RIM readies 7in, 10in BlackBerry tablets for 2012 RIM seems unwilling to give up on tablets, if what's claimed to be a leaked roadmap is correct. According to the tabulation of the BlackBerry company's plans, a revamped 7in PlayBook will be out in April. It will sport improved, 3G HSPA+ connectivity, fansite 3NBB reports. By Christmas, RIM will have released a 10in PlayBook …
No one wanted them in the first place, somehow I don't think it was the screen size that stopped people buying 'em either!
Who does RIM's customer research? Surely a quick search in Google for something like, "is playbook any good?" would give more of a clue. Give it another 9 months, pick 'em up at bargain prices and by which time someone might have ported the infinitely more useful Android O/S to it!
"Why wait until April to ship a tablet that uses it? Good question, and one that's tricky to answer."
Because RIM really don't have a clue about what they're doing?
They were fine when they were the only people punting around Blackberry's but now that the market has changed and they're having to compete against others, they're out of their depth.
I picked up a Playbook before Christmas when they were £170. The hardware and OS are superb, what's lacking is decent apps. Netflix, Skype and Kindle are all missing, and you'd be hard pressed to find someone who doesn't use at least one of them on other devices. RIM should be paying these companies to the write apps for the Playbook. Also, the BB app store policy of $1=£1 needs looking at as apps are expensive compared to Android an iOS because of it.
"Why wait until April to ship a tablet that uses it? Good question, and one that's tricky to answer."
Playbook OS 2.0, which is being released next month, works on the original Playbook devices. The author of this article didn't do any research, which is why they assumed you needed the LTE hardware to run the upgrade.
There are more than a dozen people in this office with one. They all bought them at the heavily discounted price of Cdn$200 and went in knowing the pros and cons. They're all happily surfing the 'net on the PlayBook. I used mine the other day to play Music videos into the home theatre over the HDMI output. It is what it is, and it's pretty good value for money. PB Video Chat is cool and works well, but everyone would prefer a non-platform specific video chat app.
Yeah, I'll get an iPad 4 or 5 maybe someday. And an Android tablet too.
I bought the 32g then had to go out and get the 64gb after my daughter refused to give back the 32. Now my wife wants to ditch her android tablet for a playbook. They are very good tablets, I find most of the people that don't like them haven't actually used them. All they need to add for me is Skype and it will do all I need of a tablet.
And the HDMI output works even better than I had expected. I can output a full 1080p movie to the TV while browsing the web on the tablet and it all works perfectly with no hiccups or slow down. So I'll also be using it as a portable media player for the kids when we travel, bring a cable and hook it up to the hotel TV rather than pay their outrageous rental fees.
I just picked up a Playbook from PC World for £199 and immediately registered for the OS 2 beta. I can honestly say it's the best tablet I've ever used. Top notch hardware, an OS that flies and the best mobile browser there is. I'm now waiting for news on the QNX based phones because I can't believe they won't be anything except fantastic.
The only problem is the lack of Apps but RIM have addressed that with the Android player, so expect to see thousands of Android apps ported over, solving that issue.
Seriously, for £199 it's the best tech bargain I've ever bought. In comparison, the HP Touchpad (I also bought in a firesale) is a total piece of garbage. (I'll be ditching webOS on that for Ice Cream Sandwich as soon as Cyanogen get it ported).
I too picked on up for £170. It works superbly with my work Blackberry and is far better to travel with that my 10" tablet. They really are a different class of device to iPads, Xoom, 10.1 etc.
The combination of smallish phone with qwerty keyboard and a pocketable tablet is one that I think is ideally suited to mobile workers. The OS is great as well - tbh I much prefer the user experience to that provided by my Honeycomb tablet.
I have had a few people laugh when I have produced it at work but when they have used it and I have told them what I paid all but the most closeminded have been impressed.
I too miss apps for Kindle, Skype etc. - surely porting these would be not too expensive and would help sales enormously.
Open your minds people
Have a 64GB PlayBook that was supplied by my employer (love the "out of pocket": price of $0!).
I was not sure what to expect, but being a BlackBerry phone user, it simply WORKED. The BB Bridge to tether the two just worked instantly, and Email, Calendar, etc... as well as mobile browsing all worked instantly... and that is all with the "old" operating system.
I have a couple of complaints, mostly the limited apps, but once I got over that hump I have realized that the device kicks the butt of other (even larger) tablets for business use. The lack of simple connectivity to an overhead projector is a show stopper for many(most) tablets out there, and is something that ism so easy on a Playbook.... step 1 connect HDMI cable from projector (or TV) to playbook... step 2 Enjoy.
Looking forward to the next OS simply for the additional Apps that developers have not been willing to port to the PlayBook.... not RIMs fault, per se, but still it is something they wear daily in the negative marketing.
The device and the true multi-tasking OS and interface is so nice compared to Android and iOS, I think that the bad press is simply based on the market share issue and the love by Fanbois of all things apple!
I like my apple products fine, but the PlayBook kicks arse!
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