Tablet Wars? - Revenge of the TibTabs

Shelley

Shelley

Well-known member
Is it me or is there suddenly an explosion with many companies now releasing/ planning on releasing tablets? Trending on twitter at this time is this trending topic Amazon Planning 5 or 6 New Tablets. Apple are now planning a cut down version of their tablets it just seems all of a sudden whether it's rumour with amazon or just high expectations but realizing tablets are selling being produced faster than hot cakes.
 
Interesting, I personally have no interest in a tablet, got enough computer at home. Not sure what's the big buzz about a tablet, lots of people seem to want it just for the heck of having one.
 
tablets still have a long way to go performance-wise. for instance would love to use final cut pro's advanced motion editing on a tablet. this may take a couple more years to happen.
 
Until they have a tablet with a keyboard and mouse....

Have you ever tried to type super fast and properly with a tablet?
And how can you take in all the depth, color, scale, and action of a game with your hands covering / hovering over the screen?

I'll skip the tablet generation and wait until we have virtual reality 3-D / 4-D computers (clear universal voice commands would be cool too).
 
More news just came that the Galaxy Note 10.1 will be going quad core with an exynos processor and 2 gigs of ram.

Then the Asus Transformer Infinity is coming with a quad core Tegra 3 processor, 1 gig of DDR3 ram, and 1080p IPS display.

Then the surface tablets from microsoft, too much competition. Always good for us consumers though :)
 
Adam Howard said:
Until they have a tablet with a keyboard and mouse....

Have you ever tried to type super fast and properly with a tablet?
And how can you take in all the depth, color, scale, and action of a game with your hands covering / hovering over the screen?

I'll skip the tablet generation and wait until we have virtual reality 3-D / 4-D computers (clear universal voice commands would be cool too).
Click to expand...

Acutally the Asus Transformer Tablets can be hooked onto a dock that pretty much makes it a netbook with a mouse pad and a keyboard.
 
Sador said:
Remember the time companies came up with unique ideas that weren't ripped off from others just to get easy money?

No, me neither.
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Because it never existed.

Every technological or scientific advance has come about from expanding previous research or building off earlier innovation. Cars, lightbulbs, electricity, computers and everything else has been progressed not by one single company but by nearly all companies in their respective niche.

The natural progression of tablet computing began with the PDA, then the Microsoft tablet PC (Adoption was really only picked up by ISP servicemen), the original Chinese Android tablets (Utter crap as Eclair/Froyo were not made for such large screen sizes), the iPad, and modern Android tablets.
 
faeronsayn said:
Acutally the Asus Transformer Tablets can be hooked onto a dock that pretty much makes it a netbook with a mouse pad and a keyboard.
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I learned something new today.....

Will have to look into this and see if tables became as powerful as my current pc.

4 core 3.0ghz
8gb ram
1tb hd
1gb video
 
Forsaken said:
Because it never existed.

Every technological or scientific advance has come about from expanding previous research or building off earlier innovation. Cars, lightbulbs, electricity, computers and everything else has been progressed not by one single company but by nearly all companies in their respective niche.

The natural progression of tablet computing began with the PDA, then the Microsoft tablet PC (Adoption was really only picked up by ISP servicemen), the original Chinese Android tablets (Utter crap as Eclair/Froyo were not made for such large screen sizes), the iPad, and modern Android tablets.
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True, but I'm waiting for more unique idea and ground breaking idea.

The next "wheel" as it were.
 
Forsaken said:
Because it never existed.

Every technological or scientific advance has come about from expanding previous research or building off earlier innovation. Cars, lightbulbs, electricity, computers and everything else has been progressed not by one single company but by nearly all companies in their respective niche.

The natural progression of tablet computing began with the PDA, then the Microsoft tablet PC (Adoption was really only picked up by ISP servicemen), the original Chinese Android tablets (Utter crap as Eclair/Froyo were not made for such large screen sizes), the iPad, and modern Android tablets.
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That was sort of my point.
 
1/3 of visits to 2 of my sites are on mobile devices.
I'm enjoying my Nexus 7. Looking forward to using it when I travel for when a laptop is too inconvenient.
A tablet doesn't replace my laptop which not long ago people never thought a laptop could replace a desktop.
 
Lucas said:
Not sure what's the big buzz about a tablet, lots of people seem to want it just for the heck of having one.
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I didn't want one, thought the same. Got an iPad as a present, and let me just say... I wouldn't want to go without it now.
Adam Howard said:
Until they have a tablet with a keyboard and mouse....
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They do, it's called the iPad. It uses the Apple wireless products via its bluetooth.

Having an iPad when travelling, when out and about... amazing and far superior compared to screwing around on some minuscule mobile screen, when a nice big iPad screen is muchhhhh better to view. Really perfect for watching movies / listening to music on long flights, with around 8 - 10 hrs of watching video before recharge... and well, it wouldn't run out listening to music on any flight.
 
It's also called "The Blackberry Playbook."

It DOES allow for keyboard and mouse via bluetooth. It also pairs with your phone so you can use your phone as a remote control (touchpad). And since it will bluetooth pair with your phone, you don't need a separate wireless plan to have always-on internet on your tablet. Your tablet will use your phones plan via wireless tether. It does have wireless though, when you are near a hotspot and want to really go fast.

The Playbook is way undervalued at 139.00 too! I can do anything on mine that someone else can do on their iPad or Kindle...and more.
 
Dodgeboard said:
It's also called "The Blackberry Playbook."

It DOES allow for keyboard and mouse via bluetooth. It also pairs with your phone so you can use your phone as a remote control (touchpad). And since it will bluetooth pair with your phone, you don't need a separate wireless plan to have always-on internet on your tablet. Your tablet will use your phones plan via wireless tether. It does have wireless though, when you are near a hotspot and want to really go fast.

The Playbook is way undervalued at 139.00 too! I can do anything on mine that someone else can do on their iPad or Kindle...and more.
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and then you compare it to the latest android tablets. But I do agree with you, the value is good. But the Nexus 7, is 200 dollars and it runs a quad core processor, with the latest version of Android.
 
faeronsayn said:
and then you compare it to the latest android tablets. But I do agree with you, the value is good. But the Nexus 7, is 200 dollars and it runs a quad core processor, with the latest version of Android.
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7" is too small for productivity, and while performance on the Nexus 7 is as good, if not better than the iPad, it wouldn't be something you'd really want to use a keyboard dock with due to the size (I have issues typing with a 14" ultrabook, much less a 7" docked tablet).

You'd be better off getting the Asus Transformer Pad TF300T (http://usa.asus.com/Tablet/Transformer_Pad/ASUS_Transformer_Pad_TF300T) which is a 10" quad core CPU/12 core GPU tablet for $379. It also has an OEM dock available which acts as a spare battery, and offers additional ports.

The keyboard dock works much better than any of the competition. There are also higher end tablets (Transformer Prime, and the Transformer Prime Infinity), but this is the budget 10" tablet by Asus, who also made the Nexus 7.
 
Forsaken said:
7" is too small for productivity, and while performance on the Nexus 7 is as good, if not better than the iPad, it wouldn't be something you'd really want to use a keyboard dock with due to the size (I have issues typing with a 14" ultrabook, much less a 7" docked tablet).

You'd be better off getting the Asus Transformer Pad TF300T (http://usa.asus.com/Tablet/Transformer_Pad/ASUS_Transformer_Pad_TF300T) which is a 10" quad core CPU/12 core GPU tablet for $379. It also has an OEM dock available which acts as a spare battery, and offers additional ports.

The keyboard dock works much better than any of the competition. There are also higher end tablets (Transformer Prime, and the Transformer Prime Infinity), but this is the budget 10" tablet by Asus, who also made the Nexus 7.
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Sure but if you want functional for work, isn't a laptop pretty much always better?
 
Sador said:
Sure but if you want functional for work, isn't a laptop pretty much always better?
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Always yes. Though you may get some disagreement from the ipad fan boys. And since i got my nexus 7 the android fanboys that ignore the issues with the nexus7 (they do exist believe that).

Edit: The only thing good about tablets I find is watching my movies (netflix) and watching youtube documentaries. That's as much usage my tablet will get.
 
Sador said:
Sure but if you want functional for work, isn't a laptop pretty much always better?
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Just as a laptop can never replace a desktop for many people, a tablet will never replace a laptop as well.

While it's possible to do many tasks that don't require much in the way of functionality (Email, browsing, watching movies, some gaming) it's still impossible to do other things (Writing long articles, more in-depth design, programming).

There are also a lot of other shortcomings to using a tablet to replace a laptop or desktop:

Low Storage: The highest storage you can get currently (For consumers) is 64GB, and possibly microSD (Bringing it to 128GB). With just documents and critical files alone, I have over 128GB worth of data, and most of that is not stuff I'd trust in the cloud. Also cloud storage isn't always dependable, and requires a decent connection speed.

Profiles: Most people will use their laptop for just personal use, but many people also share it within their family, which brings up the issue of needing individual profiles. While it is possible with Android with SwitchMe (https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=fahrbot.apps.switchme requires root) it isn't supported by other platforms.

Multi-Tasking: Android currently has the best current implementation (I say current as WebOS is pretty much dead, and I have little faith in HP in reviving it as a true open source project, with the action being more to save face) and there is much that is lacking with it. Until there is more cohesive multi-tasking, there isn't much possibility of turning a tablet into a productive device.

Productivity Tools: Things such as text expansion/replacement, automation, scheduled tasks etc are pretty much impossible to do on almost all platforms (Everything but text expansion is available on Android with Root, and text expansion is offered by 4.1's keyboard) making true productivity difficult.

Office Suites: There are a few available, but most really aren't all that usable, and without a keyboard dock it's a hassle to do more than basic work in them.

A lot of these issues might be covered with Windows 8 tablets, but the system is going to be very locked down, so it'll still have some flaws. Also many things come down to space availability; tablets are getting thinner and thinner, and are already at their limit in some cases. While a lot of the technology is available, most of it hasn't been put in use with tablet computing (Or is still in testing phases).

That's not to say these problems will not be addressed in the future (I'd be surprised if they were even issues within 5 years or so at the rate that Google and OEM's address issues with tablets), but I wouldn't be surprised if tablets didn't become true productivity tools till 2020 at least.
 
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