of bytes, waste of traffic.

Re:Worst "article" ever

[node 3]

Welcome to Slashdot.

Re:Worst "article" ever

[ciderbrew]

Yet, when I did a search for "apple" it doesn't come up once in the article. I even read it and it's not about apple in anyway. Are you mental?

Re:Worst "article" ever

[Chrisq]

. It reaks of nothing but fervent hate for everything Apple,

Well at least its got something going for it then.

Re:Worst "article" ever

[Anonymous Coward]

Asking is a fanboi mental? You are new to our planet right?

Re:Worst "article" ever

[ciderbrew]

Oh. oV' Course.

Not looking at it for now

[MichaelSmith]

My wife picked up our touchpad yesterday from Harvey Norman for 98 AUD. Its hard not to be happy at that price. I can see that most of the time we will use the web browser to it doesn't matter much what operating system we run.

Re:Not looking at it for now

[Gaygirlie]

My wife picked up our touchpad yesterday from Harvey Norman for 98 AUD. Its hard not to be happy at that price. I can see that most of the time we will use the web browser to it doesn't matter much what operating system we run.

I too wish I could pick up a HP TouchPad for that price. But unfortunately the Finnish shops haven't realized the firesale and are still stubbornly selling them with the original price... :/

Re:Not looking at it for now

[MichaelSmith]

They must be making a fortune because HP seem to be giving these TouchPads away to the retailers.

Re:Not looking at it for now

[Anonymous Coward]

Wish they even had them at all in Japan.

I guess I'll just have to console myself with the fact that iPad 2s here are free with a 3G contract.

Re:Not looking at it for now

[Anonymous Coward]

Same in England. If anyone knows where I can get one over here for $99, or hell, even £99, please let me know!

Re:Not looking at it for now

[Aggrajag]

Do they sell Touchpads here in Finland?

Re:Not looking at it for now

[Anonymous Coward]

My wife picked up our touchpad yesterday from Harvey Norman for 98 AUD. Its hard not to be happy at that price. I can see that most of the time we will use the web browser to it doesn't matter much what operating system we run.

and actually it is more or less the same browser as the one on the ipad.

New business plan

[gnasher719]

So we know now what companies have to do to beat the iPad: Build tablets and sell them for about $220 less than the cost of the parts. I wonder at which point Apple would start buying those tablets and taking them apart because that is cheaper than buying the parts. (I was told the Touchpad had the same screen as the original iPad, and what Apple pays for the screen is not far away from the $99 that the Touchpad sold for).

Re:New business plan

[Sockatume]

This'll sound monstrously stupid, but that's actually where Android partners could have a long-term advantage. As components get cheaper, eventually they'll be able to put out a "good enough" tablet (the current Touchpad spec, for example) for something like $150. If they can beat Apple to that market - and Apple's historically been slow to reach the mid- and low-end consumer - then they have a game on their hands. I figure they probably have a window of a year or two between when a $150 tablet is feasible and when Apple steps in with its own take on that niche.

Re:New business plan

[RobbieThe1st]

Well, with the huge advertosing budgets that some companies pour into their products, it just might be worth it to instead pour that money into huge discounts for consumers to get a large enough install base that you get customers via word of mouth alone. It's just crazy enough to work!

Re:New business plan

[Sockatume]

It works until you release version 2 of the product at twice the price in the hope that you'll start making money. Torch and pitchfork time.

Re:New business plan

[Anonymous Coward]

It's free publicity, more than any company could afford to pay. HP may have taken a loss in the short time with these tablets, but now they have over a million users. HP will makes its money back with such a large user base, plus if Webos becomes popular who do you think will benefit from it?

Re:New business plan

[Anonymous Coward]

1. Build warehouses and warehouses full of tablets that cost $320 each (in parts, not counting R&D) to make.

2. Price them at $500+, and watch as nobody buys them.

3. Announce that you're discontinuing the tablets and every other piece of hardware that runs the same operating system.

4. Sell the tablets to retailers for at least $220 less (each) than it cost you to build them. Lose your shirt on every sale and make it up in fire sale volume.

5. ???

6. Profit!

Re:New business plan

[Anonymous Coward]

That strategy certainly worked well competing against the iPod... oh, wait.

People can't seem to understand that it's end-to-end quality that has won the day for Apple.

Re:New business plan

[Sockatume]

Yes, frankly. The iPod Mini completely controlled the mid-range MP3 player market because Apple had a high-quality product ready to roll and left everyone else dicking around trying to figure out what their own copycat microdrive players should be like. By the time Creative et al got their act together Apple had consolidated their position.

With Android phones, manufacturers seem to be more aware that they need to get into the mid-range game before Apple does. Sony's had a budget Xperia range on the market since last year. HTC's now made a version of the Wildfire that doesn't suck. And people with a £25-a-month phone contract are getting used to looking for these phones, while Apple's just getting ready to release a really inexpensive iPhone. That means there's at least a chance that they won't all get washed away when the "iPhone 4 Lite" or whatever arrives.

The same thinking applies to tablets. If Apple keeps the iPad 2 around as a "budget" $300 iPad next year, then it's all over. Nobody's going to have a decent Android tablet at that price point at that time. If Apple doesn't bring out a budget model until 2013, then there's a window of opportunity for someone to come up with a decent $300 Android tablet and get people buying it.

Re:New business plan

[Anonymous Coward]

Uh, that's not unheard of. Microsoft did it with the original XBox, it's practically routine in the cell phone business (with 2 year contract, etc). Maybe it'll be ad supported. For instance, HP sells the tabs at a loss, but then gets a cut of ad revenue from Google. That would be a BIG incentive for everyone to make the devices as good as possible and run as much as possible. This is the exact opposite approach to Apple's, which I like to call "beyond proprietary". So HP dumps these at a loss, I'm sure they wouldn't do that if they weren't expecting a massive tax bill this year. This is how you get to the mass market--with predatory marketing. If you think MSFT doesn't know this also, they do, and have been successful at it.

They failed with the Zune, which they tried to flood into the market (they were giving away hundreds of them at trade shows), but they failed to appreciate the "fashion" aspect of it. But poor normal people, or people who want to use a tablet in a public school setting or industrial setting do not care about fashion. They want something good and strong but cheap to replace if it breaks.

Yes, the bill of materials might be high now, but that's just due to rarity. The actual "materials" are basically plastic and microchips and screens that, once commoditized, will plummet in price to scarcely more than the actual chemical content. I think this is a brilliant move by the industry and ballsy by HP. Apple must be stopped, everyone knows it, and HP is the one to jump on the grenade.

Re:New business plan

[makomk]

Actually, it's worse than that - Apple's launch left the competing players unable to get microdrives at all...

Re:New business plan

[Anonymous Coward]

So we know now what companies have to do to beat the iPad: Build tablets and sell them for about $220 less than the cost of the parts. I wonder at which point Apple would start buying those tablets and taking them apart because that is cheaper than buying the parts. (I was told the Touchpad had the same screen as the original iPad, and what Apple pays for the screen is not far away from the $99 that the Touchpad sold for).

They went end of life though. It's not like this is a slash'd price. 1 year warranty from HP, no returns to the stores you purchased them from if you're unhappy. It's a fire sale not a marketing strategy.

If that was true

[aglider]

Then HP should either consider to go back on its own footsteps or to sack the CEO.
Better both.
And, by the way, the iPad really stinks.

Re:If that was true

[Anonymous Coward]

Uh, dude, your Google-Fu sucks. All of those articles are more than a year old. In tablet time that's the fucking stone age. Your methods are tired and sad. Plz try harder. Kthx.

As the saying goes...

[myneknoturs]

"A fool and his money are soon parted"

Re:As the saying goes...

[jamiesan]

I thought it was "soon elected".

Re:Gingerbread

[nloop]

You mean Honeycomb, not Gingerbread. Only the kernel is GPL. You can get the source for that. The rest of Android itself is Google's to do whatever they please with. Before Honeycomb it was Apache liscensed. Now the source is closed.

Their stated reason was they didn't want people to create a "really bad user experience" trying to cram Honeycomb into devices not capable of taking it.

Always sounded more to me like they gave Motorola a deal where they would be the only Honeycomb vendor with the Xoom.

Yea, just as they dissapear from shelves...

[trum4n]

this becomes public. I was trying to order one yesterday for just this reason. Kinda pissed.

Re:Gingerbread

[erroneus]

You're thinking "honeycomb" and I wouldn't worry about it. Android 3.0 is one of those growth steps. Once the next version is out and the sources isn't there? Then there's something to be concerned about.

Apples weakness.

[mevets]

That weakness is killing them. They still aren't the world's most valuable company. Whats with that?

If you can find one......

[firesyde424]

I didn't find out until late Saturday afternoon and by then, all the stores in the area were sold out. Over the course of the next two days, I went from one bogged down retailer website to another until I had amassed three confirmation orders via email, for HP Touchpads. All three were canceled via email yesterday, including the one from CDW that actually charged my debit card. There are still several retailers(Newegg, Circuit City, ect..) who have them in stock(verified via telephone), but have not lowered their prices yet. There is also the matter of anyone who didn't sell their stock and returned them to HP instead. Hopefully I'll end up with one by the time this is all said and done.

I don't have a need for a touchpad for the same reason I don't have a need for an iPad. But, for $99, I think I could find a use for it. =)

Re:If you can find one......

[eharvill]

Bestbuy.com had them in stock until 8:07 EST on Sunday morning. I ordered a 16GB and a 32GB (one per customer limit) and they have shipped already. I am in the same boat and didn't *need* a tablet (let alone 2), but at the price point it was hard to pass up. One will go to my son and the other my wife and I will share. I look forward to using it for web browsing, as an e-reader, picture storage, etc while not having to deal with my laptop for these functions. It will be especially sweet when I travel I think.

The OS was never the issue.

[ThisIsSaei]

Thinking back to OS tests from this specific HP touchpad, iirc, the constraining factor was the hardware. While I'm glad that people will have a developer community in conjunction with this sell-off, porting Android to something with an arguably bad hardware configuration isn't going to solve it.

Re:The OS was never the issue.

[Bloodwine77]

There is a counterpoint to your link: http://www.anandtech.com/show/4658/its-not-qualcomms-fault-dispelling-touchpad-myths/2

If Android does get ported to the TouchPad then the performance being a hardware vs. software issue may finally be answered.

Re:The OS was never the issue.

[ThisIsSaei]

Great read! I'll retract based on that article - best luck to the Android port team!

i keep seeing this on every fucking news site...

[Anonymous Coward]

but where do i actually buy one?? It's like it never existed, or at least not in canada...

Re:Gingerbread

[DrXym]

I think there are two reasons for the Honeycomb closed source thing.

1. The public reason that the code is a mess and broken. This might be true. Tablets don't need a voice call stack so all that stuff is going to be bitrotten in 3.x. It's also likely that all the new apps were initially hardcoded to work well at 1280x800 and were broken at other sizes. There might also be the usual performance / footprint issues that are not such a big deal on a better specced tablet which might be for other devices. So yes I think this is a legit reason of sorts.
2. Amazon is coming out with tablets, probably imminently. Knowing Amazon they will be locked down so they only work with apps from their store, books from their store, videos from their store etc. By Google denying them Android 3.x they could either force them into the wilderness or back to the negotiating table.

I suppose the first excuse will disappear when Ice Cream Sandwich comes out and 3.x and 2.x get merged together once more. Perhaps by then we'll also see what happens with Amazon.

Any left??

[goldspider]

I don't suppose there are any retailers out there that still have them for $99, are there??

Re:Any left??

[spacepimp]

I was able to buy two HP TouchPad 16gb for $99 apiece today. Direct from HP. They seem to be out of stock now however. It is a shame to see webOS so neglected, it was a great OS which has been failed by Palm and now HP. I think i would rather leave webOS running on this than currently hack Cyanogen Mod 7 on the device. That will change if I could get Android Ice Cream Sandwich or HoneyComb ported onto the tablet... The second one is a gift for my mother to browse the web check her gmail and read books on. The Nook seems to be confusing to her to buy books on.

Re:Any left??

[jon3k]

Best Buy is supposedly restocking Wednesday.

Re:"No ecosystem" - Useful for Work

[Webcommando]

We have rolled out almost every type of tablet as a test to our users. They have claimed that they were needed, and loved them at first. A after a few weeks, the vast majority of the users have said that they rarely use it anymore....and now are back to their laptop. Maybe for sitting on the couch they work, but for productivity they seem to have been a flop around here.

Right tool for the right job I suspect and I find the iPad extremely useful for work.

Case in point: I had my laptop go out of commission for three weeks and still can't get it to connect to a non-work network (I hate Windows 7). I had an iPad and began using our over-the-air mail sync to augment. I found I could do over 90% of what I needed. My job includes reviewing many documents, tracking program deliverables, managing crisis's by email, and generating basic content for others. With iWorks, iBook (PDF), note taking software, and my mail link I was good to go.

Now would I use it to generate 20 page PowerPoint ... of course not. However, that's what my backup desktop is for and I actually find that I'm more likely to take my iPad to meetings than my laptop today.

Re:i keep seeing this on every fucking news site..

[Anonymous Coward]

That's because, when the news broke, they all sold out in approximately 48 minutes. At least in London, anyway.

A different point of view.

[MachineShedFred]

Can you expand the storage by 128GB with an SD card on the IPad[2]? No
Do most people in the target market care? No.
Are you in the target market? No.

Can you plug HDMI and USB into the IPad[2]? No
Can you plug HDMI into the iPad[2] with an available dongle? Yes.
Was the previous quoted question a half-truth? Yes.

Does the IPad[2] have a user replaceable battery if yours dies, and you don't want the downtime of a standard replacement/fix? No
I've got no argument with that.
Does the IPad[2] have a 1280x800 or better screen? No
Or that.

Can you get an IPad2 for $550, with 16GB of storage? No
You're right.
Can you get an iPad2 for $499, with 16GB of storage? Yes.

Does the IPad[2] have more apps? Yes
-- Does it's apps contain a wider range of functionality? No
Are subjective statements subjective? Yes.
Can you get a large range of apps to give you most of the fun/functionality you need on an IPad[2], for free? No
Are subjective statements still subjective? Still yes.
Have either of us tried every single app available for the iPad in order to make an objective statement regarding app availability, pricing, and functionality? No.

Does the IPad[2] have flash? No
Might this be regarded by some people as a feature, rather than a missing feature? Yes.

Re:A different point of view.

[Anonymous Coward]

Does the IPad[2] have flash? No Might this be regarded by some people as a feature, rather than a missing feature? Yes.

Who would find this to be a feature? Especially considering you don't have to install flash on any tablet that has it.

Re:A different point of view.

[AliasMarlowe]

Are you in the target market? No.

Note sure about this assumption in your post, since GP explicitly states he has

several IPad 2s

So whether he's in the "target" market or not, he is a repeat customer.

Re:A different point of view.

[hierophanta]

you dont have to install flash on a tablet that hast it? wow that is amazing

/sarcasim

Re:A different point of view.

[Deliveranc3]

How do we get on this "Target Market" gravy train?

We support devices, we recommend devices, hell we buy a lot of devices as gifts. These gifts often create whole customer ecosystems in families and recipients.

Now I task the Slashdot collective with this question: How do we as geeks, nerds, and savvy consumers become "The Target Market" how do we outshine the shine. How do we get our complaints into the media, the marketer's ear, the boardroom. Let's make a plan together and follow it through. People paying $500 for a toy they think is a computer is just unacceptable. People buying something without the option of having data backed up to a removable external system is unacceptable (Support a borked IPad ["It won't turn on " ,"I'm ready to wipe... oh wait!" vs one that backs up user data on removable media).

Can we implement a standard $15 fee, where we research the best product for the user and tell them where to buy it? How about a "you're on your own for buying a stupid product without proper counsel" clause?
Is being hard asses the way to go?

My Dad just bought my mom a $3000 Mac laptop without consulting me, she HATES it. How is this crap still going on? I didn't know she wanted a laptop even!

Re:A different point of view.

[SiMac]

Does the IPad[2] have flash? No
Might this be regarded by some people as a feature, rather than a missing feature? Yes.

Who would find this to be a feature? Especially considering you don't have to install flash on any tablet that has it.

Those of us who support open standards. If all tablets could run Flash, there would be more Flash out there. That's bad for HTML5.

Re:A different point of view.

[binford2k]

I find it a feature. Flash is one of the first things I disable upon installing a browser.

Re:A different point of view.

[binford2k]

Now I task the Slashdot collective with this question: How do we as geeks, nerds, and savvy consumers become "The Target Market

Quite simply. You spend enough money for someone to notice you.

Re:A different point of view.

[scot4875]

Can you plug HDMI and USB into the IPad[2]? No
Can you plug HDMI into the iPad[2] with an available dongle? Yes.
Was the previous quoted question a half-truth? Yes.

So you can plug a standard connector into an extortionately priced proprietary dongle? Awesome!

And you still didn't answer anything about lack of USB support.

--Jeremy

Re:A different point of view.

[spire3661]

You mean like how my Ipad backs up to my computer everytime it syncs?? Calling the iPad a toy shows your level of incompetence, and may be why your users are not communicating with you. An ipad might not be a full computer, but its not purely a toy either.

Re:A different point of view.

[kakyoin01]

Does the IPad[2] have flash? No Might this be regarded by some people as a feature, rather than a missing feature? Yes.

Who would find this to be a feature? Especially considering you don't have to install flash on any tablet that has it.

Steve Jobs seems to be pushing the iPad as the "post-PC" device with limitations. These limitations are called 'features' on purpose because he claims it's part of the process needed to move away from the PC and onto more smoothly integrated features, thus doing away with the "clunkier" PC.

And since Apple calls all the shots as to what's cool and what's practical and people follow like a herd of sheep, it'll work and Apple will rake in more money.

Re:A different point of view.

[agbinfo]

I'm sure there's a dongle for that.

Re:A different point of view.

[dgatwood]

Agreed. It's slow, buggy, and it crashes browsers and/or browser helpers with such regularity that one can safely assume that the mere existence of Flash on your computer or device poses a security hole so big you could drive a truck through it.

Flash also leads people to create overly complex web site designs that don't work well over slow connections (e.g. EDGE, 3G, etc.) and waste tons of bandwidth that could cost customers actual money on metered networks (Comcast, AT&T DSL/U-Verse, pretty much all cellular services, and many others). Add to that all the stupid banner ads and other such nonsense that uses Flash for no good reason, and it is really a bandwidth pig.

Finally, Flash is inherently fundamentally incompatible with small devices like phones because of its CPU overhead. If I play a Flash game on my laptop, I can run the battery down in about an hour and a half. Doing normal work, my laptop lasts six hours. Scale that to a phone, and you can safely assume that if every web page used Flash, your smartphones would have to be recharged several times a day just from doing light web browsing.

So yeah, it's a feature. As much as I'd like the option of installing Flash on my iPhone (in a *separate* web browser that only gets used for the occasional site that require it), I'm really glad it doesn't come with it installed by default, and given the choice between no Flash at all and built-in Flash, I'd pick no Flash in a heartbeat.

The price in Canada has shot back up.

[loftwyr]

One retailer sold out, but Future Shop and Best Buy in Canada has raised the price back up to $399. I guess they thought this demand was something they could profit on.

Nobody's buying end of life tech for full price. I'm going to wait until it drops back to $99.

iPad = lousy web browsing

[Anonymous Coward]

I purchased an iPad for my wife to use with school, but she soon realized that her online classes won't work with the iPad. The iPad's browser stinks, and you can't find one with the capabilities to get stuff done. I was lucky enough to order an HP Touchpad through work from CDW, I'm hoping the browser will have the capabilities to do what she needs. If you have a tablet with a browser that can't handle half the websites out there it's like using an old Window 95 computer with IE 3.0

Re:iPad = lousy web browsing

[toriver]

Websites that rely on Adobe's CPU-guzzler of a proprietary plugin are broken by design. Actual websites work fine in Safari on the iPad.

Re:iPad = lousy web browsing

[jo_ham]

If you're hoping Flash will have acceptable performance on that tablet, I think you will be sorely disappointed.

Re:iPad = lousy web browsing

[Anonymous Coward]

It plays HULU ok for me. So some flash apps work great.

Some other flash apps will suck yes, but some of them suck even on a powerful desktop.

Re:"No ecosystem" - Useful for Work

[Anonymous Coward]

Right tool for the right job I suspect and I find the iPad extremely useful for work.

Case in point: I had my laptop go out of commission for three weeks and still can't get it to connect to a non-work network (I hate Windows 7). I had an iPad and began using our over-the-air mail sync to augment. I found I could do over 90% of what I needed. My job includes reviewing many documents, tracking program deliverables, managing crisis's by email, and generating basic content for others. With iWorks, iBook (PDF), note taking software, and my mail link I was good to go.

If you can do 90% of your job from an iPad, then there's about a 99% chance you're an expendable employee. Better hope the company doesn't catch on.

... reputation Apple has with regular people ....

[mevets]

Really had to choke on that one, eh?

When you say 'think in different ways than we do', in which sense do you me 'we'? Is it the crowd running around in your skull, or are you assuming that others share your obsession?

Re: ... reputation Apple has with regular people .

[jawtheshark]

Actually, no... I think of specific people who have real trouble running Windows or Mac OS X based machines. but do manage to use iOS based devices. I actually tried avoiding the "think different(ly)" phrase, and apparently I oversaw this one. If you have a person with 0% technical knowledge and 0% willingness to learn anything technological, then you've got a potential happy iOS user. Such a person is my wife. She never got along with her Windows XP machine, and basically, I had to do everything if she needed something to be done. I wasted a ton of money on an expensive iMac in the hope that would help. It did a bit, resulting in less work for me, but it was far from what I'd expected. Then, by a series of unwanted events I got her an iPhone (I originally didn't want to get her an iPhone) and what happened was absolutely incredible. She actually started to use the Internet as I have done for years, she uses it to buy songs, she sends pictures to her friends by email, she now uses facebook and youtube. It is amazing.

She is not stupid, she is just absolutely not tech inclined at all. For me that was an eye opener. iDevices are not for us geeks, they are for the rest of "them".

For the record: I do not use Apple products myself. I use Linux on the cheapest machines I can buy or get out of the dumpster. For me, Apple is too expensive as I do know how to manage computers.

Re:Gingerbread

[padraic2]

Presumably the source will be opened up again with the release of ICS, which is supposed to be a "universal" Android that can play nicely on any device, phone or tablet. I'm not sure I completely agree with Google's decision not to release Honeycomb source - you probably wouldn't want to run it on a phone, but for example the Nook Color is supported by CyanogenMod and possibly could have benefited from Honeycomb (right now it runs Gingerbread with some "tablet tweaks" that the team provided). But bottom line, this phone/tablet divergence in Android is set to re-converge with next release, perhaps late this year or early next year.

I wonder...

[itsdapead]

I wonder if that's why Apple is trying to physically get Samsung off the shelves in Europe. There doesn't seem to be much danger of competing Android tablets decimating iPad sales - its pretty clear now that they are not going to succeed unless they are (a) significantly cheaper than the iPad and/or (b) offer something obviously different (not just incrementally better specs such as a slightly faster processor or higher res camera which will be leapfrogged by Apple in a few months time).

So why is Apple trying to block them? Whatever the rights/wrongs of their case, I can't see it succeeding long-term (at most, it will just establish what combination of features make something an iPad lookalike rather than just a tablet so competitors can work around it) - and it risks a Streisand effect. But if the Android Tablet train is about to hit the buffers, getting them off the shelves for a few months now would prevent any more fire sales in the run-up to Xmas.

Personally, I'm still waiting for this which actually seems to tick the "offer something clearly distinct from an iPad" box - but its been "coming soon" for ever and, from the link, I see they've brilliantly decided to up the minimum memory and push up the price. Otherwise, I'll stick with my iPad 1 until we see (a) what MotoGoogle will do or (b) whether the rumors of an Amazon tablet are true.

Re: ... reputation Apple has with regular people .

[AngryDeuce]

iDevices are not for us geeks, they are for the rest of "them".

Pretty much it right there. I know a handful of people that love Apple devices to death that actually work around computers and would qualify as "computer people", but the vast majority of the rest are the people that do nothing but surf the web, buy shit online and listen to music. You get out of "burning a CD" territory and they're completely lost.

So yes, here on /. we can trot out any number of people that are computer geniuses and love Apple's offerings but /. is so far removed from the norm that doesn't mean anything. Go down to your local Apple Store on a Saturday afternoon and start polling the people shopping there to get a gist of their general knowledge of computers. I assure you, most of them will stare at you like you're growing an arm out of your ass and then get lost in another dippy iPad game on the demo unit. Just talking to people shopping at the Apple Store will demonstrate that they are not computer people, at all, unless they either work there or are that one random guy that actually has a Mac Pro and does real work on the platform.

Re:"No ecosystem" - Useful for Work

[Glock27]

If you can do 90% of your job from an iPad, then there's about a 99% chance you're an expendable employee. Better hope the company doesn't catch on.

Most executives can do 90% of their job using an iPad. They are expendable (like you and every other employee, don't kid yourself) but if they are "expended" they get that nice golden parachute thing...

iPads most definitely fill a highly useful niche, and the form factor is here to stay. As voice input matures, that "keyboard" device will become more and more optional...

Wouldn't touch it with a ten foot pole

[kheldan]

If you gave me one of these HP tablets for free, I would turn it down. Why would I want something that I can't repair myself, that, after less than 2 months, is already being abandoned by the manufacturer?

If you bought one of these, you have my deepest sympathies. If you bought one after they announced the fire sale, I shake my head in disbelief at you. If you're one of the nudniks buying for $250 on Ebay, then I point and laugh at you because you're a flaming idiot.

Of course to be fair I wouldn't want an iPad either, I have no use for it, and I have no desire for a Nook or Kindle, either. But wasting any time, let alone money, on something that's orphaned? Insanity.

Re:Wouldn't touch it with a ten foot pole

[saihung]

You're either a liar or a fool. Which do you prefer?

Damn slashdot stripping out characters.

[jo_ham]

Those were supposed to be two unequal lines, the iPad profit line being considerably longer.

The way to make it work...

[mbessey]

You can make this work if you do what the game console makers have historically done - get commitments from parts suppliers on price reductions over the expected lifetime of the product (due to Moore's law, etc) and aggressively plan as much cost-reduction as possible. You then sell the product for what it *should* cost when the product is mature. You lose a fortune on the first units, but the bleeding stops and eventually you can sell them at a profit.

Of course, if you mis-estimate the lifecycle, or fail to get the expected volumes, this is *really* risky. It's also not really clear what the expected lifetime of a tablet is, yet. The market's just not as mature as the video game console market.

MyCleanPC gave me nightmares about circus midgets!

[Thud457]

MyCleanPC gave me Dutch elm disease and gave my new phone number to my ex-girlfriend!

Game consoles

[Anonymous Coward]

Isn't this what game consoles have been doing for a really long time? Loose money on the hardware and make it up some other way. I'm sure it'll be hard to make up the money on software like consoles do, since the perceived value of an app is $0.99, but I'm sure they could come up with some other way to lose money on hardware and make it up somewhere else.

Re:"No ecosystem" - Useful for Work

[badkarmadayaccount]

The keyboard has been dying since the 90s, IIRC. So has the mainframe. So have text based programing languages. And AI. And Lisp. And x86.