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HP Delivers a Big-Name, 7-inch Android Tablet For $100: Comes With Compromises
Ars Technica reports that HP is back in the $100 tablet market, and this time with a tablet that's intended to be priced there instead of just a fire sale. The new offering lacks Bluetooth and GPS, among other features you might wish for in a tablet, and the screen is surrounded by a hefty bezel, but manages a pretty good list of features. Ars summarizes: "For $100, you can't expect much of the spec sheet. The HP 7 Plus has a 7-inch 1024x600 IPS display, a 1GHz quad-core Cortex A7 processor (made by a company called "Allwinner"), 1GB of RAM, 8GB of storage, 802.11 b/g/n, a microSD slot, and a 2800 mAh battery. The biggest downside HP could have fixed at this price point is the software: it's only running Android 4.2.2. Android versions are free, HP." Having an avaialble microSD slot beats some more expensive options, too.
I'm wondering how much it costs to add bluetooth to a device. I mean... them bluetooth headsets have it in, hell even the dinky little $12 'bluetooth speakers' you can park next to your iThing have it in...
What in the world possessed them to release a device that doesn't have bleutooth?
Probably something useful to do with this. Hand it to the kids with all their movies on it? Use it for a car radio display? Competing on the low end is not the way to make money and stem the layoffs.
Allwinner is the king of tablets ... http://www.eetimes.com/author.asp?section_id=36&doc_id=1287293
:D ) and such for similar price.
The Cubieboard is also a popular RPi alternative with faster CPU (and sweet sweet SATA
In my opinion Allwinner is more credible than HP these days since they actually seem to believe in their own market... whereas HP is practically at the point of execs jumping out of windows (Or the modern equivalent of selling the company out for peanuts).
The problem with these tablets and other computing devices is all of digital restrictions, proprietary drivers, and similar that they are being shipped with. You can't replace the wifi chip even if you wanted to and if HP uses a particular chipset that there is no driver for the latest version of android your shit out of luck. There is no source code. You can't fix the problem yourself or depend on a community to do so for you.
I'm going to call out the companies we should all be boycotting for these types of practices:
HP, Dell, Lenovo/IBM, Toshiba, Apple, and Sony.
These companies are including digital restrictions on the wifi card slot (laptops), locking boot loaders (tablets), and/or using proprietary technology (such as non-standard wifi cards, etc), etc. These practices are preventing people from switching operating systems, upgrading to the latest release of an otherwise supported OS, and much more.
See fsf.org/ryf for a list of products that aren't crippled. The list is small, but growing and you can find a lot more non-crippled devices from ThinkPenguin as well (not all RYF certified, but not crippled in any way either, and completely free software friendly/RYF'able).
last Christmas.
It's similiarly specced to the HP. Something like this:
http://www.huffingtonpost.co.u...
To be honest, it kinda sucks compared to an iPad but makes for good presents. What makes it suck is android more than the hardware, tbh. Android and software bloat by the manufacturer. HP won't be any different going by past computer purchases.
Sad that so many (or is it all?) of the formerly great US tech firms are now just rebranders of Chinese products.
I remember when HP actually made things. Good, things, too, known for their bulletproof quality.
Now? Not so much.
HP doing what is good for itself, but not for 50,000 employees.. Good luck selling these tablets to them. And good luck, NOT.
There are some $99 tablets from Lenovo and other companies. The concept isn't bad, but my big problem with them is the resolution. They clock in at only 1024x600. That's okay if you just want any type of tablet, but 1280x720 would be better. And I don't think any of them have HDMI out (or MHL or SlimPort or whatever), so they aren't any good as media players.
Just looking around, I discover that there's something called the HP Slate 7 Plus. That has 1280x780 and it's $130 at Walmart ($150 on HP's website). Still no HDMI support, but it might be a decent comic viewer.
(Arstechnica wants GPS in a tablet? I suppose that's good if you want a substitute GPS device, but I'd still prefer dedicated units for a car.)
Word verification: ponder
Allwinner is the Intel of ARM chip these days, they're a Chinese National ARM chip manufacturer, they produce in volumes that allow them to get the chip in under $7 for the dual core models. The quad core models are pretty competitive as well. They're in pretty much every Hobbyist robotics kit (check out the PC Duino) and are quite reliable, and have been for years... I won't disagree that it's a silly name, but they did win basically the entire (all) of the low end Android market. So it's pretty accurate. Nobody else can compete on price.
moox. for a new generation.
Apparently someone at DICE forgot to put a check in the mail
Is anyone else seeing this?
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[Fuck Beta]
o0t!
I have a huge problem with the fact that Android Tablets and by extension Chrome Books, require the use of Google Services. I have a Domain controller, and VPNs. I have Internal, CalDAV supported Calendaring, Tasks, and Contact distribution list systems. I have Samba File servers, and WebDav Shares with my data. But My data needs to stay My Data. Not Google's Data. When I buy an Android Tablet, I should NOT have to register for a GMAIL account. I don't want a GMail account. I want to log in to my Domain, and have the Android Calendar sync to my Calendars, and Contacts, not Google's. I cannot trust Google to not sync my CalDav based srevices with Google leaking everything on my internal servers to Google. Making an Android Tablet a security threat, and an iPad tablet, an even worse Security threat
Today, a computing device is more than just the hardware. Any person who watched the growth of the iPhone w/"Developers, Developers, Developers" knows exactly what that means. Major electronics firms have had well over a half decade to recognize the change Apple introduced and immediately start their own hardware/software ecosystem.
Not one major company I've heard of has done what Apple has done with tablet, connections to phones & desktop, cloud synching, significant quality App development, good-great security, privacy and reasonable consistency for prior generation products.
I'm still waiting for someone to take Unix or Linux and do what Apple has done. I've not heard anyone commit to that same sort of effort. Manufacturers today either control their product ecosystem top to bottom, or they keep fighting the Asian copycats it seems to me.
I'm strongly suggesting that the big "computer" type companies have simply blown it by waiting so many years to try to jump in ... seriously.
Android 4.anything will do just fine. What makes this almost a joke device is the screen resolution of NotEnough x NotEnough. Seriously... 1024x768 was a reasonable desktop resolution fifteen to twenty years ago. 600 vertical pixels in 2014 is an unforgivable sin unless you're putting them on a watch or a contact lens or the head of a pin or something else uselessly small to start with.
"Oh no... he found the
thinking the same thing, 100 buck tablets with similar specs are all over the place, and having just bought bottom of the line HP laptops I am not sure that having that logo silk screened on a generic Chinese table means anything
Can I install Windows 8.1 on this and get rid of the Google stuff?
I have two tablets just like this. 1024x600 IPS screen. Large bezel. uSD slot. No BT. No Cameras. No GPS. But, they have a well supported SoC (they are fully supported by CyanogenMod), twice the internal memory, and cost me just $89 (each) two years ago.
Heck, for $109, you can get the Nook HD which has a vastly better processor, screen, and has BT. Why not step up to the Nook HD+ for $129? It's got an amazing screen.
Who would buy this thing?
they're a Chinese National ARM chip manufacturer, they produce in volumes that allow them to get the chip in under $7 for the dual core models.
How do you know this? The financials are not publicly available and I wouldn't trust them even if they were.
Most likely the Chinese government is subsidizing the production to allow for these chips to be sold cheaply. Then after crushing the Western Capitalist manufacturers, they are then free to raise prices if they want. But more than likely, it is to develop a Chinese chip market using stolen or *contractual "technology transfer" of Western technology.
*A contractual obligation that was shoved down some Western company's throat in order to do business in China. See back in the 90s and early 00s, Western companies were sooo anxious to get into China thinking that they would be there first to sell their shit to a billion people. Only the Chinese government had different plans: suck the Western round eyed capitalist pigs, take their technology, start their own firms, and run the pigs out.
Do not do business with China, they will fuck you sideways.
Some? There's fucking millions. I sometimes think everybody in China has his own brand.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
They come tied to hardware requirements.
Don't complain about syntax, grammar, or spelling. There is no.hell like input on android.
Once again, HP comprromises themselves right of the features people want in favor of the features no one cares about. No GPS for mapping, no bluetooth for headsets, and the wrong OS for tablets.
Fortunately, this way, they can lose money on every sale but make it up in volume! That trick always works!
Replying to myself: checking more there is also the HP Slate 7 Extreme for $200 ($175 at Best Buy, $170 at Walmart) which does include mini/micro-HDMI out. Of course, there are other tablets in the $200 price range with HDMI out...
You learn something new everyday.
Why would I buy a weak HP tablet for $100 when I can have a better tablet for $90?
http://www.pandawill.com/cube-...
Cube (well-known Chinese manufacturer) tablet with same features as HP plus: built-in BlueTooth, GPS and 3G. Only $90, shipping included.
Android is NOT free. Thousands of man hours have to be spent tailoring, testing, adjusting and fixing the OS just to have it run in the target hardware. And that is ignoring the fact that Google has ZERO quality control process and the code is mostly spaghetti.
Anybody who thinks that Android is free is a total ignorant idiot.
Sure, this is not going to replace anybody's iPad. That is not the point.
Help stamp out iliturcy.
I got an HP TouchPad at fire-sale price of $100 (original MSRP ~$500).
This new HP pad should be available for about $20 after a short while.
I wouldn't be surprised if the '3 in 1' chips were cheaper anyway though, since they're much more popular.
Perhaps some fuses are blown on some chips to disable the Bluetooth circuitry to save on patent royalties payable to Bluetooth SIG.
My wife and I got some $99 tablets at Wal-Mart that have HDMI out, and SDHC. As I recall, the 8" one is $109 and the 7" one is $99 or $89, something like that. They are an off-brand, Nextbook I think.
She used hers for Netflix and Facebook mostly. I use mine as a media player exclusively. They do okay. The build quality isn't excellent. The HDMI works fine even over a long cable, though.
In the Android 2 era, you needed a Gmail account to use Android Market. A Google account can be tied to any e-mail address, but using a non-Gmail Google account would result in a message "chester@example.com does not use Gmail" followed by a Gmail sign-up form. But as of Android 4, any Google account works with Google Play Store.
No. This device uses an ARM CPU made by Allwinner. Windows for ARM is called Windows RT, and Windows RT is available only as a preinstall.
Google has ZERO quality control process
What is the Android Compatibility Test Suite if not a "quality control process"?
(Arstechnica wants GPS in a tablet?
It's useful when you are sitting at a coffee shop in a strange town and want to be able to find some other business nearby.
Google can pull some tricks with WiFi to help locate you, but it's not universal.
Nowadays it's pretty much all cheap crap.
Such a shame.
Yup, there's nothing more open than an iPad!
That's a dealbreaker right there. How are you going to connect a wireless keyboard to it?
> Arstechnica wants GPS in a tablet? I suppose that's good if you want a substitute GPS device, but I'd still prefer dedicated units for a car.
Why not just use your cell phone?
Now, if they included RPN...
So HP has a crappy, crippled $100 tablet? So what? It sounds like a real turd designed by the company penny pinchers, not a nice tablet at a bargain of a price. Boooooriiiiing... I wonder how much this one will go for in a couple months when they discontinue it.
This is a hacked account, for which the owner can not be held responsible.
Dude, the news is the fire sale, which is HP for "we fire 15k employees and then we have a sale of a hideous product".
These sound remarkably like the cheap Chinese tablets you can find on DealExtreme. I was wondering when a big brand was going to start slapping their name on them.
The $100 price-point is actually a bit of a deal, since that's basically what that 'tier' (The quad cores and 1024 displays) costs from DealExtreme, but I presume you're getting HP warranty and support with these. So not bad!
I bought four different 7-inch tablets in their $65-$80 price range during a half-off sale last May. My favorite is the ICOO ICOU7W.
Its specs:
800x600 screen, the 4:3 aspect being one of my favorite features, because I use it primarily for reading.
1.0GHz Allwinner A13 (Single core)
512mb of RAM
Mali-400 GPU @ 350MHz
8gb of internal storage, plus a microSD slot. (They all have microSD slots)
802.11b/g/n
Front-facing camera
Android 4.0.4 (I could probably update it, but haven't felt the need.)
3000mAh battery, 2A DC fast-charge jack*
On sale, I paid a whopping $36.45 for it. ;)
Only bad things I can say about it are no OTG on the USB port, and no bluetooth...but mostly it's the missing OTG that's a letdown. There's also no GPS which is a little bit of a bummer. Only one of the tablets I bought had GPS; the Erani E70. For some absurd reason, the MK808 'Android TV' stick I bought for $25 also had GPS. (I mean, really?!)
*It's funny, because under full load-- playing HD video, screen brightness up all the way, using the wifi, etc. --normal USB can't actually charge faster than you're discharging... So the 2-amp DC jack is handy for when you're using it in bed or something. I have no idea if the USB port is capable of fast-charging from fast-charge capable ports... I haven't tried it, but I just got a 10,400mAh portable USB battery from Jackery... If it can't, I'll have to make a USB to DC jack, so I can fast-charge through the DC jack using the 2-amp output USB port on the Jackery battery.
Friend: "The NIC is misconfigured..." Me: "No prob, I'll just telnet in and fix it." *Silence*
I read: "HP blah de blah de blah" not interested.
Had they reversed the order I would have read: "A big name 7 inch tablet for $100 from HP blah de blah de blah" not interested.
Seriously, why would anyone buy anything from HP these days who, like, didn't have to?
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
but recently mainly for low-price products. i dont complain, i bought a HP low-cost notebook 3 years ago, and i am happy - despite the obvious drawbacks, since the price was more than ok.
I'm an Android developer and am alarmed by how Google is making it difficult or impossible to use the SD card from an app. Most tablets don't have them. I went out and bought a Galaxy tablet just to have a tablet with an SD card slot for testing, and ... my app writes to the directory that used to be the SD card directory and it's mapped to onboard storage. I still haven't figured out how to actually use the SD card. Users have asked for SD card support, and I'm trying to provide it, but kind of at a loss as to how.
So Android 4.2 is a plus, not a minus, since the SD card support was ruined in 4.4 if my memory is correct.
Go to Alibaba.com. The place is FILLED with similar specced tablets in the sub $100 bracket. Most of them are Allwinner devices with a similar res screen and form factor. I suspect that all HP is doing is bulk ordering a bunch of these, putting its badge on the front, applying some quality control and polish to the product and throwing it out at a higher price.
So HP has had to lay off 50,000 due to its race to the bottom with other PC vendors.
So their solution is to go as-low-as-possible in the new tablet market.
What could possibly go wrong?
If I had fifty cents for every time I got modded troll for bagging on the Chinese...
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Android versions aren't 'free'
They come tied to hardware requirements.
That's bullshit prevarication in this case, because Kitkat has lower requirements than Jellybean, notably in the memory department. Try doing just the least bit of research.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
A bezel give your thumb a resting place to the hold the beastie. Better yet would be handles like the milspec tablets. Edge to edge displays is nice on mounted display but suck on one you hold in your hands!
Ive never had any BT device connect and work with an ipad. Its a dodgy ass protocol.
Liberty freedom are no1, not dicks in suits.
Cortex A7 processor (made by a company called "Allwinner")
Hahaa. Why is Allwinner in quotation marks? It makes it sound like it's some neverheard ping pong company. Allwinner is a very well known CPU maker in the mobile space.
At the time of design and manufacture, allwinner did not support kitkat on their cpus. Getting another cpu would have cost money. Changing afterwards would cost in manpower. There is still no clear upgrade path from 4.2.2. to kitkat on allwinner devices.
OH, but less memory!!! Great, you can read wikipedia, how about next time you try doing more than the 'least' bit of research and try and add in some critical thinking.
Not to mention, most people expect ES 3.0 on their kitkats.
Don't complain about syntax, grammar, or spelling. There is no.hell like input on android.
Why say "made by a company named Allwinner"?
Why not also say "A company named HP is back in the $100 tablet market"?
What I wish they had was HDMI onto the device. Then it be worth getting for me.
Really, if I could get one with a screen the size of a legal pad and the smooth animation capabilities of OS X and with nice fonts, I'd be a happy man.
Large photo portfolios, coffee table books. These are the types of things I want to look at on a tablet.
- Zav - Imagine a Beowulf cluster of insensitive clods...