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iPad Competitors Begin to Disappear Even Before Being Released
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It's a bit a on the heavy side and good for web browsing. That's not enough to drop $499 on one though.
I can see HP taking some time to assess, but really the HP windows Slate must be essentially done by now. They dropped some iPad baiting mockup videos, appeared in the Huts Hand during a CES keynote.
HP has been a big windows convertible maker for years as well.
I still expect them to ship the Windows Slate, if for no other reason, they won't have WebOS slate ready this year. Whatever business case they had really hasn't changed. They could even be coexisting products whenever they finish a WebOS slate.
HP has been a big windows convertible maker for years as well.
I still expect them to ship the Windows Slate, if for no other reason, they won't have WebOS slate ready this year. Whatever business case they had really hasn't changed. They could even be coexisting products whenever they finish a WebOS slate.
The Slate and Courier weren't competition, they were trash. People, especially on Engadget, were blindly loving them just because they were the response to the iPad. When you read the specs though, and read what they were promising, a slow device with little battery life would fail and ruin the name of the maker. HP most likely knew running Windows 7 would do this, and that's why they bought Palm. Light tablets need to run a light OS, it's nice to know they are finally realizing what Apple knew all along. I hate how there are so many electronic gadgets on the market that are complete trash, and people buy them out of ignorance and actually provide revenue to the maker.
Yep. Ever since the iPad was still rumors, all the gadget sites were posting tons of "me too!" devices that were promised to be just as good. Then when the iPad was announced, with all of its perceived shortcomings, the tech blogs were flooded with rumours of "oh yeah?" devices that were coming that would support everything the iPad didn't. Dell was going to make them, HP was going to make them, Microsoft, all kinds of Chinese companies... They promised that tablets would be the next netbook, they would change the world, and be available for as little as $199.
Well, we're still waiting...
Fair disclosure, I'm not sure how interested I am in the iPad, but I was very interested in Courier. I'm sure that flood of tablets is still just over the horizon, so I'll wait and see...
We saw renders of a concept and that was all. Concepts do not make competition. An OS may look great in an animation, but that doesn't make it real. I gave this as good a chance of coming out soon as I gave the computers in Avatar. Little did I know transparent displays were actually just around the corner...
Microsoft had so many obstacles to overcome, this should have been the expected result, not a surprise. They needed a working OS, a pleasing form factor, decent performance and good battery life. We have no way of knowing if they actually achieved any of those. Perhaps we will see some of these concepts in the future, but when a concept appears to be way ahead of its time, maybe it is...
HP can take Palm and ram it where the sun don't shine!
HP isn't even capable of making a decent calculator anymore. Their graphing calcs are the same, antiquated drivel they had 21 years ago but in a cheaper case. I bought a 48g from J and R music world for $150.00. What a waste of money. Plastic, flimsy, junk!!! Horrible navigation. After all these years you'd think they'd toss in a beautiful UI etc. Nope! They don't care.
I bought the HP smart calc. GARBAGE BEYOND GARBAGE!!!!
HP doesn't give a d***!!
Bought a 33 s 4 years ago and the effing decal for the number 4 came off after 2 months!!
OMFG!!!!
Look, Apple has their own OS for Mac and iphone and a bevy of engineers under one roof to collaborate on projects. THEY ARE ALWAYS ON THE SAME PAGE!
HP has spent years living off of another company's OS. HP can't do anything to windows. All HP does is shove windows into a pc and slap their name on it. That ain't nothing!!!! I know a crack w**** that can do that.
HP can only hire a young, hip ad agency to take their license, off the shelf crap and spruce it up with a bunch of generation X, skinny jeans sag wearing tweens grinning and shmucking into the camera with a Justine Bieber(EWWWW!!!) soundtrack blaring.
So, there is no way that tired ink seller will be able to outdo the ipad. Apple has already sold a million so far. A FREAKING MILLION in less than a month.
HP isn't even capable of making a decent calculator anymore. Their graphing calcs are the same, antiquated drivel they had 21 years ago but in a cheaper case. I bought a 48g from J and R music world for $150.00. What a waste of money. Plastic, flimsy, junk!!! Horrible navigation. After all these years you'd think they'd toss in a beautiful UI etc. Nope! They don't care.
I bought the HP smart calc. GARBAGE BEYOND GARBAGE!!!!
HP doesn't give a d***!!
Bought a 33 s 4 years ago and the effing decal for the number 4 came off after 2 months!!
OMFG!!!!
Look, Apple has their own OS for Mac and iphone and a bevy of engineers under one roof to collaborate on projects. THEY ARE ALWAYS ON THE SAME PAGE!
HP has spent years living off of another company's OS. HP can't do anything to windows. All HP does is shove windows into a pc and slap their name on it. That ain't nothing!!!! I know a crack w**** that can do that.
HP can only hire a young, hip ad agency to take their license, off the shelf crap and spruce it up with a bunch of generation X, skinny jeans sag wearing tweens grinning and shmucking into the camera with a Justine Bieber(EWWWW!!!) soundtrack blaring.
So, there is no way that tired ink seller will be able to outdo the ipad. Apple has already sold a million so far. A FREAKING MILLION in less than a month.
It's good news because it means that these companies are going to put a lot of thought into exactly what to release in competition with the iPad. So the competition will be better than if they rushed out the stuff that was in their labs.
Courier seemed pretty impressive in the video, but the more that I thought about it the more that I realized that it would have been a difficult act to make it scale (ie. add new apps into all the "notebook" metaphors that it's built on).
The HP slate was a cool looking device that seemed to pretty much do the same thing as all the failed MS Windows tablet since the early 2000s. I think that they'll be able to a lot more with WebOS than they could ever do with Windows.
If HP reworks the Slate to utilize Palm's WebOS, they will be able to drop the price of it, as they won't have to pay a licensing fee to Microsoft to utilize Windows....
I hope HP and others don't sit on their hands for too long. I'd like to see a competitive product released sooner rather than later. I think that by waiting, they are going to let Apple get a solid hold on this new tablet market, and they'll never be able to compete. That's all well and good for Apple, but it may cause less competitive innovation when it comes to the products. themselves.
I hope HP and others don't sit on their hands for too long. I'd like to see a competitive product released sooner rather than later. I think that by waiting, they are going to let Apple get a solid hold on this new tablet market, and they'll never be able to compete. That's all well and good for Apple, but it may cause less competitive innovation when it comes to the products. themselves.
Given that Dell has a bunch of Android/Moblin devices on their roadmap it seems doubtful that they would also be investing heavily in Windows based MID/tablets.
Microsoft's not dead in mobile just focussing on Windows Phone 7 (Series).
Personally, I'm still waiting until WWDC and the Dell Mini 5/Streak release to see if the iPad is for me or if I want to upgrade my iPhone 3G and add a non-contract Android device instead...
B
Yes. We're constantly reading about all the shortcomings of the iPad, which make it mostly useful for consumption, not producing real work. But the great thing about it is that Apple got the big things exactly right. Great screen quality, battery life, the iPhoneOS and form factor, all at an affordable price point. This makes it infinitely better than a netbook or laptop for just looking at stuff. HP's slate was just going to be another overpriced netbook or maybe a clumsier laptop.
Not trying to be hater but were there really many people who watched the Courier video and thought it was something they were actually working on? I watched it and thought it was an interesting collection of ideas they were showing but never in a million years would I have mistaken it for a product demo and that was without thinking through issues like the cost/weight of the double screen and such.
The HP slate cancelation surprised me a bit, they showed off a working prototype and it seems like there is plenty of room in the iPad/slate space for something to run Win7 and to compete on hardware feature/windows software compatibility even if it would never have the super sexy mojo of the iPad.
Hahahaha the Courier is vaporware. I'm laughing because I'm reminded how the PC fanboyz kept boasting how it would be the next best thing.
Guess not.
You sound like an Apple Fanboy...
See you in the semis!
Honestly, such a dumb thing to say. Use iPad apps for an extended period of time and then use iPhone apps and you'll realize that the extra screen real estate changes everything in terms of the usability and function of the device. So it's a large iPhone perhaps, but one that makes the iPhone platform usable in a completely new and expanded way. And by the way, I just got off a skype phone call on my iPad...
Amazing!
BTW, Gizmodo's article "Microsoft Cancels Innovative(lol) Courier Tablet Project" is quite funny because the Courier since the beginning was just conceptual videos and nothing more.
I dunno. If the game is weight and battery life (as it should be for any mobile device design) any tablet that runs a full OS will be less efficient for battery life. If larger batteries are installed to correct that, the device will be heavier. Mobile devices require a new operating system which targets specific uses. Desktop machines and laptops will still be around to fill the need beyond the handheld.
And this is Apple's fault?
I don't agree that competition is bad for consumers. I actually think competition is companies offering the *same* product in an effort to slice some of that profit away from the original product creator. Competition is nothing but another profit monger squeezing in on another product's profit.
Imagine that these idiots stop trying to steal each other's profits and actually tried creating products different from one another so that we could enjoy our choice of truly *different* products, not a bunch of "me-toos" with different brand names.
CES 2010 was very reactionary based on the rumors of an Apple Tablet. No one was expecting $499 and bringing Microsoft along for the ride to make a profit.
I was much more interested in the Courier as well but I'm unable to explain why.
I was actually looking forward to seeing how the Courier performs. The concept videos we've seen always looked a little too good, in my opinion, but still... it's a shame that Microsoft axed it. Maybe they have something better in the works.
Microsoft needs to come out with a mobile touch-based OS stat if they don't want to get left behind.
HP is already on their way to not needing Microsoft for its tablets. How long until Dell and Sony come up with their own OS for their tablets?
Just putting Windows 7 on these things is not gonna cut it.
HP is already on their way to not needing Microsoft for its tablets. How long until Dell and Sony come up with their own OS for their tablets?
Just putting Windows 7 on these things is not gonna cut it.
Apple seems to have set the bar a little too high.
Yes they did!
There is no one able to outdo the ipad on their own. 12 hours video life! WTF!
A flawless media ecosystem! OMFG!
HP couldn't make anything that could come close to the ipad. They better stick with selling MS's intellectual property like they have for years now. Yeah, trolling out yet another MS powered pc for Redmond. LOL!
They're not competition if no one buys them. And neither company would put these back on the shelf if they thought they'd sell enough to make money on them.
Yes, but built in Flash, they provide good web content that can't be viewed on an i-thingy. I guess we Apple "fanbois" now officially don't know what we're missing.
Then don't buy an Apple product. The funny thing about pricing is that if people can't afford it, the products won't sell. If they don't sell, the company doesn't make any money and goes out of business. Funny thing competition - it's a concept I contend really benefits profit mongers.