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Ask Slashdot: Why Do Most Tablet Specs Suck?

Slashdot reader Qbertino describes himself as a "happy tablet user," moving from an old HTC Flyer to his Yoga 2. But he notes that most other tablets "have laughable battery times," and "I've yet to find a tablet that does not give me storage or memory problems in some way or other, lasts for a day or two in power and doesn't feel chintzy and like it won't stand a month of regular everyday use and carrying around..." He asks why none of the manufacturers seem willing to offer more than one gigabyte of RAM -- and why they're so stingy with storage. "Where is the rugged 16GB RAM / 1TB Storage / 20-hour battery tablet?"

So leave your educated opinions in the comments. What are your thoughts on the current tablet market? And are they the ultimate all-purpose "convergence" device that Apple and Ubuntu seem to think they are?

231 comments

  1. cuz RAM uses power by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    More RAM less battery life

    1. Re:cuz RAM uses power by TechyImmigrant · · Score: 2

      More RAM less battery life

      Not with effective power management. Unused RAM can be powered down.

      --
      I should use this sig to advertise my book ISBN-13 : 978-1501515132.
    2. Re: cuz RAM uses power by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      RAM is hot as well. Though still can be powered down.

    3. Re: cuz RAM uses power by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Not very much at all- especially for LPDDR4. The cost being maybe 5/GB for tablets including battery, I don't get it.

    4. Re: cuz RAM uses power by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The "Cloud" is the future of data storage. Tablets are the "thin clients" of the decade.

    5. Re: cuz RAM uses power by Toonol · · Score: 1

      No, but that's what the manufacturers would like, so they're crippling tablets to try to force it.

    6. Re:cuz RAM uses power by tlambert · · Score: 1

      More RAM less battery life

      Not with effective power management. Unused RAM can be powered down.

      It is. RAM which is never installed in a device is, by definition, "powered down".

    7. Re:cuz RAM uses power by houstonbofh · · Score: 1

      Of course you have a lot more room for a bigger battery in a tablet then in a phone...

    8. Re: cuz RAM uses power by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Not used the ASUS TF range I see.... A boxed NOS TF101 will now set you back almost $1000

    9. Re:cuz RAM uses power by Larryish · · Score: 1

      Toshiba Thrive 10.1

      HDMI out, full-sized USB, mini USB, and an SD slot. 768 RAM, decent storage.

      Holds a charge for 2 to 3 days depending on how much browsing is done.

      The only difference I find between it and a low-end netbook is the touchscreen keyboard.

    10. Re: cuz RAM uses power by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The iPad by design restricts communication with the outside world. Jobs was paranoid about polluting his systems, so he made them islands to themselves. The iPad badly needs a general purpose USB connection, and it badly needs an SD slot to create a more flexible storage system. There is no user accessible file system on the iPad. There is no console. There are no compilers. It's a toy for doing mundane tasks, allbeit very well. Their facetime app is superb.

    11. Re: cuz RAM uses power by HangUpAndDrive · · Score: 1

      iPad 1 original had cheap adapters available for both SD and USB, which got less and less functional with every update, eventually not working at all. IMO it's concrete proof of Apple "making things worse on purpose" Still love my iPad Air 2 for anything not involving productivity, so yes, toy apps

    12. Re:cuz RAM uses power by Maritz · · Score: 1

      The Android tablets are all jokes designed to be ebook readers and nothing else.

      All of them. Suure.

      It must be weird being so besotted by the offerings of one company.

      --
      I do not want your cheap brainburning drugs. They are useless for work. And I am a working man today.
  2. people want cheap by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    apparently these days cheap is all that matters - quality doesn't

    1. Re:people want cheap by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      apparently these days cheap is all that matters - quality doesn't

      This.

      Nobody is interested in making a good product, only a cheap product.

    2. Re:people want cheap by Noah+Haders · · Score: 1

      apparently these days cheap is all that matters - quality doesn't

      I'm super satisfied with my new iPad Air 2. Good performance, good battery life, good storage, good build quality.

    3. Re:people want cheap by Tx · · Score: 4, Insightful

      apparently these days cheap is all that matters - quality doesn't

      This.

      Nobody is interested in making a good product, only a cheap product.

      The issue is that nobody is willing to pay for high-end tablets. A few years ago, there were more premium tablets around, and they didn't sell.

      The fact is that high end phones sell because a) many people get them on contract with low up-front cost, and b) people carry their phones around and use them a lot every single day, so it's easier to justify. By constrast, you mostly have to pay up-front for a tablet, and for many people it's used a lot less than a phone, and so for the majority, a cheap tablet is just fine, especially since today's premium tablet will be outperformed by budget tablets in less than two years.

      --
      Oh no... it's the future.
    4. Re:people want cheap by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      then why the hell are iPads are so popular?

    5. Re:people want cheap by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

      apparently these days cheap is all that matters - quality doesn't

      This.

      Nobody is interested in making a good product, only a cheap product.

      The issue is that nobody is willing to pay for high-end tablets. A few years ago, there were more premium tablets around, and they didn't sell.

      Tablets are a niche product with limited usefulness and as a result nobody is willing to pay a lot for them.

      The iPad is well made and has good specs, but offers no expandability and you have to buy the most expensive one to get a decent amount of storage. For the same price as the top of the line iPad I bought a laptop with a bigger screen, faster more powerful CPU, a lot more storage, 4 USB ports and an HDMI.

    6. Re:people want cheap by Sax+Russell+5449D29A · · Score: 2, Insightful

      I don't think it's about costs, it's about demand. Having a tablet with such specs would be like cramming a 5 liter V8 into a moped. It can be done, but there likely aren't many people who'd want an unstable and unbalanced vehicle.

      --
      -SR
    7. Re:people want cheap by Chas · · Score: 0

      Two words on this:

      LIFESTYLE ACCESSORY.

      That's basically all Apple is actually any good for nowadays. Affluence signaling...

      The thing is, compared to other devices, tablets are actually MORE expensive due to the need to reduce weight and size. This magnifies the cost impact when moving up to a superior spec for hardware. And, as has been noted, most people don't WANT to pay beaucoup buckage for a superior tablet. This means creation of a separate SKU that they KNOW isn't going to sell well. As such, the price becomes even HIGHER as they tack in enough surcharge to make it financially worth carrying the extra, low-volume SKU.

      Additionally, most tablets are media CONSUMPTION devices. As such, so long as they can roughly handle the software load for all the formats they're expected to use, they're "good enough". In a lot of cases, a workstation-spec tablet is pointless, as it isn't delivering a superior media consumption experience and nobody in their right mind performs more than VERY cursory media creation tasks on one.

      As such, guided by the market, manufacturers have somewhat rigidly defined the loadout and form factor for a tablet. And that's cheap, low power, low space and totally un-upgradeable.

      --


      Chas - The one, the only.
      THANK GOD!!!
    8. Re:people want cheap by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Apparently you've never heard of GAMES. Of which, there are thousands and THOUSANDS on both the iOS and Google Play stores.

      Manufacturers can make loads more selling cheaper tablets, which is why none of them want to compete with faster tablets, more storage, more RAM...the cheaper tablets sell, and the premium tablets (of which there are a few) are astronomically expensive (and have huge margins).

    9. Re:people want cheap by roc97007 · · Score: 1

      > The issue is that nobody is willing to pay for high-end tablets.

      I think that it's a chicken-and-egg issue. Tablets are considered media consumption devices, so nobody makes a tablet studly enough for real work, so the expectation is that tablets are media consumption devices, and consumers don't expect tablets to be studly enough for real work.

      --
      Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
    10. Re: people want cheap by johnsmithperson123 · · Score: 1

      Yeah, the $200 iPhone scam sucks. We need the FCC to ban lock in contracts from cell providers.

    11. Re:people want cheap by Stan92057 · · Score: 1

      i didn't and wont buy a table because if im going to spend the kinda money to get a decent one i might as well just buy a laptop. IMO tablets are a total waste of money. Everyone that i know who bought one its collecting dust or used by kids for playing games. They use their phones or laptops. and say i regret buying a tablet.

      --
      Jack of all trades,master of none
    12. Re:people want cheap by Gondola · · Score: 5, Informative

      We have three tablets for the two of us. One in the kitchen for recipes, and a personal one for us to use around the house.

      I often hang out on the couch and listen to music while I read e-comics, browse Reddit or Imgur, or use the tablet to look up IMDB entries. A laptop is just cumbersome and hot in those circumstances. An 8" tablet like my Samsung (1600p, beautiful display) is perfect, easy to read -- easier to read than a 4" phone screen. Laptop too big, phone too small.

      Also works fine in the bathroom. Easier to read than a phone.

      I have a crappy Nook HD for recipes and music selection in the kitchen -- it's a lot more portable than a laptop, fits everywhere, lasts a week or more on a charge just sitting there, and I don't have to worry about getting anything in a keyboard or using a mouse or crappy touch pad. Laptop too big, phone too small.

      I was skeptical about getting a tablet, but for us they've worked out great in these scenarios.

      Everyone has different needs.

    13. Re:people want cheap by Chas · · Score: 1

      try rereading what was said.

      --


      Chas - The one, the only.
      THANK GOD!!!
    14. Re:people want cheap by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I have a $300 laptop and use it for serious development work. I don't need anything more and with the money I save, I can afford to upgrade faster if I need to.

    15. Re:people want cheap by Toonol · · Score: 1

      I don't think it's the price. I think it the fault of shallow fashion. The push for the thinnest, most minimalist tablet possible, outweighs nearly everything else. If they doubled the thickness of an iPad, how much bigger battery could they fit? 4x? How much more durable would it be?

      My tablet is big, clunky, but has both a micro and a full size USB port, along with the HDMI, microphone, power, and sd card, and I love it.

    16. Re:people want cheap by fluffernutter · · Score: 1

      I'd be fine with paying a premium price for a tablet if I didn't have to pay a premium price for the shareholders of the company that makes the tablet.

      --
      Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
    17. Re:people want cheap by whoever57 · · Score: 1

      The issue is that nobody is willing to pay for high-end tablets.

      It's not that nobody is willing to pay for high-end tablets, it's that not enough are willing to pay.

      The same phenomenon has affected many other products. You can either buy a low-end and cheap product or an ultra-high-end and very expensive version.

      The pool of natural buyers of mid-range devices (the middle class) is being hollowed out with increasing wealth disparity to the point that the middle class do not buy enough mid-range products for it to be economically viable to make mid-range products.

      --
      The real "Libtards" are the Libertarians!
    18. Re:people want cheap by Shadow99_1 · · Score: 2, Informative

      I still don't own a a smartphone and instead use a very old now Asus Transformer TF201. I don't own a smartphone because even basic plans cost me around $90/month and I just don't need mobile data much at all (I almost entirely use wireless at home and use the tablet when I do). My talk and text is astronomically low to the point I have over a 'thousand minutes' built up on my pay as you go feature phone and I spend like $22 every 3 months. However I take my tablet everywhere and have for years with ~8 hours of life as long as I keep the screen brightness down and if I need it I have the keyboard with a second battery in it. My mom actually complains about how I take it with me everywhere so I can read books, play video, tap into open wifi to look things up online, listen to music, take notes, write a novel, and perform all sorts of other tasks. It's more than paid for itself, though it did cost ~$700 brand new with the keyboard. So it could have bought a laptop, but I have a laptop and barely use it because it's to big to take with me easy and overkill for most of what I need. Instead a tablet with a keyboard attachment is basically perfect. Sadly it's getting long in the tooth now running an ancient version of android and it's certainly never going to see an upgrade to a newer version. It's taken a lot of abuse over the years as well and is still ticking, though it's chipped and even has a crack from the hundreds of times it's fallen off of something I lay it on and fallen onto numerous floors including some absurdly hard tiles.

      Since most pay pay absurd amounts for a mobile phone each month and already have a smartphone which has grown larger and larger over the years, I'm not surprised most people don't look at tablets. I know I'm so not the typical consumer, but then most people don't know what they are missing either. My parents have wanted a tablet like mine for quite awhile instead of the laptop they got (and which has numerous odd issues). I think they would appeal more to the older generation, but they aren't targeted at that market and so a lot of people who would enjoy them never hear of them (not even the Ipad, which is probably the best known of them).

      --
      we are all invisible unless we choose otherwise
    19. Re:people want cheap by Shadow99_1 · · Score: 1

      I don't own a smartphone so I know I'm an odd duck, but my tablet goes with me everywhere and has for five years now. It's much smaller and easier to take with me than a laptop (of which mine is gathering dust and was a giant paper weight and internet tv long before that). Mine lasts more than 8 hours on a charge (even now five years on), has a keyboard which is nicely sized (no squished fingers trying to type on it) which even has a extra battery should I need it, Is perfectly fine to write things on or even do light spreadsheet work with (I balance my checkbook on it and import it to PC), and is perfect for listening to music or even watching video. I also have a large collection of books on it (from manuals to comics). So no, for me it wasn't a waste of money and I've loved it every since I got it.

      --
      we are all invisible unless we choose otherwise
    20. Re:people want cheap by Shadow99_1 · · Score: 1

      I own a Asus Transformer TF201 , which must not be a 'media consumption tablet' as I do a lot of 'media creation tasks' on it. Heck I've done video editing on it a few times, though recent updates have made that more painful. But I balance my checkbook (spreadsheet), keep notes, have written a couple novels (at least in part, though that has more to do with the limitations of formating in the app I had that made it cross platform with PC and autosynced it wirelessly). That said I do read a lot on it and watch Twitch and Youtube on it a good bit while using my PC even, so I do consume a lot as well. However at least my tablet is flexible and while it was fairly expensive (around $500 for the tablet itself when I bought it), it has been more than worth it.

      --
      we are all invisible unless we choose otherwise
    21. Re:people want cheap by Solandri · · Score: 2

      That's what I'm trying to do too - tablets lying around the house as convenience devices to replace magazines, sticky notes, a pad of paper, etc.. But the problem is these tablets drain their battery in about a week even when not doing anything. Charging one tablet once a week is trivial. But when you've got a half dozen tablets and no easy way to keep track of all their charges at once, it becomes a chore. Turning them off isn't really an option because it takes about half a minute to turn them back on.

      I'd really like a suspend feature like on laptops, where the battery can last a month (or three) when not used, but the tablet wakes up in seconds ready to use at the press of a button. As a bonus that takes care of all the stupid apps which insist on draining your battery even though there is no reason for them to be doing anything because nobody is using the tablet - they can't run if the device is suspended.

    22. Re:people want cheap by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Gotta wonder what you've got...I have an Iconia A500 that sounds like that. I'm running a roll-your-own rom and have 2 128GB micro sd cards plugged in (one internal, one on a micro usb reader). With a motorola bluetooth trackpoint keyboard, I have stopped using my laptop for a lot of stuff. Not a real powerhouse, but it has been a workhorse for me, and I can plug in a 3TB usb drive formatted in compressed NTFS--no problems. Since it has a separate charge port, I can use the usb all the time, and when I plug it in to my laptop, I have access to all the storage on it. It has a real GPS receiver, with all the North American continent on it, I can always figure out how to get from A to B. I have looked at replacing it with something more current and powerful, and have not found anything with all the features this old thing has. Sad that nothing I've found can replace this 5-year-old feature-wise in a way that I think counts...

    23. Re:people want cheap by Chas · · Score: 1

      Ah, the old "I hates me some capitalismz!" argument...

      --


      Chas - The one, the only.
      THANK GOD!!!
    24. Re:people want cheap by Chas · · Score: 1

      Nope. The Asus Transformer is a Tablet/Laptop hybrid that skews heavily toward laptop...

      --


      Chas - The one, the only.
      THANK GOD!!!
    25. Re: people want cheap by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You can change to a custom rom and get an upgrade in experience..try cyanogenmod

    26. Re:people want cheap by mobby_6kl · · Score: 1

      >apparently these days cheap is all that matters - quality doesn't

      Oh shut up. First of all, the tablet the OP wants exists, go ahead and pay three grand for it if you want. The battery won't last two days of usage because there's no battery technology that is dense enough to allow that without making the tablet enormous and/or super slow.

      The claim itself is of course extremely stupid, but I'm not going to spend time on it as I'm getting a feeling that this was a very masterful troll that got modded up somehow.

    27. Re:people want cheap by Osgeld · · Score: 1

      that's obviously true for the op as he has only been searching in the 200 section of newegg

    28. Re:people want cheap by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      you mad bro?

    29. Re:people want cheap by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I agree. The problem is a tablet doesn't have expandablity. They don't offer the ports for usb, monitors etc. There might be some now with usb type c that can attach to an external monitor without chromcast/air play or whatever it is called but true real, dual monitor with a real non-remote control sized keyboard? Doesn't really work with a tablet. So for those willing to pay "real money" for a productivity tablet they probably also want all the other stuff that comes along with a computer, big harddrive, docking to external monitors support for usb devices, in most cases a non-mobile OS (the arguments you can do 90% of what you need on an app is pointless if the other 10% is required to get paid) etc.

    30. Re: people want cheap by Shadow99_1 · · Score: 1

      Cyanogenmod doesn't support the transformer series, most likely due to the custom interface (which includes a locking mechanism to hold it in place) for the keyboard/battery attachment. Though for the TF201 specifically the GPS chip is also not supported at all.

      --
      we are all invisible unless we choose otherwise
    31. Re:people want cheap by YukariHirai · · Score: 1

      I think that it's a chicken-and-egg issue. Tablets are considered media consumption devices, so nobody makes a tablet studly enough for real work, so the expectation is that tablets are media consumption devices, and consumers don't expect tablets to be studly enough for real work.

      Tablets were actually like that before - basically laptops with a touchscreen that you could swivel around to use without the keyboard in the way. But they never gained much traction in that form. They cost more than the same laptop sans swivelling touchscreen, and few had that much use for it over and above a standard laptop.

      Since the introduction of the current standard format of tablet, there have been a few here and there that try to be a tablet for "real work" from the other direction, by adding a detachable keyboard and things like that. But they've never really taken off either. The reality is that for 95% of people, the tablet is for media consumption and other light tasks, and the PC and/or laptop are for more serious work. One device with the strengths of both but the weaknesses of neither would be nice, but is A) way easier said than done, and B) only considered necessary by a small handful.

    32. Re:people want cheap by Shadow99_1 · · Score: 1

      Um, no. Their are 2 transformer series of devices from Asus. One is a series of laptops with 'tablet' style features. The other are Tablets with laptop style functions (through the keyboard/battery attachment).

      This is what I own: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... or go here for the original page: https://www.asus.com/Tablets/E...

      Asus seems to have been brain dead when creating the marketing for these, which has lead to the confusion.

      --
      we are all invisible unless we choose otherwise
    33. Re: people want cheap by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Android 6.0.1 Marshmallow for the Asus Eee Pad Transformer Prime:
      http://forum.xda-developers.com/transformer-prime/development/rom-katshmallow-t3296607

    34. Re:people want cheap by Blaskowicz · · Score: 1

      That's becoming a technical possibility. If the tablet outputs Displayport then dual monitors is a thing, if you use daisy chained monitors or a hub. That's special hardware though. In other cases you might need to carry the HDMI dongle or the DVI dongle etc.
      Even VGA CRT and PS/2 keyb and mouse might be possible with the right dongles, cables and hubs.
      I think the issue is the general public will not order dongles and crap from the internet(*) or want to put research into which hardware supports what. Even, or especially if a $15 expense makes your $1000 stuff a lot more useful.

      (*) Repeat when needed. Likelyhood of dongles-on-dongles in some cases, or dongle on hub on dongle.

      Another technical possibility is the single chip PCIe SSD. Fast, big (512GB) and reliable storage, it's completely fixed though (like mac book pro)
      USB 3.1 may be deemed good enough for spinning platter storage, SSD etc.
      Now can you get USB 3.1 and dual external display at the same time? That's the kind of question most don't want to deal with.

    35. Re:people want cheap by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I know if I put my iphone/ipad in airplane mode without wifi, they can easily last a month on standby.

    36. Re: people want cheap by Dahamma · · Score: 1

      Welcome to 2016! The major providers have for the most part abandoned lock in contracts for cell phone discounts already.

    37. Re:people want cheap by Dahamma · · Score: 1

      You have somewhat of a point, but size is not the same thing as fashion.

      Sure, the iPad Air is "sexy", but it's also amazingly compact and lightweight - I can take it on short trips instead of my laptop without carrying a backpack. And I can hold it up to read for extended periods without making my arms tired.

      I just don't see the need for a tablet having most of the specs of my laptop (minus decent graphics, I guess) without the usability of a real keyboard, mouse, Ethernet, etc.

    38. Re: people want cheap by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I am not willing to stick a sim card in my tablet. Bad enough that google sucks my phone number and who knows what else out of my cell. My tablet connects well enough via wifi thru my phone. Power drain is about the same as using the tablet as a phone to get 4G. This way I can install any app from anywhere. My data is backed up. The only issue I see is that the android OS still does not have the basic programs PCs always have. Command line (yes, I know there is an app for that). Basic text pad (how can android compete with windows if it does not offer the basics), root ((without hacking the OS)), full access to the OS, etc.

    39. Re:people want cheap by houstonbofh · · Score: 2

      The issue is that nobody is willing to pay for high-end tablets. A few years ago, there were more premium tablets around, and they didn't sell.

      Not exactly. The "High End" tablets came preloaded with crapware and were hard to root. The China knockoffs had the same specs and had no preloaded crapware and were easy to root if not pre-rooted. I will pay more for more ram, and flash. I will not pay more for Samsung Update Utility and backup!

    40. Re:people want cheap by houstonbofh · · Score: 1

      The A500 is a fantastic device! We have one too and it ain't for sale!

    41. Re:people want cheap by davester666 · · Score: 1

      But it wasn't free as well. I want a free one. Mind telling me where you live?

      --
      Sleep your way to a whiter smile...date a dentist!
    42. Re: people want cheap by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You can't lay in bed and hold a laptop in your hands. Smart phones are too small for extended use.

    43. Re: people want cheap by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Tablets need a privacy mode similar to browser privacy mode. Enable the mode and no real data is scraped from your tablet, no changes are permanent, files are protected ala ms UAC, etc.

      At some point tablets will stop being just toys.

    44. Re:people want cheap by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      Sadly it's getting long in the tooth now running an ancient version of android and it's certainly never going to see an upgrade to a newer version.

      You can get Marshmallow for it, but it bootloops on my TF201. And frankly, even the Kitkat release is quite unstable. You really have to go back to HairyBean if you want the damned thing to be reliable.

      I don't know if motorola makes a tablet and I'm not in the market so I don't care but I love their phones. Kind of crap GPU usually, but coming from a TF201 you'd be used to that

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    45. Re: people want cheap by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      To use in bath: Put tablet inside an A4 ziplock bag

    46. Re:people want cheap by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It's absurd to have that many tablets. They'll all go obsolete at the same time and end up in a mountain of e-waste in Ghana or China. Pen and paper require a modicum of resources. Tablets are full of rare metals and plastics that will not be recovered even by "recycling."

      Come on, laziness is no excuse for the proliferation of waste.

    47. Re:people want cheap by jon3k · · Score: 1

      . I know I'm so not the typical consumer, but then most people don't know what they are missing either.

      What are they missing? Lugging around an old, mediocre tablet or using a terrible flip phone? As someone who has a smartphone, tablet and laptop (all with integrated 4G) I think you're the one who doesn't know what he's missing.

    48. Re:people want cheap by jon3k · · Score: 1

      Why does everyone keep saying there aren't high end tablets? You can get a Surface Pro 4 with 16GB of RAM, 256GB SSD and an i7.

    49. Re:people want cheap by jon3k · · Score: 1

      Why not just buy/build some docks for them that keep them charged? Something like this.

    50. Re: people want cheap by roc97007 · · Score: 1

      Windows doesn't count, for a number of reasons. I tried going that route, it's carp. Microsoft still doesn't get tablets.

      --
      Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
    51. Re: people want cheap by jon3k · · Score: 1

      Windows doesn't count, for a number of reasons.

      Original post doesn't specify an operating system, and you can run Linux on Surface tablets. There's an entire subreddit devoted to the practice.

      So YOU'RE specifically referring to high end Android tablets? Samsung tried higher end business tablets and it was a disaster. The Android tablet ecosystem is horrible. The only chick and egg problem is that no one will buy an Android tablet because of the horrible state of Android tablet apps, and no one will build Android tablet apps because, well, Android tablets are cheap garbage.

    52. Re:people want cheap by Noah+Haders · · Score: 1

      You want a free ipad? everybody wants a free thing. I'm in CA.

    53. Re:people want cheap by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "Sadly it's getting long in the tooth now running an ancient version of android and it's certainly never going to see an upgrade to a newer version."
      See xda-developers.com for both Lollipop & Marshmallow on the TF201. I use [ROM] [TF201] KatKiss 5.1.1 - v30 [MultiWindow] [Stable] [RRO]

    54. Re: people want cheap by roc97007 · · Score: 1

      Nope, I'm specifically referring to a tablet, almost certainly with a stylus, a professional-grade digitizer, enough grunt for serious content creation, an operating system that doesn't demand you connect a keyboard and mouse to get real work done, and applications that are truly touch friendly. The name of the OS is immaterial. It's just that I know from personal experience that Winders ain't it, and is in fact much further behind the curve than either IOS or Android. The feel from Microsoft is that they added touch as a line item, not something that people would seriously use.

      And yes, I'm aware of PixelSense. Unfortunately, it doesn't seem to have a future beyond TV prop.

      --
      Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
    55. Re: people want cheap by jon3k · · Score: 1

      In what world is Windows behind Android on a tablet for "serious content creation" ? What Android tablets have anything approaching a "professional-grade digitizer" ?

    56. Re:people want cheap by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Thing about the iPads is that there is no capability for inserting a Micro SD. Otherwise, there'd be no issue

    57. Re:people want cheap by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I don't think it's about costs, it's about demand. Having a tablet with such specs would be like cramming a 5 liter V8 into a moped. It can be done, but there likely aren't many people who'd want an unstable and unbalanced vehicle.

      Not a valid analogy at all.

      On the battery thing, for people who use their tablet on the road all the time, or are usually away from a charging station, a 20 hr battery would be a godsend. On the memory thing too, it doesn't take much space to store memory, and even for storage, in this age of SSDs and GB density NAND, that wouldn't be an issue either. In other words, that wouldn't eat up more of the battery life. Yeah, having a more powerful CPU would erode battery life, but not the memory capacities.

      My biggest beef is manufacturers capping how much of Micro SD density something can take - capping it at 128GB or 200GB? That thing is just a slot - why not let the device handle whatever the density? Is that an OS limitation? For 64-bit OSs, it's a pretty stupid one. From Marshmallow on, one has the capability of making the SD card the primary memory (just never remove it). So get a tablet with say, 8GB of storage but with Marshmallow, slap on a 256GB SD card, make that the main memory, and make the on-board storage of the tablet the secondary memory, where one can store all the music.

    58. Re:people want cheap by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Due to the paucity of apps for Windows 10, somehow Surfaces are not seen as tablets the way iPads or Android tablets are. Try getting, say, Lyft or AirBnB on that, and you'll get what I mean. Yeah, physically they are tablets, but getting them is like someone getting say, an SGI Indy in the 90s, and then trying to get something like Quicken to run on it.

    59. Re:people want cheap by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Tablets are a niche product with limited usefulness and as a result nobody is willing to pay a lot for them.

      The iPad is well made and has good specs, but offers no expandability and you have to buy the most expensive one to get a decent amount of storage. For the same price as the top of the line iPad I bought a laptop with a bigger screen, faster more powerful CPU, a lot more storage, 4 USB ports and an HDMI.

      For me, while I use a laptop more, my tablets have replaced both paperback books, as well as TV. Any book I want, I get via Kindle. No need to lug them around when I move, and all my books are at my fingertips w/ the tablet. And TV - I either view them on YouTube or go online on the laptop to view them.

      Also, some of the things available on tablets are not there on phones, and vice versa.

    60. Re: people want cheap by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Linux on Surfaces is not the point. The point is - the apps that you need the most - are they there on Windows 10, or the other OSs that you run on a Surface? If you run Android, you may get it.

      I have 2 tablets - an iPad Mini, as well as a Verizon Ellipsis 10. The Ellipsis 10 - not had any issues w/ any of the apps I've downloaded on it. Same w/ the iPad Mini. Some things, like your banking apps, ain't there on tablets, which is a shame. But other than that, the tablets work pretty well for me.

    61. Re:people want cheap by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I have 2 tablets and 3 phones. What I did was got a USB hub, which I connect to a power source near my bedside table. Then plug in everything to each port - usually leaving one on hand. That way, the devices are not battling each other for the power supply.

    62. Re:people want cheap by tehcyder · · Score: 1

      Why does everyone keep saying there aren't high end tablets? You can get a Surface Pro 4 with 16GB of RAM, 256GB SSD and an i7.

      It's an unwritten law on slashdot that anything produced by Microsoft doesn't really count: it's bound to be rubbish, and it probably takes pictures of you while you're asleep and sends them to The Cloud for later blackmail purposes such as forcing you to upgrade to Windows 10.

      --
      To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
    63. Re:people want cheap by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I don't think it's about costs, it's about demand.

      Some people have incredibly stupid and/or impossible expectations, and they tend to bitch the loudest when ther demands aren't met.

    64. Re: people want cheap by david_thornley · · Score: 1

      an operating system that doesn't demand you connect a keyboard and mouse to get real work done

      How the heck are you supposed to get real work done without a decent keyboard? Why would you expect a tablet to have a decent keyboard built in, that would just get in the way for lots of use cases?

      If you want a usable keyboard with your tablet, buy one. They aren't all that expensive, and they're easy to use.

      It sounds to me like the closest thing to what you want is a Microsoft Surface running Android or iOS, and they have detachable keyboards you pay additional for.

      --
      "When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
    65. Re:people want cheap by david_thornley · · Score: 1

      I bought a low-end tablet with a large screen because I was getting a lot of letter-sized PDFs and I was getting really tired of reading them on my laptop. For what I wanted it for, it does the job just fine at a reasonable cost. It's also great for the ePub comics I buy now and then. The camera sucks, the sound is bad, and the processing power is unimpressive, but I don't care.

      --
      "When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
    66. Re:people want cheap by david_thornley · · Score: 1

      They're dead easy to use and are pretty secure when used by people who don't have a clue about computer security. They work very nicely. They're not particularly expensive when compared with comparable Androids, and they tend to be nicer.

      --
      "When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
    67. Re:people want cheap by Coren22 · · Score: 1

      https://fi.google.com/

      $20/mo + $10/GB, with refunds of up to the megabyte not used in a month.

      If you are paying $90/month for a phone, you are doing something very wrong. Even Verizon, the most expensive cell company doesn't charge that much.

      --
      APK likes to ask for responses to the same things over and over. Maybe he just likes the responses?
    68. Re:people want cheap by Coren22 · · Score: 1

      Thank you for linking to your social awkwardness and inability to comprehend basic logic, it saves me the time linking to those posts where I totally demolished your whole argument.

      --
      APK likes to ask for responses to the same things over and over. Maybe he just likes the responses?
    69. Re:people want cheap by Coren22 · · Score: 1

      Thank you for again linking to your failure. It is so nice to see you showing your own lack of knowledge out in the open like that. Maybe when you go out and learn some about security you can intern under me to learn how the real world works.

      --
      APK likes to ask for responses to the same things over and over. Maybe he just likes the responses?
    70. Re: people want cheap by roc97007 · · Score: 1

      I think you misunderstand. A well designed tablet system (hardware/os/apps) shouldn't need a keyboard at all. The Surface is just a laptop with a touch screen, an OS mashup that doesn't do anything well, and a bunch of KVM-specific apps.

      --
      Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
    71. Re:people want cheap by sjames · · Score: 1

      Besides, they want to make tablets thin enough to chop vegetables so they can break easily.

  3. Xperia Z3 Tablet Compact by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    8"
    1920*1200
    around 8-10 h SoT
    3 GB RAM
    32 GB storage
    front speakers

    review and specs:
    http://www.gsmarena.com/sony_xperia_z3_tablet_compact-6633.php

    1. Re:Xperia Z3 Tablet Compact by Tx · · Score: 1

      I have one, and it's great, but it sure isn't the "rugged 16GB RAM / 1TB Storage / 20-hour battery tablet" that the submitter is asking for. But I think the submitter needs to explain why he thinks he needs those specs, because the fact is tablet specs actually don't suck, since they're good enough for the task most people use them for, and I can't see how most people would benefit from the specs he's asking for.

      --
      Oh no... it's the future.
    2. Re: Xperia Z3 Tablet Compact by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The Z4 Tablet is also superb. I'm writing this post from mine, and get ~11 hours screen-on with high brightness, loads of memory and storage, great performance, and you name it. And yet it is slimmer than any iPad ever built, and far lighter as well.

    3. Re:Xperia Z3 Tablet Compact by chipschap · · Score: 2

      the fact is tablet specs actually don't suck, since they're good enough for the task most people use them for

      This clearly states the issue.

      A year ago I bought a supposedly high-end expensive Samsung tablet and completely regret it. I've gotten little use out of it because (and I confess to having done inadequate pre-purchase research) it is just about useless as a productivity device, even with a Bluetooth keyboard.

      At about the same time I bought an Asus Zenbook, installed Linux on it, and it's been worth every cent I paid--- I can get work done, unlike on the tablet. (For me, work is mostly writing and blogging.)

      Tablets indeed are media consumption devices and seem to be nearly always used as such. It leads to a self-limiting cycle in which a productivity oriented tablet won't come to pass.

    4. Re:Xperia Z3 Tablet Compact by yithar7153 · · Score: 2

      Yeah, I agree with you. I don't understand why he doesn't just buy a laptop with those specs, as laptops are better productivity devices. It's not clear to me why he specifically needs a tablet with those specs.

    5. Re:Xperia Z3 Tablet Compact by Shadow99_1 · · Score: 1

      If you want a tablet you can get work done on, I'd look at the Asus Transformer tablets. I own an ancient TF201, and not the shiny new TF701T, but it's been simply great with an attachable 'fullsized' keyboard that folds up with it and includes a second battery should ~8 hours not be enough (or you want to run the screen fairly bright all the time). I've done everything from writing novels, updating spreadsheets, and a couple times even video editing with it. Sadly from a quick look Asus doesn't seem to sell the TF701T on their website anymore and few places seem to carry it. Sad for such a great product that they simply never marketed well.

      --
      we are all invisible unless we choose otherwise
  4. Advertising, that's why there's no storage by CRCulver · · Score: 5, Insightful

    and why they're so stingy with storage.

    Because the business model of a number of tablet makers is giving you little on-device storage so that you start using their cloud storage service, which gives them an opportunity to sell you an additional service or sell your data to advertisers, duh.

    1. Re:Advertising, that's why there's no storage by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      in summary, they're scum.

    2. Re: Advertising, that's why there's no storage by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Maybe with an microSD slot and OTG USB it's easier to put those requirements in the hands of the user and not constantly bog the battery?

    3. Re:Advertising, that's why there's no storage by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      oc this bm extends further into their hardware but we the consumer will be left standing naked in the cold with our hardware in our hands. Presumably.

    4. Re:Advertising, that's why there's no storage by thegarbz · · Score: 2

      I don't think it's that nefarious. I think it's because tablets are treated as toys and therefore priced as such.

  5. WHY? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    Why Do Most Tablet Specs Suck?

    No fucking idea about tablets. I use caplets and gel caps myself.

    Maybe try rectal administration?

  6. Convergence device? by krisbrowne42 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Most pundits decry Apple for not making the iPad a convergence device. The tablet condenses nearly every hard problem in making computers - big, high-res displays take more memory and compute to drive. Memory takes battery to drive. Battery weighs a lot. Nobody wants to carry that weight. Every tablet is a compromise - no matter what MS tries to tell you.

    1. Re:Convergence device? by guacamole · · Score: 1

      Tablets have a nice niche as a media consumption device, just don't try to use them as a convergence device. I hope the convergence bubble eventually pops as devices like Surface Pro are kinda crappy if used as notebooks, and or the most part hardly qualify or are usable as a tablet. I personally don't understand the unhealthy interest people have in those things. I'd take a Lenovo Yoga any time over Surface.

    2. Re:Convergence device? by RoccamOccam · · Score: 1

      I haven't looked at the Yoga, but I disagree about the Surface Pro being crappy as a notebook replacement. That's exactly what I did (replaced a high-end HP Laptop) and I've been extremely happy with it.

  7. I'm a happy tablet user by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I got the Samsung Pro 12,2" with 32gb on board with a 128gb sd and a optional keyboard. It's the best laptop I never had. It's not rugged, but with the keyboard that double has a case, I drop it so many time since i have it and it never broke... but, then, it's over 2 years old tablet and Samsung doesn't update the software after 6 months neither they have another version !

    1. Re:I'm a happy tablet user by denisbergeron · · Score: 1

      I have the same setup and very happy!

      --
      Ceci n'est pas une Signature !
  8. My Recommendation... by EmeraldBot · · Score: 5, Informative

    Try checking out the Memopad 572c. 2 GB RAM, a fantastic screen, supports SD cards, and a really high performing chip with ~ 10 hour battery life, all for less than $199. It's not made anymore, can only get up to Android 5 at the moment, and won't take on the full size ipad, but for what you get it's a fantastic deal, if you can still find it. A decent $199 tablet seems to be a lost art these days :/

    --
    "Set a man a fire, he'll be warm for the rest of the night. Set a man afire, he'll be warm for the rest of his life."
    1. Re:My Recommendation... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Who let the advertisement bot onto the forums?

    2. Re:My Recommendation... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Since the original question doesn't mention limits for screen size or prize, I'd suggest the Panasonic Toughpad 4k. It's 20", runs Windows by default, and only comes with 256GB SSD, but fulfills the requrement of 16GB. It happens to cost about $4k

  9. RAM by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I've got 2 tablets, bother are several years old, one of which can be had for $100 on ebay, both of them have 2GB of ram.

    Try looking harder.

  10. "Where is the rugged 16GB RAM ... tablet"? by Nutria · · Score: 3, Informative

    In fairy land with the unicorns and super-dense LiPo batteries that don't explode when you sneeze really hard.

    Because what do you need in order to power 16GB RAM and a 1TB SSD??? Lots of power. Which don't exist in batteries with the density required at prices that are affordable.

    --
    "I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
    1. Re:"Where is the rugged 16GB RAM ... tablet"? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Another way to say this is that he isn't shopping for a tablet. He's shopping for a laptop.

    2. Re:"Where is the rugged 16GB RAM ... tablet"? by AmiMoJo · · Score: 2

      It's pointless having 16GB of RAM anyway, because tablet apps don't need it. Anything that needs 16GB RAM would be better run on a laptop with a keyboard and mouse. You can get laptops that are under 800g with a good 12" screen and good battery life.

      1TB of storage is more useful if you are really random and can't plan far enough ahead to whittle your HD movie collection down to a 256GB SD card.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    3. Re:"Where is the rugged 16GB RAM ... tablet"? by thegarbz · · Score: 5, Informative

      This is the dumbest comment on Slashdot today. There's almost no difference in power consumption between small and large SSDs, likewise with the additional RAM. For example: standby power difference between a 120GB 850 pro and a 500GB 850 pro is in the order of 5mW. For those that don't understand what five milliwatts is let me put it for you in an example:

      An iPad has a 43Wh battery in it. The power difference between the SSDs would drain the battery in 8600 hours, or to put it in numbers that are easier to understand, if you iPad currently lasts 10hours, with the upgraded SSD the iPad would last 9h 59m 18s.

      During write these numbers are worse but the standard tablet usage scenario does not include continuous writing.

    4. Re:"Where is the rugged 16GB RAM ... tablet"? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Welcome to Slashdot, where a fucking retarded comment like that gets +5 Informative.

    5. Re:"Where is the rugged 16GB RAM ... tablet"? by Blaskowicz · · Score: 1

      It's pointless having 16GB of RAM anyway, because tablet apps don't need it. Anything that needs 16GB RAM would be better run on a laptop with a keyboard and mouse. You can get laptops that are under 800g with a good 12" screen and good battery life.

      1TB of storage is more useful if you are really random and can't plan far enough ahead to whittle your HD movie collection down to a 256GB SD card.

      Remember netbooks? There were lots of slashdot arguments that netbooks have to be used for content consumption only or lightweight browsing and such ; even after they came with a hard drive and Windows, so people ran Photoshop (cracked) and video games on the thing if that's what they wanted to do.
      There's less highly pressing need but some could rely on the tablet like those weird peopke that had a laptop and no desktop all those years ago.
      With a 16GB/1TB tablet you could even ssh or RDP in from a crappy old desktop when you've got some "real work" to do and your desktop's CPU/RAM etc. isn't enough.

    6. Re:"Where is the rugged 16GB RAM ... tablet"? by q4Fry · · Score: 1

      This was interesting. Are the numbers for RAM similar to the SSDs?

    7. Re:"Where is the rugged 16GB RAM ... tablet"? by david_thornley · · Score: 1

      Why would I want to buy an expensive tablet to use from a cheap desktop? It's cheaper to get high power out of a desktop, and battery life isn't a factor. If my desktop's CPU or RAM becomes insufficient, putting more in is fast and a heck of a lot cheaper than buying a new tablet with the desired specs. Most of what I'd want a tablet for doesn't require high-end CPU or RAM.

      --
      "When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
  11. Here: by bill_mcgonigle · · Score: 3, Informative

    Here.

    Not even a LMGTFY.

    --
    My God, it's Full of Source!
    OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
    1. Re:Here: by Pharmboy · · Score: 1

      From 4000 to 6000 dollars. No, maybe something in between.

      --
      Tequila: It's not just for breakfast anymore!
    2. Re:Here: by OzPeter · · Score: 4, Funny

      Interesting. But I am amused to see that the SSDs are listed as "Shock mounted MIL-STD-810G ". You really ned to shock mount an SSD and not the rest of the electronics?!?!?!

      --
      I am Slashdot. Are you Slashdot as well?
    3. Re:Here: by PopeRatzo · · Score: 5, Funny

      Not even a LMGTFY.

      I don't see what sexual orientation has to do with this.

      --
      You are welcome on my lawn.
    4. Re:Here: by Falos · · Score: 1

      I think this joke achieves the Dennis Miller ratio.

    5. Re:Here: by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Just because it's inside a tablet doesn't make a 1TB SSD any cheaper.

    6. Re:Here: by PopeRatzo · · Score: 1

      Yeah, but that one in a million is busting a gut right now.

      --
      You are welcome on my lawn.
    7. Re:Here: by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      That's what these things cost. Just like the Dell Rugged 12 at $4000+. Killer specs on a niche, rugged device comes at a steep price. Just like toughbooks and everything else.

    8. Re:Here: by inode_buddha · · Score: 1

      .... that was the funniest thing I've read in a LONG time, and I read bash......

      --
      C|N>K
    9. Re:Here: by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      laugh my assoff or get the fuck out, you?

  12. But why? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    You can have high specs or (some) battery life and a tablet that doesn't burn you. Remember that your skin needs to be in contact with a tablet which relies on passive cooling, unlike other computer form factors.

    Also what on earth are you planning on using it for that requires those kind of specs? I use my tablet while my desktop is rendering or other heavy duty processes. Why I'd want that process to portable is beyond me.

    1. Re:But why? by AK+Marc · · Score: 1

      The point is if you take 8 phones and lay them out next to each other, I'd have the specs he requires.8x2G RAM, 8x128G HD, and all that. And the battery could keep the whole array working for a week on standby, or a few hours at peak usage. So why can't someone put that in a single form factor? It'd meet the specs of at least one person, the guy asking the question.

    2. Re:But why? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Heat is cumulative.

    3. Re:But why? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      so a Beowulf cluster of phones?

  13. Why is most software bloated? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Good grief, if you can't read an email with that kind of processing power, maybe it's time for the software industry to look at itself.

    Why is it always up to the hardware to get better?

  14. China has the good tablets by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Take a look at the Chinese import sites: there are a lot of interesting tablets available in China that aren't widely marketed here. For $200 you can easily get a tablet with a1920x1200 or 2048x1538 screen, Cherrytrail Atom CPU, 4 GiB of RAM, and 64 GiB storage. And many of them are available in dual boot Android & Windows 10, so you can pick your botnet.

  15. Microsoft Surface family by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    either the Surface Pro 4 or Surface book?

    1. Re:Microsoft Surface family by RoccamOccam · · Score: 1

      Exactly!! Why don't these count? I have a Surface Pro 3 and it has been a complete laptop and desktop replacement for me for a year-and-a half. It has 8 GB of RAM and a 512 GB hard drive. When I'm at work, I plug it into a docking station and I have gigabit Ethernet and 3 displays. Pop it out and I have a tablet with a high-resolution display with pressure-sensitive pen capability and a pretty decent keyboard that doubles as a stand support.

  16. Because most people don't use them by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    They are toys that get used for short periods of time, so they make really cheap ones that will allow them to be impulse buys.

    The mobile platforms all suck.. plain and simple. We deal with smartphones because we have no better options. Tablets are popular ONLY because they are new. Like smartphones people are realizing there is no real value to the gadget and the only way it makes sense to keep buying them is if they are dirt cheap.

    So... that's why it's hard to find good tablet.. because they are mostly meant to be disposable crap because otherwise companies wind up with millions of surplus tablets they have to sell for dirt cheap.

    Basicaly if you want a good tab you get Apple and everyone else wants a tablet for around 100 bucks. Those are the markets. Not many people want to go up against the iPad.

    Google's tablet version of Android is even worse than smartphones since many apps refuse to let you install them, so it's not a good experience and unlike a smartphone it's not really portable. Thin laptops are WAY more useful than tablets and seen enough we will have dirt cheap 1 in 2's like RCA and others are making.

    Those are the best cheap designs I've seen. RCA Viking Pro and Cambio with a little better specs is what tablet and laptop designers should be aiming for. They even have two charging ports!

    But the real problem is that Android sucks to do much of anything on. I honestly think Windows 10 Mobile is already a better mobile OS, especially on tablets. It just lacks all those mostly useless apps.

  17. The perfect tablet is impossible. by jellomizer · · Score: 4, Insightful

    RAM: the more you want the more power it uses. Every one of those bits in RAM being used or not needs that charge to keep its state.
    CPU/GPU: the faster the more power it uses. Every tick is a pulse of electricity
    Video: The higher the resolution the more RAM and CPU/GPU needed.

    Now what happens to this power once the calculation is done. Most of it becomes heat. Excess heat from these devices can damage components in the table. As well damage your body as well.

    Then we have battery life. Battery storage capacity has been improving linearly, while computing power has been growing exponentially. So while the computer components get smaller leaving more room for battery, however it will rarely allow doubling the power capability.

    Your Desktop PC can have loads of performance as you can burn energy right off the grid, filled with big empty spaces for heat dissipation
    Your Laptop PC has less space and weight, however due to the space needed to type on a keyboard they are allowed much more room for battery power, as well some air pathways to keep the device cool.
    Tablets are self contained computing devices. with nearly 0 room to spare. So any components are often underpowered or under clocked to keep heat down and extend battery life.

    Normally this is a good tradeoff as they are normally just browsing web pages, or running simple apps. or more complex apps off of the could.

    --
    If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
    1. Re:The perfect tablet is impossible. by thegarbz · · Score: 1

      RAM: the more you want the more power it uses. Every one of those bits in RAM being used or not needs that charge to keep its state.

      That's not true and ignores the differences in manufacturing various RAM chips. True adding a whole second stick of memory to a PC will double the amount of power, but going from 1x 4GB stick made up of 8 chips to 1x 16GB stick made up of 8 chips changes nothing due to manufacturing differences in the chips themselves.

      CPU/GPU: the faster the more power it uses. Every tick is a pulse of electricity

      Assuming constant use, yes, assuming low power no not at all again.

      The rest of your post is right on the money.

    2. Re:The perfect tablet is impossible. by FrankSchwab · · Score: 1

      The DRAM sticks in a PC have nothing to do with the SRAM in a tablet. The SRAM idle power consumption is almost purely leakage, and will be proportional to the number of gates - thus doubling capacity will double power consumption. Active power is unlikely to be significantly affected by doubling the memory, however.

      As far as faster CPUs, even on the same process a CPU is synthesized for a target speed. If you want a slower CPU, the synthesis creates smaller (lower-power) transistors, and uses fewer buffers and/or synchronization stages. If you run a CPU synthesized to run at 2GHz at a 1 GHz clock rate, it'll take significantly more power than the same CPU, in the same process, synthesized to run at 1 GHz with a 1 GHz clock rate. At idle, the CPU synthesized for the higher clock rate will have higher leakage.

      So, both of your statements are incorrect.

      --
      And the worms ate into his brain.
    3. Re: The perfect tablet is impossible. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Main memory in tablets is DRAM, not SRAM. Who is going to pay 2-5$ per megabyte?

  18. Convergence devices suck anyway..... by King_TJ · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Seriously, I work in I.T. for a company with a highly mobile workforce, and we're both Mac and Windows friendly on top of that. So our environment is mixed, with a lot of emphasis on trying out various portable options and cloud offerings, while still supporting some traditional server "back end" for our financial system and shared network drives.

    Long ago, we switched all of our users from desktop systems to laptops, and we had a policy of issuing corporate iPads ever since the iPad 2 came along. (For a long time, we had a division of our company doing iOS software development - so it made sense to issue hardware to run the stuff we made.)

    Right now, we're starting to issue the Microsoft Surface Pro 4 to new hires who request a Windows PC instead of a Mac. And that brings up the question of whether its time to stop issuing iPads - if the Surface Pro is supposed to double as a tablet.

    What we're seeing though is that generally no, the "one solution fits all" model is a big compromise and doesn't really work that well. Out of all of the different computers we've issued over the years, from HP Elitebooks to various Dell machines to different Macbooks -- the only one that's held up over the years as the "gold standard" that users really liked AND worked reliably was the Macbook Air 13". It's light and thin enough so people can throw it in a backpack or whatnot and take it with them without a care. Battery life is great. It's about half the price of the high end Macbook Pro laptops. The basic look stayed the same from the first year of production through current models - meaning there's no stigma about someone pulling out and opening an older 2011 or 2012 model in a meeting with clients. And repairs are pretty reasonably priced. (With Apple doing a "flat rate" repair program on them, you can have one with 5 or 6 things wrong with it and it's still cost effective to have it serviced rather than trash it.)

    With the Surface Pro 4, by contrast? Yes, people think things like the pencil are cool, and it's a very capable machine when plugged into a dock and used like a desktop. But as soon as you take it with you to use like an iPad, you run into a lot of downsides. Battery life NOT so great, for starters. And because it runs a full Windows 10 OS, it has the inherent problems that come with a full blown, more complex OS. Issues not always waking from sleep properly, for example -- leading to a long wait to reboot the whole thing, or apps that aren't designed for the hi-res 4K display so fonts display so tiny, they're unreadable. The keyboard cover is too flimsy to allow typing on it like laptop if you actually have to use it in your lap. (It's designed assuming you have a solid surface like a table underneath the whole thing.) Lastly, I think it's a big omission that you can't buy a Surface Pro 4 with a built-in LTE cellular modem like you can an iPad. Having a cellular data plan on the devices goes a LONG way towards feeling "always connected" and ensuring your cloud-based data or apps are always available "on the go".

    1. Re:Convergence devices suck anyway..... by bananaquackmoo · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Disclaimer: I don't like Microsoft, but I like the Surface Pro. All of your complaints are relatively incorrect. I've never had a problem typing on the keyboard cover. You can scale the font-size or set the display to a different resolution. >= Four hours of battery life running a full-fledged OS is, for me, much better than a battery which can last all day but can't do half the stuff I need it to. Who is using it that far away from some kind of charging device for more than 4 hours? I can run multiple VMs at a time or run full windows-based games on it, such as The Division. I've never had any issues with waking from sleep and the reboot isn't long, it's a minor quantity of seconds. Personally I have no issue with tethering to my phone for data. Finally, the Surface (not pro) has an option for built in LTE and gets better battery life, but is admittedly much slower.

    2. Re:Convergence devices suck anyway..... by Radical+Moderate · · Score: 1

      Interesting. I'm on my second Air, and have considered a Surface. But yeah, the Mac just works, pretty much flawlessly. And tethering to an iPhone is stupid-easy. I'll be moving to Android soon, hopefully that won't screw up tethering.

      --
      Never let a lack of data get in the way of a good rant.
    3. Re:Convergence devices suck anyway..... by dprimary · · Score: 2

      4 hours will barely get me between major airports. It is not worth the risk to believe that I can find a place to plug in while in the boarding area. What happen when I have to be in three cities that day? when is the device getting recharged.

    4. Re:Convergence devices suck anyway..... by bananaquackmoo · · Score: 0

      Anywhere there is an outlet? From an extra battery you carry with you? It shouldn't take much imagination for you to figure this out.

    5. Re:Convergence devices suck anyway..... by guacamole · · Score: 2

      I am glad there are people like you who can think rationally about devices like Surface Pro 4. Those "tablets" suck. They're too bulky and heavy for any real tablety application. Try to hold an iPad Air or Samsung Galaxy Tab S2 and then tell me after that that surface pro 4 is actually a tablet. Moreover, Surface Pro 4 is also a _bad_ notebook. For one, it's very clumsy to be used as a laptop, since the screen won't stand on its own without the rear hinge. The keyboard bends like its made from carboard. And people end up paying upwards of $1200 for this? I never got what exactly makes Surface Pro 4 better than say a convertible ultrabook such as Lenovo Yoga series. The Yoga is a full-fledged laptop, very lightweight, but still converts into a (relatively thick and bulky tablet) just like Surface Pro.

    6. Re:Convergence devices suck anyway..... by thegarbz · · Score: 1

      A convergence device is a convergence device. It's not a laptop, and not a tablet and thus shouldn't be used as such. As such some of your comments are completely off the mark when they fundamentally can be summarised as [convergence device] doesn't suit me because it's not [specific device].

      People have use cases, for some people they need a laptop to fit that use case. Other's need a tablet. Some even need tablets of a specific size. For me, since I bought a convergence device I stopped using both my laptop and my tablet altogether since the use cases suited quite well. The only one of your complaints I remotely agree with is the high-DPI scaling problems in Windows, but even that affects a grand total of one of the programs I use.

    7. Re:Convergence devices suck anyway..... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Q: Lastly, I think it's a big omission that you can't buy a Surface Pro 4 with a built-in LTE cellular modem like you can an iPad. Having a cellular data plan on the devices goes a LONG way towards feeling "always connected" and ensuring your cloud-based data or apps are always available "on the go".

      A: Get a MiFi.

  19. Little computers vs big phones by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The kind of tablet you want makes sense because you think of it as a smaller, portable computer. The disparity is that the manufacturers market them as essentially larger smartphones. You don't need storage and RAM when you're expected to stream video to it and use cloud storage. You're using Google docs, not MS Office, and everything hooks into the same app store on your phone so you can get Candy Crush easily. Those tablets aren't intended for anything that would come close to requiring 16GB of RAM, and it isn't cost effective for them to offer terabytes of storage when it's mostly photos and maybe music (which they'd rather you use their bundled services for anyways).

  20. Gee, I wonder... by nedlohs · · Score: 1

    If it could have something to do with the fact that more ram, more cpu, more storage increase power usage, heat production, and weight. And more battery life means more weight.

    I'm not sure there is a very large market for heavy tablets that melt your fingers. Though gaming laptops exist so I'm probably wrong...

    1. Re:Gee, I wonder... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Gaming laptops is a misnomer though. They're really just portable gaming computers. No one plays games with them actually on their lap.

  21. Supplies in Guangdong & Shenzhen by Pollux · · Score: 2

    It's the same reason why 1366x768 laptop displays aren't going away. There's a huge supply of them, they work, and they're cheap.

    Guangdong and Shenzhen are mass producing cheap and common tablet parts like mad. You can find and buy them yourself on Alibaba; there's tons of cheap 8 and 16GB eMMC chips, 1GB RAM chips, and ARM processors. Companies like Samsung make higher quality and newer, pioneering products, like chips that integrate the storage & RAM together. Soon, the Chinese generics will add these to their lineup, making tablets even smaller and cheaper.

    If you want something different, vote with your wallet and buy something different. Then, if enough people do, that's what will become cheap and mass-produced.

  22. The Rules, Break Them by BrendaEM · · Score: 2

    A tablet camera must be barely acceptable.
    A tablet with a pen must be updated rarely.
    Android cannot be upgraded; You are allowed only one newer version or 2 years, whichever comes first.
    A tablet cannot have removable main storage.
    A tablet must use expensive MicroSD even if there is room for a full sized SD card.
    The number of SD cards must only be 1.
    Android must not be vanilla; it must be larded with crap so updates come slow.
    Early Apple updates must break your device.
    The tablet screen must be so shinny that you cannot use it outside.
    You may not put a volume knob on anything.
    Tablet must all look the same.

    --
    https://www.youtube.com/c/BrendaEM
    1. Re:The Rules, Break Them by Misagon · · Score: 1

      A tablet must have only one data port that is also used for charging.
      A Windows tablet must not act as a USB storage device, only as a USB host or use USB for charging, even if the hardware is capable.

      --
      "We mustn't be caught by surprise by our own advancing technology" -- Aldous Huxley
  23. The form factor sucks by Dracos · · Score: 4, Informative

    I have yet to come up with a reason why I would want a tablet.

    Tablets are meant for consumption, not production. Touchscreens are a regression in human interfaces: sloppy, imprecise, immediately unintuitive kludges for meta input. Tablets are one side of a power grab by the industry because PCs offer too much freedom, privacy and repairability; the other side is app markets and cloud services. Tablets are too convenient; to achieve that they must sacrifice any spec based on volume: battery capacity, storage, RAM, cooling, etc. Except screen size... gotta keep packing more pixels.

    1. Re:The form factor sucks by thegarbz · · Score: 1

      Tablets are meant for consumption, not production.

      Interestingly enough computer are meant for both, so at least a portion of your computer load can be served with a tablet and in great comfort too.

    2. Re:The form factor sucks by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Touching your screen is anathema to many people who worked with CRTs.

      It's like when you have a six month old monitor that looks as perfect as the day it as set up, then you have a coworker come into your office to show you something leaving fingerprints all over the schematic on display.

    3. Re:The form factor sucks by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I have yet to come up with a reason why I would want a tablet.

      A sub-$50 decently large mobile screen to carry around the house to look up things (like how-to videos) or text for a task that won't likely take more than a couple hours.

      PS - Before anyone mentions a laptop, they have most of the disadvantages of a tablet but cost more and are less mobile. And just to be clear, I'd recommend a sub-$50 tablet without an expectation to root the device or ever get updates. The point isn't to get a powerhouse machine with awesome battery life. It's to be a relatively cheap middle-ground to avoid getting a laptop since laptops suck.

    4. Re:The form factor sucks by movdqa · · Score: 1

      I only use my iPad in the office for two reasons: as an additional screen for reference material, and, to bring a screen to show another engineer a problem case. It's not really usable for much else in my work environment.

    5. Re:The form factor sucks by Threni · · Score: 1

      > Tablets are meant for consumption, not production.

      Yeah, they're not replacements for a laptop. But a lot of people use laptops as a replacement for a desktop. I'm not down with that. Laptops always seem slow and shitty after a few years; the keys fall off, the battery ends up lasting for 30 minutes, and so on. A desktop - which I put together myself - are a lot cheaper (for a given spec) and you can upgrade them and reuse. Ultimately, if you're not out and about on your laptop you might as well not have one.

      So I don't have one, and the stuff I do on my tablets is stuff like surfing, reading gaming, shopping etc when i can't be arsed to sit in front of my desktop, and when i'm not out and about with my phone. I understand this is a popular use case.

    6. Re:The form factor sucks by guacamole · · Score: 1

      Exactly. Tablets are primarily information and media consumption devices. I use a smaller 8 inch tablet to browse the web on a living room couch or in the kitchen, and a larger 10 inch android tablet more like a portable screen that I can take to a gym, motel or a flight to watch my favorite shows. But trying to do any productivity work with such device? Please. I have used a surface pro 4, and I can tell that it is both lousy as a laptop and lousy as a tablet. It's much easier and more effective to buy a convertible ultrabook like Yoga series, and then if you think you need a tablet, throw a 300 gram iPad Mini 4 or similar into the same backpack (it doesn't even need any special bag).

    7. Re:The form factor sucks by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Honestly, I use my tablet for drawing, programming and note-taking, as well as remotely using my PC from around the house.

      I draw all the time using VNC to PC as well, turning my tablet in to a bastardized graphics tablet.
      Specifically I use Jump VNC client because every other client I tried sucked SO MUCH. Stupid control schemes being the number 1 issue.
      Just sitting out in the garden drawing on PC. Very relaxing.

      For the keyboard control stuff, since on-screen keyboards are a bit shitty, even the good ones, I wrote a sticky chord-key script in Autohotkey.
      I press shift+`, then it waits for 2 seconds till I press another key, which performs an action. (if no key, does nothing)
      Simple things like copy, paste, undo redo, even manual clicks if I want absolute precision in my clicks. (which is rare since I usually just zoom the VNC client in if I need precision)
      The ability to zoom in on things is very handy, actually. Makes drawing those precise lines so much easier without having to zoom the drawing program in, so you can see the zoomed in view on tablet, but the full view on screen to see if it looks right or not.
      Easy to iterate through different ideas very quickly instead of the hassles of zooming in and out frequently on the drawing program. Those "zoomed out views" windows you can open in most drawing programs are honestly the worst.

      Equally programming all the time. Using a simple bluetooth keyboard (the PS3 snap-on keyboard, actually, I just stick it on the top of my tablet case)
      Sometimes I don't even use that, Hackers Keyboard works really well for programming since it is more-or-less a full standard keyboard sans numpad (behind Fn)
      That is both programming on the tablet itself as well as the VNC method above.

      I don't know what you are doing, but it doesn't seem right.
      Tablets are great on their own for a lot of production tasks, but combined with a PC they are even better at extending their ability as well as giving you the freedom to work anywhere around the house.
      I mean, you could get a laptop with a touchscreen if you really wanted to, that would work even better to be honest. All the advantages of a tablet without the disadvantages.
      I only got this tablet because it was cheap on top of cheap, I had a discount as well as staff discount. Woohoo.

    8. Re:The form factor sucks by Dracos · · Score: 1

      How many weeks of your life have you wasted waiting two seconds every time you want to do a meta keystroke? Surely you can't be doing anything beyond childishly simple if you think that's a satisfactory solution.

  24. The people buying them? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    When you're simultaneously describing yourself as a "happy" tablet user then complaining in a post on fucking Slashdot, of all places, about their problems...

    Maybe the real problem is the person making the stupid purchases.

  25. Laptops by bluescrn · · Score: 5, Funny

    The really good tablets come with keyboards attached...

    1. Re:Laptops by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      But those ones always come with crappier screens than the non-keyboard tablets... Why is that?

  26. because you are a mindless consumer by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    tablets and "smart" phones are devices made by corporations to consume content, their content. They don't want you to create things, only consume. Keep consuming mindlessly and they will keep you treating that way

  27. Old junk by rasmusbr · · Score: 2

    A lot of companies that make Android tablets over-estimated the market size and rushed to marked with less than stellar devices. Then the market turned out to be a lot smaller and a lot more crowded than most of them had predicted. So they stopped investing in Android tablet hardware development. I think most of the Android tablets that you seen on store shelves now are probably basically 2012 models with some slight modifications. Of course they're under-powered compared to smartphones from 2015 and 2016 that have much more RAM and more powerful CPU:s.

    Some exceptions:
    Lenovo's new models. Their screens are not great, but they're okay for indoor use.
    The Nvidia Shield K1.
    Samsung's high end models, if you want to spend iPad-levels of cash on an Android tablet.

    1. Re:Old junk by guacamole · · Score: 1

      most of the Android tablets that you seen on store shelves now are probably basically 2012 models with some slight modifications

      That's a slight exaggeration, but roughly speaking you are correct. Most tablet manufacturers, including Apple and Samsung, are effectively on a 2-year model cycle. They may refresh their products more often, but a lot of those refreshes are basically marketing tricks to keep consumer interest going at all. I recall Apple's re-release an iPad Mini 2 as an iPad Mini 3 in 2014, with the only difference being the fingerprint reader and a higher price tag. The Air could go for a couple of years without updates. There was barely any improvement going from the flagship Samsung Galaxy Tab S (2014) to a Galaxy Tab S2 (2015), and looking at the specs of the S3, I can tell as a Tab S (2014) user that there is hardly any improvement justifying the 400-500 USD expense for the unreleased yet 2016 model. The tablet market is so slow that flagship Samsung tablets for years now had slower CPUs than the flagship Samsung smartphones.

      Having said that, I do not get why people need a tablet with laptop specs (e.g. 1TB storage, etc). Such device already exists, and it's called Surface Pro4. It's very expensive and hardly qualifies as a tablet. Basically a laptop with removable keyboard.

    2. Re:Old junk by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The only real hardware difference between a phone and a tablet is the size of the screen (and battery). There is no real reason for tablets to be underpowered compared to phones.

  28. Found your problem... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Your tablets are running Android.

  29. Because No One Wants To Actually Buy That by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    This person is asking for a high end laptop without a keyboard, which would have the same cost, size, weight, and heat production as a high end laptop with a keyboard. Microsoft and HP made exactly that with their initial responses to the iPad, years ago, and those product lines all got cancelled due to lack of sales. Their products were big, heavy, and incredibly expensive. If you really want a super high performance ruggedized tablet, you can get a Panasonic Toughbook that has 8GB RAM, a 1GB drive, is extremely durable, and costs $5000.

  30. Because of Clouds by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Tablet are designed to be used with could services, including storage. They are the teletype terminals of this age. If you want storage on the go, you need a mobile workstation, sometimes referred to as a laptop. The merging of tablet and laptop space makes the life of the consumer increasingly difficult, of course.

  31. They sell in increments. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    They want you to buy for the duration of their careers not just have a nice device and thanks. Buy quality it saves you money and landfills don't fill up with junk as fast.

    It is similar to the price of car parts. It's called gouging.

  32. Because Apple doesn't want to eat laptop sales by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Apple could do it. They could make a touchscreen MacBook or a tablet with osx. But they won't, because doing so will cannibalize sales from the other category. So they carefully leave out certain features to get people to buy all the products.

  33. 16GB RAM, 1TB storage right here by raymorris · · Score: 2

    > "Where is the rugged 16GB RAM / 1TB Storage / 20-hour battery tablet?"

    I think the submitter might be happier looking under a different category in Newegg. Newegg has 26 options with 8-16GB of RAM, and 256GB-1TB storage. Most products with that much RAM and storage ALSO come with a detachable or fold-away keyboard, so they are listed in the "2 in 1" category.

  34. Browsers SUCK CPU by redelm · · Score: 1

    I was shocked when I saw how much CPU scripts take on many websites. Even an 3 GHz i5 can get 75% loaded. Small wonder the little tablet ARMs get overwhelmed. Also seriously missing is [mini/micro] HDMI output on nearly all.

    1. Re:Browsers SUCK CPU by guacamole · · Score: 1

      Indeed, for most PC/tablet users who don't crunch numbers, don't game, and don't encode media files, the number one CPU hog is with web browser. Some of that problem can be mitigated by installing an adblocker, and configuring the flash and silverlight plugins to "always ask to activate". Noscript can improve speed further, but it's actually a big pain to use on daily basis.

  35. They don't by allo · · Score: 1

    You're buying the wrong devices.

  36. Amrel tablet? by Z00L00K · · Score: 1

    Maybe you should look here: http://computers.amrel.com/rug...

    Color: Black or NATO Green (Military Package only)
            Windows®7/8.1 Professional
            12.1” XGA (1024 x 768) with LED Backlit
            Intel® Sandy Bridge i7-2610UE Processor
            4GB DDR3 1333MHz (Upgradeable to 8GB)
            Intel® HD Graphics 3000
            Standard 500GB SATA HDD (Upgradeable)
            Solid state hard drives (SSHD) available
            Options: WiFi 802.11 a/b/g/n, Cellular (Gobi 3000), Bluetooth®, GPS
            MIL-STD 810G & IP-65 Certified
            Military Package Option: NATO Green, MIL-STD 461F, Metal Twist Lock Amphenol (621N Series) Power Connect

    --
    If builders built buildings the way programmers wrote programs, then the first woodpecker would destroy civilization.
  37. Tablets for media consumption by roc97007 · · Score: 1

    Tablets, with enough resources, and an intelligently designed GUI and intelligently designed apps, could really revolutionize content creation. We have the technology now to do this. But it's not done because of the perception that tablets are only for media consumption.

    But it's not just about tablet hardware -- serious applications must become more touch friendly. And by this I do *not* mean clipping the optional $114 keyboard to the tablet in order to do real work.

    What I want is the equivalent of an Alienware laptop as a tablet, with an intelligently designed stylus (one like the Galaxy Note would be ok) running an OS intended to actually work full time as a touch OS (not just with touch "features" that require you to break out the keyboard and mouse to do any serious work (so Windows is not at all a consideration)) and a version of the Adobe suite that actually works in a touch environment, not just acts as a way to consume media created on a conventional KVM PC. Then I'd throw out my PC and never look back.

    ...and all this could be done NOW. It's like the various hardware and application vendors are deliberately foiling this obvious next evolution, while paying lip service to the concept by giving us a place on the screen we can touch to play a cat video.

    But the argument is that people are using tablets for consumption only, and people are using tablets for consumption only because that's all you can currently use them for.

    ex vi termini

    --
    Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
    1. Re:Tablets for media consumption by fluffernutter · · Score: 1

      The problem is user interface devices. Nothing has replaced a keyboard and mouse as a decent way to do lots of work. Using a touch screen is laughable for anything more advanced than picking the media you want to consume, and touchpads aren't much better. I don't even comment on Slashdot without a keyboard available.

      --
      Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
    2. Re:Tablets for media consumption by Tyrannosaur · · Score: 1

      Yet, sadly, it seems samsung has abandoned their Note line of tablets; I was hoping for them to go this direction :/

    3. Re:Tablets for media consumption by guacamole · · Score: 1

      Well, it would be great if you invented an email client, an calendar, word processor, and the rest of productivity apps that don't need either a keyboard or a mouse.

    4. Re: Tablets for media consumption by roc97007 · · Score: 1

      I don't even care about that. I can do most of that on my *phone*. I want a tablet that runs adobe lightroom, photoshop and premere without a stupid keyboard or mouse, in some reasonable fashion. That's my primary use. Office suite is a far far distant second. You can do that on a $200 laptop.

      Why the hell should you have to spend all your time scraping your rat just to move sliders around?

      --
      Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
  38. The Entire Post Explained: by johnsmithperson123 · · Score: 1

    16GB RAM- Not many people use it on desktops, let alone mobile devices. I would like to see 8GB ones though. 1TB Disk- Flash is just too expensive now. A 1TB M.2 drive, what you probably would be looking at, is $500 or so when I last looked. 20hr battery life- Batteries are heavy. And big. And you'd have to lower other specs.

  39. Cannabalize Sales by zenlessyank · · Score: 1

    Most tablets are made by the same peeps who make laptops. If they made the tablet well enough it would eat into their laptop sales and those make them more money. The only company that makes a useful tablet is MS who does not make laptops. Problem is MS is new at this and charges accordingly. Everything else is an experiment and no one wants to invest a lot of cash that would make the tablet useful.

    1. Re:Cannabalize Sales by guacamole · · Score: 1

      Surface Pro line are hardly "tablets". So far I see that most people still buy keyboards and use them as a very lousy notebook (because for the same money, you can buy a convertible ultrabook that can actually be usable on your laps, and with a proper keyboard that's not made from recycled cardboard).

  40. surface pro 4 by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    You can get a surface Pro 4 with an i7, 16GB of RAM and a 1TB SSD, but it'll cost you $2700. It's not going to be rugged or have super great battery life with those specs, so in order to acheive this mythical device, you still have to add on the cost of "ruggedizing" it and a higher capacity battery and you're ending up north of 3 grand for a tablet. Probably not the bet way to spend your money when you could get a capable tablet and a powerful desktop for that price.

  41. Where have they gone by AF_Cheddar_Head · · Score: 1

    A few years back you could buy a decent name-brand 10" tablet for $300. Toshiba made the Excite 10, Samsung and Sony had direct competitors. Now you start at $500 and up for a name-brand 10" tablet, that is laptop territory.

    I love the Excite 10 that I bought, two issues Toshiba no longer updates Android for it and refuses to unlock the bootloader so I can install Cyanogenmod.

    1. Re:Where have they gone by guacamole · · Score: 1

      There is always some kind of deal going on allowing you to buy a Google Nexus 9 or Samsung Galaxy Tab S/S2 for around 400USD. But the way I see it, 400USD retail price for a large table is sort of a price that forces the manufacturers to cut corners. The Galaxy Tab S/S2 have the best screens, build quality, and SD card slot, but also come with poorly performing SoC (probably worse than some 200USD tablets) and poor battery life. The Nexus 9 comes with good SoC and better battery life, but there is no sd card slot, which is a poor decision as a lot of people get the large tablets to play recorded TV shows, and 32GB of internal storage is just too limiting.

  42. FREE MARKET by markdavis · · Score: 1

    >" A Huffington Post article notes that this behavior has contributed significantly in "generating heaps of e-waste." Citing many advocates, the publication claims that Apple has "opposed legislation that could help curb it." "

    It is a free market (or it is supposed to be, anyway, mostly). Yes, Apple prices suck. Yes, they do things to lock people in and charge an arm and a leg to keep people from fixing things.

    AND YOU ARE FREE TO NOT BUY APPLE PRODUCTS. We don't need "legislation", we need INFORMATION. Want to stop Apple from doing this? STOP BUYING THEIR PRODUCTS. Inform your friends and family what it REALLY costs (total cost ownership) when you buy something you can't get fixed. Post articles about it online. Write reviews. Send a letter to Apple. Do something productive, other than complaining to legislators.

    Magically, most consumers are not total idiots.... if they know the information before a purchase, it is likely to shape their decisions. The market will respond. Competitors will shape products to address the demands. Apple will be forced to deal with the backlash or lose sales.

    And if you think Apple is a monopoly and there are no other excellent products in every category in which they sell, you have your head in the sand and are buying Apple products as a fashion statement. If that is what you want to do, fine, but stop complaining about it. Yeesh.

    1. Re:FREE MARKET by rainer_d · · Score: 1

      And if you think Apple is a monopoly and there are no other excellent products in every category in which they sell, you have your head in the sand and are buying Apple products as a fashion statement. If that is what you want to do, fine, but stop complaining about it. Yeesh.

      Apple does have a monopoly - on Apple products. I'm always amazed how people can overlook this fact.

      As long as enough people like the products and the price is still within their financial means, Apple will do well financially.

      Of course, there's a limit on how much Apple products and services the average household can buy before the monthly bill becomes existence-threatening.

      --
      Windows 2000 - from the guys who brought us edlin
    2. Re:FREE MARKET by david_thornley · · Score: 1

      Most of the stuff I buy never gets fixed. It doesn't break in the first place. Given that, the cost of repairing Apple stuff really doesn't affect the TOC much. And, yes, most consumers aren't total idiots, and will buy things based on their own preferences rather than yours.

      --
      "When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
  43. Re:people buy what they can afford by I75BJC · · Score: 1

    Yes, there are people, like me, who will pay for a high-end tablet. But people like me are a minority. People clobbered by their economic situation don't have "extra" money to spend on high-end tablets. They spend what they can afford and have to budget their money. I purchased an original iPad on the first day but most people bought Amazon Fire tablets from what I have seen locally. Most people who stretch to buy an iPad keep them for longer periods of time or wait until they can afford a used iPad. (I gather this from Craigslist, etc. postings. There is still a market for the first iPad because the price point for used has reached the general populace.)

  44. Take 2 tablets daily by garryknight · · Score: 1

    I was lucky enough to find a lightly-used Surface Pro 3 (i7, 8 GB RAM, 256 GB SSD storage) with 2 pens, keyboard (or whatever Microsoft call it) and full-sized dock for less than half price. With a 128 GB micro-SD card, it gives me 4-6 hours of battery to do the 'serious' stuff which, in my case, is photo processing (Lightroom 4,ON1 Photo 10, Photoshop Elements) and music making (Presonus Studio One, Ableton Live 9.5, Komplete 10, etc). Plenty for my needs, and it slips into the skinny laptop compartment of my rucksack with room to spare. (It actually also fits into the map pocket of my gilet, but that's another story). Also in my rucksack is a small, lightweight Bluetooth mouse for when the pen and/or keyboard aren't enough - it doesn't get a lot of use.

    In my pocket is an 8" Acer Windows tablet which also gives me 4-6 hours of 'consumption', including G+, Twitter, web browsing, maps, train and other transit times, magazine and book reading, etc, etc. It has 32 GB of storage space (plus a 64 GB micro-SD card) and 1 GB of RAM. As it's an 8" device, it runs full Windows 10 desktop.

    Out and about, they connect to the net (and so to OneDrive, Dropbox, etc) via my 10 GB per month 4G to WiFi dongle. At home, they're on the same Workgroup as my PC, so I can drag and drop files between them at LAN (the Surface) or WiFi (the Acer) speeds.

    This combination of two tablets serve my needs very well. Perhaps the OP might consider this solution.

    --
    Garry Knight
  45. How long should the battery last? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    One spec that I don't care about is how many days it can last without being recharged. If I don't recharge it every night, then I still need a routine to make sure I recharge it every other night, or once per week or whatever. And if I forget, it's not charged when I need it.

    1. Re:How long should the battery last? by YukariHirai · · Score: 1

      Gotta agree there. My nightly routine involves plugging my phone, iPod, iPad and laptop in to charge overnight. If I don't do it nightly, I'll forget about it and one of the above will be out of juice when I'm out and about and need it. And since I'm charging them nightly anyway, I really don't give a damn whether it could theoretically go a week without charging or "only" three days or so.

  46. When begging the question, beg a stupid one. by Hognoxious · · Score: 1

    They don't. They're sufficient for their intended purpose when you take into account all the inherent tradeoffs.

    You might as well complain that an A10 is slow or an MX5 has poor towing ability.

    --
    Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
  47. I say this in hopes for such a device... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Not likely to happen but you know the device I want above all others?

    An Intel power efficient x86 multi-core chip with legacy BIOS support in a Droid 3 (xt862?) housing/phone with slide out qwerty; removable battery, microSD, microHDMI, and add a 2nd micro USB port(one to charge, one for hub/devices).

    Make this and as high a resolution screen that can fit in that form factor, and I'll pay serious $ for it.

    Next generation OQO that has a cell interface and the standard wifi,bt,etc...

    I could run my legacy Windows/Linux, consume so little power(as the newest mobile intel chips do) processes can run all day on battery power... They basically do this now on $50 tablets like the winbook TW-700; but stick it in a phone with all those options and I'll simply dock it in the monitor/tv when I get home and keep the same system all day, screw the cloud. .

  48. Tablets are supposed to be LIGHT... by macs4all · · Score: 1

    "Where is the rugged 16GB RAM / 1TB Storage / 20-hour battery tablet?"

    My answer would be "That's easy: They're hidden under their battery-packs!".

    Seriously. Not every stinkin' thing that has a CPU/MCU/SoC in it is EQUIVALENT!

    No matter how the industry tries, they just can't get a computing device with an integrated display, 16GB RAM, 1 TB SSD and under TEN hours of battery life into a package weighing less than about TWO pounds.

    And then you want it to be "Rugged", whatever that means...

    Fine. But people whine about "too heavy" when a Tablet is barely over HALF of that these days.

    WTF, over? I thought people who read Slashdot generally UNDERSTOOD what the current state of technology (especially BATTERY technology) is.
    br. Guess not.

  49. Re: people buy what they can afford by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Wow, you're a cunt.

  50. My ipad 2 lasts for almost a 2 weeks usually... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    then again its my go to reading device when im on the can. Its really replaced all those magazines I used to store next to john for reading material. Contrary to how that sounds I actually do use it everyday and think it was a worthy purchase.

  51. Duh. by Charcharodon · · Score: 1
    Most tablets are nothing more than streaming devices. You want a more powerful tablet? Then build a monster PC at home connected to fiber optic and stream what it does to your tablet.

    Tablets are not going to do any heavy lifting until they figure out a better battery tech in which to drive all that hardware you are lusting after.

  52. Unrealistic expectations on price/performance? by TomGreenhaw · · Score: 1

    What is the use case for 20 hours? Who want the compromise that would entail?

    Q>"have laughable battery times,"...lasts for a day or two in power
    A>Have you looked at an iPad or Surface Pro?

    Q>won't stand a month of regular everyday use and carrying around..."
    A>I've had iPads and a Surface pro for years and they are fine.

    Q>He asks why none of the manufacturers seem willing to offer more than one gigabyte of RAM -- and why they're so stingy with storage.
    A>Have you looked at a Surface Pro?

    Q>"Where is the rugged 16GB RAM / 1TB Storage / 20-hour battery tablet?"
    A>What are you using this device for? Are you really willing to have heavy weight and/or poor performance to get 20 hours of battery life? I'm not - give me a faster lighter tool with 8 hours.

    --
    Greed is the root of all evil.
    1. Re:Unrealistic expectations on price/performance? by guacamole · · Score: 1

      I think the person asking questions was basically a troll. For one, such generous specs are not needed yet on most tablets for years. Second, a "tablet" with such specs (minus battery) already exists. It's called Surface Pro 4. Newegg lists a 16GB/1TB model for $2699 USD.

  53. re: complaints relatively incorrect? by King_TJ · · Score: 3, Informative

    I have to disagree that "all of my complaints are relatively incorrect". I'm glad you haven't experienced issues typing on the MS keyboard cover, but it's a fact that many of our users have. The Surface Pro is designed so it props upright along the edge of the cover, and the cover is a plastic and fabric combo that's slightly flexible. That means if you're sitting on a train or other form of public transportation and it's vibrating/bouncing around, the Surface Pro 4 can't really be held still by the keyboard portion - unlike a laptop with a traditional hinged lid firmly attached to the bottom half of the shell. That doesn't even begin to discuss such questions as why MS feels the need to sell the keyboard cover as an *option* for over $100 on a computer this expensive? Seems to me it should be included, as I've never met anyone who bought a Surface Pro 4 and decided to skip the keyboard cover.

    As for the font scaling? Try any of a number of older apps developed using Java 6.... It's typically not compiled to be "scaling aware" (even if Java 6 technically did offer the option to compile source that way). Our Fonality VoIP "HUD" control panel is one such example. On a Surface Pro 4, if you launch it - you can't even see the phone extensions you're trying to click on because it draws them so tiny. There's no way to get Windows 10 to tell the app to draw it larger in proportion to everything else. All you can do is drag it onto a regular (non 4K) external display where it will display properly.

  54. Money For Nothing? by guacamole · · Score: 1

    I am sorry OP, but if you want a tablet with 16GB of memory, 1TB of storage, rugged, and a quality screen, then you're going to have to pay the same as for an Ultrabook or tablet with such specs. A Surface Pro 4, comes with about the specs you want, but you gotta pay 2.5K bucks for that.

    And in general, I do not get it why people want a tablet with laptop specs. A tablet with laptop specs (e.g. a surface pro 4) ends up being relatively bulky and heavy, and is actually a lousy tablet and a lousy productivity tool.

    An ideal application for a tablet is to be a media/information consumption device for the times when using a notebook, or a convertible ultrabook, is less convenient. A small 8-9 inch lightweight tablet is perfect to browse the web or watch a video on a flight or in your bed. But for real productivity work, please do yourself a favor and get a laptop or a convertible ultrabook, like a Lenovo Yoga or similar.

  55. Replacable battery by MouseTheLuckyDog · · Score: 1

    I would settle for a tablet with a replacable battery.

  56. Re: complaints relatively incorrect? by bananaquackmoo · · Score: 2

    What I'm hearing is "I want to use the keyboard a very specific way that the Surface Keyboard doesn't do" and "I have a problem with Java 6". It's like complaining that the 2 door car you bought doesn't have 4 doors. Why not buy the 4 door car then? I'm saying that I'm very happy with my Surface Pro. The only thing which could make me happier is a better GPU.

  57. Surface Pro 4 by cyber-vandal · · Score: 1

    That comes in a 16 GB / 1 TB version. It's very expensive though.

  58. Cameras are especially crap by HalAtWork · · Score: 1

    It's impossible to find a tablet with a high resolution camera or image stabilization. I must buy two devices.

  59. It's quite simple by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    It happens because Qbertino is a stupid name.

  60. One word answer by dbIII · · Score: 1

    One word answer - heat.

    A tablet just cannot shed as much heat as a larger device so it's not going to match a gaming rig with huge fans.
    It's actually quite amazing that the "low spec" tablets complained about have as much processing power as they have.
    We've become the people who if we had a chance at high speed sub-orbital flight would complain about the airline food :)

  61. Re: complaints relatively incorrect? by thegarbz · · Score: 1

    I also have a Surface Pro. Actually 2, the 2 and the 3 model, and my girlfriend has the 4. While I agree he bought the wrong device if he's complaining about the keyboard, the inability to do display scaling naively in Windows is a BIG problem. Not a obscure VoIP app no one uses problem, but rather a problem that affects a lot of devices and a lot of the programs running the OS.

    Fortunately I am only affected with one program. Photoshop. a premier tool for photo editing and a must have for people the world over supported only 100% and 200% scaling which on the SP3 and SP4 renders them either too small or too big. But that's not where it ends. There are a multitude of problems with the way scaling works in Windows 10 to the point where even Microsoft's own installers can't render correctly. When you're not greeted with super tiny applications you can't read, you get given an upscaled pixellated dialogue which looks like someone is playing a practical joke, and that's before you get applications which render content but pickup the UI scaling in the content but not the application itself resulting in programs with large things in one area and tiny unreadable ones in the other.

    Mind you none of this is a Surface specific problem or a convergence device problem, but it's far from some simply complain like "I have problems with Java".

  62. Toughbook 20 by karl1984 · · Score: 1

    "Where is the rugged 16GB RAM / 1TB Storage / 20-hour battery tablet?" This product exists and is called the toughbook 20. https://www.youtube.com/watch?... You might want to re-evaluate your "need" of these features after spotting the price tag...

  63. Crap camera though by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I have yet to finmd a tablet with a camera that even compares with what phones are getting

  64. All over the place? by jon3k · · Score: 1

    Take your pick of 2-in-1 devices. Surface Pro, Lenovo Miix 700, Acer Transformer, etc.

  65. Dynamic RAM by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Makes me wonder why nobody has created a dynamic RAM system.
    On low-use, only 1 stick is active.
    On demanding programs, it activates the other one(s).
    "but making people pay for something inactive a lot of the time?! Madness"
    Make a slot for expansion. Laptops have been doing it for over a decade.

    Of course, heat is always going to be a killer for that.
    But we are only really speaking a few extra gigs, rather than 16 which is just beyond the needs for a tablet. (and even most PC users)

    Processors already turn off cores when nothing is happening. So it isn't entirely crazy.
    Just need to find that space, though. Tablet vendors have such a hard-on for making things stupidly thin. Thanks Apple. Dicks.
    Give me a fat tablet any day. I want features, not barely-paper-weights.
    Who the hell holds their tablets anyway? Gorilla arm is only an issue if you are a moron or unhealthy as fuck.

    We sorely need a breakthrough in batteries. They are holding back any industry that depends on batteries.
    The first company to make that breakthrough are going to be multi-billionaires overnight.

  66. Re: complaints relatively incorrect? by epine · · Score: 1

    That doesn't even begin to discuss such questions as why MS feels the need to sell the keyboard cover as an *option* for over $100 on a computer this expensive?

    Because sticker shock has discrete spectral lines. Nobody ever said humans were rational, although Greenspan put on quite the show concerning where that assumption would take you (the financing model was also innovative: no money down, no giant one-time trillion-dollar payment until your children can legally drink in public).

  67. shock mounting of SSD by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Yes. shock standards still apply. It's all about how things are packaged, and if you've got cantilever loads, when it gets shocked it might break.

  68. Tablet buyers are cheap by Shirley+Marquez · · Score: 1

    With the notable exceptions of the Surface Pro (which is better viewed as a hybrid device; they're mostly bought to use with a keyboard, not as a pure tablet) and the iPad line, tablets sell for less than high end phones do. Most of them don't have cellular radios as a cost factor (except for the models with LTE connectivity), but they have big screens and big batteries that cost more than the smaller ones in phones do. Tablets with the specs of a high end phone are scarce because few people want to pay $800 for them.

    But yeah, at least offer us 2GB or more RAM on Android tablets. 1GB is painful given the size of present day apps. Installing Facebook and Messenger on a 1GB Android device will bring the poor thing to its figurative knees. Tablets without LTE tend to have fewer apps installed than phones do, so they don't need as much internal memory IF they also have a memory card slot. (Apps mostly have to be in internal memory, but media can happily live on a card.) Tablets are not only more likely to have a slot than phones are, it's also likely to be much easier to get to; some phones require removal of the battery to get to the memory card.

  69. OLD Tablet? by Jager+Dave · · Score: 1

    I'm still using a gen-1 iPad. Mind you, I'm not a fan of Apple, loving my LG phone nearly as much as bacon, but I cannot deny that with moderate use, it's battery life can easily be measured in days. Sure, very limited memory, but I don't watch movies on it. When some 3rd party clones a gen1 iPad, hopefully with Android, but with more increased memory/storage/speed, I'll gladly replace it. Manufacturers are afraid of making them "too bulky", "too heavy"... a matter of a single-digit amount of ounces, is not going to hold me back, if it does what I want it to.

  70. Microsoft is to blame by Not-a-Neg · · Score: 1

    With regards to cheap Windows 8/10 devices (tablets & netbooks) Microsoft is to blame. Microsoft limits OEMs to a maximum of 2GB of RAM and 32GB of eMMC storage in order to purchase reduced price licenses of Windows.

    --
    -==- Buy a Mac and leave me alone!
    1. Re:Microsoft is to blame by GeckoFood · · Score: 1

      Microsoft limits OEMs to a maximum of 2GB of RAM and 32GB of eMMC storage in order to purchase reduced price licenses of Windows

      I have a tablet that has 4GB RAM and 64GB storage. It runs Windows 10 and Android as well - dual boot. It's a Chinese device, even by brand. If that is a limitation imposed by Microsoft then this tablet maker doesn't seem to care.

      That said, Windows 10 on a tablet is mediocre at best. I much preferred Windows 8.x for touch devices. I use the Android side almost exclusively.

      --
      Be excellent to each other. And... PARTY ON, DUDES!
  71. Dont buy samsung tab pro 12.2 they are defected. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I bought a galaxy tab pro 12.2 in December 2014, lasted 1.5 years wouldn't charge properly, random reboot, and couldn't turn off manually.
    Problem battery connector to motherboard solder done terribly due to oxidation of joints, causing above problem.
    Contacted Samsung they say its out of warranty. When you Google this problem it is wide spread, but Samsung will tell you that you have to repair yourelf.
    I am wondering if there is a sight that tracks these defects etc. and this is my last Samsung product including appliances, their customer service is terrible.

    Dennis,

  72. Where the fuck is my post? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Where the fuck is my post?

    I posted a comment about samsung's galaxy tab pro 12.2 has having a motherboard to battery connector defect.
    Samsung doesnt want to repair them if out of warranty i.e. 1.5 years old.
    Don't buy one until you do your research on their longevity.

    Dennis,

  73. What the fuck happened to my post? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    What the fuck happened to my post?