More Google/Motorola musings: SplatF’s Dan Frommer names winners and losers.
Tag Archives | Tablets
Fusion Garage’s Grid-10 Tablet: Not the CrunchPad and Not the JooJoo. And Not Android, Either–Except That It Is
A startup which called itself TabCo has been teasing the world about its upcoming tablet in recent weeks while remaining stealthy and mysterious. (Among its PR tactics: Delivering pizza to journalists such as me.) Today, the company came out of hiding–and it turns out that it’s not a new startup at all. It’s an old startup named Fusion Garage, known until now as the company which worked with Michael Arrington of TechCrunch on his CrunchPad tablet idea before cutting Arrington out of the project and releasing a spectacularly disappointing, unsuccessful device called the JooJoo. The TabCo ruse was intended to drum up interest in the company’s post-JooJoo products, a tablet called the Grid-10 and a phone named the Grid-4. I met with Fusion Garage founder Chandra Rathakrishnan today to get demos of both gadgets.
5 comments
See Ya, Streak 5
Dell’s first Android tablet, the Streak 5, is officially discontinued. A strange farewell message now appears on Dell’s Streak 5 web page (“Goodbye, Streak 5. It’s been a great ride.”), with an image of a pretty woman who is not holding a Streak 5.
The general consensus is that the Streak 5 was too big to be a good phone and too small to be a good tablet, but I’m not convinced of that argument. Phone makers have successfully made 4.3-inch screens desirable, and are now pushing toward 4.5 inches with the Samsung Infuse 4G and rumored HTC Holiday. And whenever I write about 7-inch tablets, I’m shocked by the number of commenters who want to use them as phones. I think there’s a niche for oversized handsets. Dell just failed to capture it. In hindsight, it’s easy to see why.
7 comments
Someday, There Will Be a Great 7″ Tablet
With all due respect to Steve Jobs, I’ve never been convinced by his stance that 7″ tablets are a bad idea. But I haven’t been able to mount a convincing case that he’s wrong, either. The original 7″ Samsung Galaxy Tab suffered from using a version of Android meant for phones. RIM’s BlackBerry PlayBook had even bigger problems. Neither one was a 7-incher you could use to refute Jobs’ argument. On the other hand, though, it was factors other than their screen size that hurt them–so I continue to hold out hope that someone will make a 7″ tablet that’s just plain nice.
13 comments
The TouchPad Price Break: Permanent!
That temporary sale that knocked $100 off the price of HP’s TouchPad? It’s no surprise that it turned into a price cut, period. The TouchPad now starts at $399, a hundred bucks less than an iPad. I wonder if it’ll boost sales enough to make the TouchPad the first clear hit in the tablet biz that isn’t from Apple?
One comment
Kindle Cloud Reader and Vudu: The Promise and Pitfalls of iPad Web Apps
iPhone to Support Third-Party Web 2.0 Applications
Innovative New Way to Create Applications for iPhoneWWDC 2007, SAN FRANCISCO—June 11, 2007—Apple® today announced that its revolutionary iPhone™ will run applications created with Web 2.0 Internet standards when it begins shipping on June 29. Developers can create Web 2.0 applications which look and behave just like the applications built into iPhone, and which can seamlessly access iPhone’s services, including making a phone call, sending an email and displaying a location in Google Maps. Third-party applications created using Web 2.0 standards can extend iPhone’s capabilities without compromising its reliability or security.
“Developers and users alike are going to be very surprised and pleased at how great these applications look and work on iPhone,” said Steve Jobs, Apple’s CEO. “Our innovative approach, using Web 2.0-based standards, lets developers create amazing new applications while keeping the iPhone secure and reliable.”
Doesn’t that feel like a press release from another era? It is.
As everyone who knows anything about the iPhone and iPad knows, developers and users turned out not to be that surprised or pleased by Web apps running in Safari. But when Apple opened up its mobile operating system to true third-party apps in 2008, it set off an explosion of enthusiasm that hasn’t stopped.
There have always been some excellent Web apps for iOS–Google’s ambitious versions of Gmail for the iPhone and iPad spring to mind–but the vast majority of companies that have attempted to build something great for iOS have chosen the flexibility, power, and responsiveness of native apps over the open standards and cloud-based capabilities of Web apps. Which makes this week a notable one for iOS Web apps.
Today, Amazon.com released Kindle Cloud Reader, a browser-based version of its e-reader that works in Safari on the iPad (and Safari and Chrome on Windows PCs and Macs). It give you access to all the Kindle books you’ve bought, has a similar look and feel as the Kindle app, and includes a built-in version of the Kindle bookstore. (Amazon’s iOS Kindle apps deal with Apple’s new rules for in-app purchasing by serving only as readers, not online bookstores.) Cloud Reader’s arrival comes a day after movie-streaming service Vudu launched an entirely browser-based version which can deliver movies to the iPad, no app required.
3 comments
Another Print Publisher Turns to Tablets
In the latest news of print media companies turning to tablets,CNN reports that its sources say media conglomerate Tribune Co. plans to develop its own tablet device that would in turn be offered to subscribers.
Tribune publishes several major dailies, including the Chicago Tribune, Los Angeles Times, and the Baltimore Sun, as well as several smaller papers, plus a host of television and radio outlets.
The plan sounds to me to be a lot like a similar pilot program. soon to be underway in Philadelphia. There, local papers plan to sell devices at a discounted rate to support digital editions.
6 comments
Suddenly, at Least Temporarily, the TouchPad is the Mythical Cheap iPad Alternative
First, HP introduced its TouchPad tablet at the same starting price as Apple’s iPad: $499. Then it introduced a $50 instant rebate, bringing the price down to $449. Then it announced a special $100 instant rebate this weekend, bringing the price down to $399.
And now WebOSRoundup says that Staples has a $100 coupon that you can use and still qualify for the instant rebate–letting you snag a 16GB TouchPad for $299, or a 40 percent discount off the original price.
That’s one way of answering the question “Why should anyone buy the HP TouchPad instead of the iPad”–give the TouchPad a much more aggressive price. The TouchPad may theoretically be going back to $499, but in the world of tech, there’s almost no such thing as once-in-a-lifetime deals: if a $299 TouchPad is available today, it probably means that all 16GB TouchPads will go for $299 sooner or later. Probably sooner. And while it might help move tablets, it presumably isn’t a sign that HP is thrilled with how well the TouchPad is selling at $499.
9 comments
HP’s TouchPad Gets a $100 Price Cut, This Weekend Only
Did Tuesday’s $50 price cut on the HP TouchPad strike you as ho-hum? Perhaps this weekend’s $100 price cut will do the trick.
The instant rebate will be in effect from August 5 through August 7 on HP’s website, PreCentral reports.
The TouchPad debuted to lukewarm reviews, partly because there aren’t a lot of tablet apps on HP’s WebOS platform, and partly because the software was buggy and slow. HP has improved its software through a subsequent update, but the app deficiency remains.
One comment
India’s $35 Laptop: The Case Gets Curiouser
India’s $35 laptop/tablet, a concept that I’ve been skeptical about since its announcement a year ago, is close to completion — as long as you ignore a few signs that it’s not.
According to the New York Times’ Bits blog, the Indian government will deliver on its promise of a dirt-cheap Linux or Android device in several weeks. “All the naysayers will be unpleasantly surprised,” said Kapil Sibal, India’s minister for human resource development.
But that’s pretty much all that Sibal is saying right now. Here’s why I still won’t believe it until I see it:
- Sibal claims that a version of the $35 laptop is already in his possession, but he wouldn’t show it to the Times because he apparently left it at home.
- Sibal’s office wouldn’t say who’s making the device, or whether production has begun.
- The Times’ story offers no further details on the $35 laptop’s specs or design.
The last time I wrote about the $35 laptop, the Indian government had run into some financial misunderstandings with its hardware vendor. Meanwhile, one government source told India’s Economic Times that the device’s component costs alone exceeded $125, and Gartner analyst Vishal Bhatnagar estimated that $35 wouldn’t even cover the cost of a touch screen and microprocessor. Skeptics may also remember India’s earlier promise of a $10 laptop in 2009, which turned out to be, well, not a laptop.
I’d still love to see India pull this off — the whole point of the project is to sell cheap computers to students — but empty promises don’t inspire confidence.