Not a timeline. Just a few of the many tablets I remember our engineering dept trying to use effectively over the years. They all sucked, and yet, we continued to buy them dozens at a time, on the promise that one day they'd change everything.
If that bottom one is the joojoopad or whatever it was called, it was conceptualized during the build-up to the iPad, was to be a reader only, and never hit market. Nor did any of the props on star trek or 2001.
That sleek minimalist white job looks like a nice late model Sahara as well. We had a couple of those. At $3500, they could barely run Excel. Illustrator was out of the question.
I wouldn't say either of them beat the iPad to anything.
Originally, Crunchpad - later JooJoo (after fallout between FG and techcrunchs Arrington --- revived as GridPad, another failure by the peeps at FG). Second, what the hell does "during the build-up to the iPad" mean? Apple was rumored to release a tablet, therefore anyone who did a tablet before Apple still copied them? Awesome.
Further, it was not to be a reader only. Not by a long shot. It had apps and services. And most certainly, envisioned replicating the (late) success of the iPhone app store. As for hitting the market, i'm not sure. It was released, and preorders were taken. Whether or not they actually delivered any devices is beyond my knowledge.
I checked: Engadget states that it did in fact hit market, and did have sales (albeit poor), but... yeah. Still: it was built, it functioned, and it pre-dates the iPad in terms of design (and type of OS).
But please, RMWebs, show us all the amazing models of the "tablet industry" that Apple copied to get where they are today. I'd certainly love to see what us and all the other design firms I've worked with that slagged on through the last 15 years missed. Perhaps you can start with the convertibles, you remember, what everyone decided was the future of tablets, because slates were impractical and useless.
Image
Some would hold that convertibles are still the future of tablets:
http://www-bgr-com.vimg.net/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/asus-transformer-prime-gray.jpeg
(the battery life on that one is beyond this world when docked. if I'm not mistaken, the dock actually works as a charger too).
Personally, i'd kill for a functioning 11" MBA-styled tablet that has three added modes.
1) removal of screen. Cf. Transformer above
2) swivel-lidding the screen. Cf. your convertible (i would assume that one swiveled into tablet mode)
and most importantly:
3) "re-hinging" of the screen, effectively placing the screen at an angle with the front end about where the keyboard sits today (still leaving the trackpad open).
obviously, the screen would be multi-touch and it would include a Dual-mode OS. Granted, somewhat of a pipe-dream to date, and one heck of an engineering feat. But still. Its something i'd gladly ship out $1999 for.
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don't know why you posted that Sahara tablet to back your claim about ipad having some insanely creative design, take that Sahara tablet, remove some buttons, make glossy, you pretty much have an iPad
Tablet kiosk (the company behind the Sahara) did that themselves already. Dont think they did end-to-end glass though.
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