Research in Motion's 7-Inch 'PlayBook' Tablet to Target Business Users

[MythicFrost]

It supports 1080p video but can't even play 720p at full resolution -- only good for outputting it.
You know it mentions absolutely nothing about battery life whatsoever, anywhere (unless I missed it), that's a little worrying.

 

[therealdeal]

Guys...

QNX ≠ webOS

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/QNX
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WebOS

webOS is based on a monolithic Linux kernel...
QNX is a microkernel with some BSD interoperability...

Did I miss something here?

 

[Carniphage]

But you can't tether it to an iPad without jailbreaking the iPhone.

Or you jailbreak the iPad and add iTether - which turns on the Bluetooth PAN stack.

Something that should have been present in the iPad from the get go.

C.

 

[Carniphage]

Because computers without Flash and Java are useless for web gamers.

Computer without mice are useless too. Without hover, these games will not work.

C.

 

[mstrpln.mx]

the next iPad nemesis

The real next iPad killer will be the one who have the next 2 keyfeatures:

1. better or same user interface & experience
2. cost less than $499

you're forgeting the most important keyfeature on the iPad, said by apple, is the price! most of the people only can buy a netbooks! so the real next iPad keyfeature should be a better price.

 

[Pilgrim1099]

Why on earth do people think that RIM is the right company to provide a tablet adequate for doing presentations squirted to a projector? What software exactly does the RIM run?

I can tell you this. The iPad runs keynote, and there will soon be plenty of projectors and add-ons to projectors to support AirPlay.

HDMI. What a joke.

Why? Simple.

MILITARY. GRADE. OS. It's designed to kill. your. a$$. dead. Is Apple involved in the military/industrial complex? No. There's a real reason for that and their OS is too "childish" to use. What the military has used is going to RIM and it's been around since TRON came out in 1982 .

End of line.

 

[Night Spring]

Am I the only one who is bothered by the "book" part of the name? I keep thinking, "But it doesn't open/close like a book!"

 

[Pilgrim1099]

Apple leaves out ridiculously obvious things like HDMI, 1080p, etc. They innovate like crazy then hobble their awesome products on purpose.

Then their product(s) should've been called iHobble. Apple's a good company but they sure do sometimes miss a smart opportunity and don't usually listen to consumers.

Steve Jobs once said in his interview last year prior to releasing the iPad that Apple will create products on what they think is best for us, not based on our demands.

How '1984'.

 

[Popeye206]

Looks cool.... but everything "looks cool" in a promotional video.

It will come down to Blackberry fans will eat this up... others... the choices are going to be wide and varied... so we'll have to see. I'm sure iPad 2.0 will not disappoint.

 

[Xeronimo74]

Why? Simple.

MILITARY. GRADE. OS. It's designed to kill. your. a$$. dead. Is Apple involved in the military/industrial complex? No. There's a real reason for that and their OS is too "childish" to use. What the military has used is going to RIM and it's been around since TRON came out in 1982 .

End of line.

lol, this 'Playbook' has childish written all over it though. Starting with the name.

Ok, the OS may be stable (while we're at it: uh, when is the last time your iOS crashed?) though it remains to be seen how this device actually performs outside of shiny videos. And its user interface does not look any less 'childish' than (allegedly) the one of iOS ...

And what's its price? How long do the batteries last?

 

[Xeronimo74]

Looks cool.... but everything "looks cool" in a promotional video.

It will come down to Blackberry fans will eat this up... others... the choices are going to be wide and varied... so we'll have to see. I'm sure iPad 2.0 will not disappoint.

I'm also sure iPad 2.0 won't disappoint.

Btw. how is the Blackberry Torch doing so far?

 

[Xeronimo74]

Then their product(s) should've been called iHobble. Apple's a good company but they sure do sometimes miss a smart opportunity and don't usually listen to consumers.

Steve Jobs once said in his interview last year prior to releasing the iPad that Apple will create products on what they think is best for us, not based on our demands.

How '1984'.

Yeah, and that was such a bad decision! Apple is nearing bankruptcy. Oh, wait ...

 

[Kenrik]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (Linux; U; Android 2.1-update1; en-gb; Dell Streak Build/ERE27) AppleWebKit/530.17 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0 Mobile Safari/530.17)



But you can't tether it to an iPad without jailbreaking the iPhone.

Wrong, ever hear of iProxy?

Google it.

I have a tethering app on my iPhone.. not jailbroken.

You just have to be a developer (or know one) to use it.

 

[Bernard SG]

Why? Simple.

MILITARY. GRADE. OS. It's designed to kill. your. a$$. dead. Is Apple involved in the military/industrial complex? No. There's a real reason for that and their OS is too "childish" to use. What the military has used is going to RIM and it's been around since TRON came out in 1982 .

End of line.

http://www.forbes.com/2007/12/20/apple-army-hackers-tech-security-cx_ag_1221army.html

http://www.macnewsworld.com/story/34669.html

http://www.tuaw.com/2010/03/23/us-army-meets-with-apple-discusses-tech-for-soldiers/

 

[Thex1138]

Basically

If it were not forAple's innovation in re-inventing the tablet for the consumer.. the others had no idea TF hey were doing nr how to do it... Nor what the consumer wanted in these devices.

So every new device these donkeys attempt to turn from vaporware to market... they bow their heds to Apple.

 

[Colman]

I'm not getting the 7" tablet format.

Maybe it's just me, but a 7" tablet sounds like a product designed by asking people what they imagine they want - which isn't a good plan when you're working on a new product class because they don't have any experience to base their opinion on.

Apple probably could have produced a 7" tablet a year or two ago and chose not to. You've got to ask why - I don't believe that we'll see a 7" iPad, that's just analysts hearing that Samsung and RIM are producing them and assuming that Apple will too.

While 7" sounds like a nice pocket size in theory, I suspect that it's too small for most uses - the iPad is just about big enough to read a full page of PDF on comfortably, just big enough to type on comfortably (I avoid typing in landscape mode), just big enough to share when you're looking at something. I don't think there's enough difference in capability between a 7" tablet and a smartphone screen to justify the extra device for most people. Sure, it'll fit in a big pocket, but it's just going to wreck the line of a suit or get smacked around in your combats or you'll leave it at home and rely on the smartphone instead in the same situations you'd leave behind the iPad sized device.

An iPhone is as big as a smartphone can comfortably be, more or less. I wonder if an iPad isn't as small as a general purpose tablet can be, more or less.

 

[Thex1138]

Evolution...

I'm also sure iPad 2.0 won't disappoint.

Btw. how is the Blackberry Torch doing so far?

If iPad 2.0 turns to be of the kin of MacBook Air then I will probably keep 1.0, to GF, so I can view evolution in process... Purpose.

 

[ChrisTX]

Let's see how it feels in the hand, and in use

That's what she said?

On a serious note, will the tethering through an existing BlackBerry device be free, or will it inevitably cost? Pretty sure most carries won't allow even more bandwidth to be used for free.

 

[ten-oak-druid]

Why? Simple.

MILITARY. GRADE. OS. It's designed to kill. your. a$$. dead. Is Apple involved in the military/industrial complex? No. There's a real reason for that and their OS is too "childish" to use. What the military has used is going to RIM and it's been around since TRON came out in 1982 .

End of line.

LMAO

I can picture the commercials now. Rather like the ads for some patriotic commemorative coin with "My Country Tis of Thee" played throughout.

Am I supposed to be interested in a product because of the military industrial complex? Give me a break.

 

[kdarling]

This thing will debut in six months with no software library, and it'll be up against Version 2 of the iPad, plus whatever the Android clone army can throw at it.

Every device does not have to target the same type of customer.

Just as with Blackberry phones, the Playbook won't need lots of consumer apps to become a favorite in the business world.

Being able to playback Flash presentations gives it one business edge already.

It's dead on arrival.

On the contrary, it's going to reduce the chances of other tablets getting larger footholds in enterprises.

(I can't count the number of corporate clients who have asked me over the past year when a RIM tablet was coming out. As with IBM in the old days, no one gets fired for recommending a Blackberry solution.)

If this thing works well at all, it'll become a major complementary managerial and sales device, carried in the inside jacket pocket of every executive.

 

[hwhalers]

MILITARY. GRADE. OS.

And this may explain what powers Project: Echelon at the NSA . And it ain't Mac OS or iOS.

You keep repeating this stuff as if it was at all relevant to smartphone operating systems.

 

[Thex1138]

(I can't count the number of corporate clients who have asked me over the past year when a RIM tablet was coming out. As with IBM in the old days, no one gets fired for recommending a Blackberry solution.)

Yes thats fine but 18 months ago they weren't thinking it was any kind of viable solution, nor how it should nor could be delivered...

 

[*LTD*]

This is gonna play out like the iPod.

The next "iPad Killer" is the next iPad.

 

[NebulaClash]

On another point, if it's true that the PlayBook supports Flash out of the box, hopefully it'll prove to Steve Jobs and all the other Flash naysayers that Flash CAN work on a tablet device.

From what we've seen of phones that support Flash, it seems that Jobs is more right than wrong so far. Flash is not working too well yet on mobile devices.

Cue the chorus of people who swear it works just great on their phone. But I'm just talking about the published reviews and YouTube videos that show how poorly it works today.

 

[NebulaClash]

This is gonna play out like the iPod.

The next "iPad Killer" is the next iPad.

It is boring, isn't it? For years we had to put up with people swearing up and down how device X would take market share from the iPod. Never happened. Too many advantages for Apple.

With the tablet market, it's still early innings, so anything can happen. But it's shocking to see how long a lead the market is giving Apple. We're talking in this thread about a device that won't be out until next year. Where is HP with their tablet? Dell (a true tablet, not a blown-up phone)? We have Samsung and ? This Christmas season will belong to Apple. They will have a 10-20 million tablet lead before any true competition shows up.

And then just as with the iPod, the competition will furiously copy the current version of the iPad, slap on some extra goodies to win the feature chart war, only to see Apple release iPad 2.0 (then 3.0 and 4.0 ...).