Recommend me a tablet

Eh, I'm in no hurry. It's a toy/convenience gadget. I don't need it today. I'd rather wait endlessly for an as yet unfinalized product than even consider paying for a device that's tethered to iTunes the way the iPad is.

Sounds like there's a few of us in the same boat. The last thing I want is another rolling contract payment, so its Wifi-only all the way. This is the article that tipped the possible Xoom model.

Thin_J wrote:

Eh, I'm in no hurry. It's a toy/convenience gadget. I don't need it today. I'd rather wait endlessly for an as yet unfinalized product than even consider paying for a device that's tethered to iTunes the way the iPad is.

Yeah, I'm this way too. Its a complete luxury, and I'm willing to take my time to pick the right one. I might even be tempted to wait a few months after release to see if there are any major design faults in the 1st gen.

From what I've been reading, the Xoom is the i-Killer of this current lot, in that it does a lot of the same general-use things well. If that's the case, I'll probably lean that way (though that Blackberry Playbook sounds like it made a good impression.)

That was the counterpoint to me not buying the iPad last year (I can just wait until alternatives exist). Looking back, my day-to-day activity (heck, my families' day-to-day activities) would have been drastically different had I gone that way. Not saying I'm right and your wrong, but I'm glad I took the plunge. I'm recharging the 9-10 hour iPad battery about every 2 to 4 days from use. And that's been pretty consistent from the time we got it.

Thin_J wrote:

Eh, I'm in no hurry. It's a toy/convenience gadget. I don't need it today. I'd rather wait endlessly for an as yet unfinalized product than even consider paying for a device that's tethered to iTunes the way the iPad is.

This.

I have serious qualms spending money on anything apple as long as they are separating themselves off from the rest of the technology world. Supply chain management is great, but I do not long to be part of a captive audience.

Check out this thread at conceptart.org

If you're looking for cheap digital sketchbook get an LE1600. I got one for $150 from ebay. I put $50 into it to upgrade to a 2Gb stick of ram.
-with this one you'll experience a little bit of brush lag
-with this one you'll experence a little bit of parralax which will affect your accuracy depending on your zoom level
-not your best choice if you're a professional and colour exactness is critical

The 1700 is reported to have less brush lag. They were running around $750 when I bought.

If you want to go high end, the Motion Computing Tablets are now called J3400, J3500 but they're more specialized toward being construction site tablets now.

If you're a casual artist and you want to surf the net, sketch on the couch, let your three year old paint with it, the 1600 or 1700 is a good choice.

If you're a professional artist, and accuracy, colour correctness, and brush response are critical, you're pretty much locked into a Wacom Cintiq and it's high cost, and tethered to a desk.

Here's my sketchbook at concept art. I'm not a great artist, but I did these with the 1600. I'm sure I don't do the tech justice.

**edit** I should note that the le1600 and 1700 predate the common use of capacitive touch. J3400 may not have touch either. The J3500 certainly does but is $$

I so wish the microsoft courier had lived.

Ghostship wrote:

I so wish the microsoft courier had lived.

Surely they're working on something like that, though. It's hard to imagine Microsoft staying out of the game.

ClockworkHouse wrote:
Ghostship wrote:

I so wish the microsoft courier had lived.

Surely they're working on something like that, though. It's hard to imagine Microsoft staying out of the game.

I think their strategy is to stay out of the game long enough to become almost irrelevant in the end. Basically like their smartphone approach. I did see a tablet from another manufacturer that was similar in design to the courier. Not sure about functionality, though.

Being in architecture / design, that courier video was close to home. I suppose I was more interested in the representation of the OS than the form factor. It would be sensible for microsoft to put out an OS for many pieces of hardware over a piece of their own hardware.

I'm sure MS has something in the pipeline based on Windows Phone 7.

Well, my potential choices have now been narrowed down at least slightly.

Motorola is pricing the Xoom at over $700.

Keep dreaming guys. You're going to get killed by the revised iPad if you can't get that price down.

I just don't get this. Are we not an in an era of sub $300 netbooks? Did tablet makers not get the memo?

Hmmm... greed seems to be working for Apple so, its gotta work for me!

$700 is definitely too much, but I think a lot of that must have to do with adding in 4G and other cellular capabilities.

The 16GB 3G iPad is $630, so that's about the right price if their only concern is targeting that specific slice of the market (potentially the most profitable?) No one else so far is planning for that many models, although Notion Ink comes close, since they offer 4 depending on if you want the Pixel Qi screen.

Remember, the smaller and lighter something is, at a given performance level, the more it costs. You can't really expect netbook pricing on tablets, because netbooks can take much larger batteries, and have more room for cooling. That means the manufacturer can use components that are less power efficient, and run hotter.

Even so though, Apple's set the bar for pricing. If companies are releasing products which can't compete with that bar, then they're wasting money.

I think Apple's getting their usual 40% margin on the iPad, so you'd think there'd be plenty of room to undercut on price.

Haakon7 wrote:

Apologies for the necro, Mystic, but I figured this was safer than starting my own thread.

No need to apologize! Seeing this wave of new tablets is exciting. And the HP Slate ain't dead? What?

Thin_J wrote:

Eh, I'm in no hurry. It's a toy/convenience gadget. I don't need it today. I'd rather wait endlessly for an as yet unfinalized product than even consider paying for a device that's tethered to iTunes the way the iPad is.

This is where I stand as well. I'd still like to have a portable sketchbook/painting device without restrictions. No need for 3G/4G either. I'll wait for as long as it takes.

tagged.

Malor wrote:

I think Apple's getting their usual 40% margin on the iPad, so you'd think there'd be plenty of room to undercut on price.

Which is why I'm blown away by companies launching tablets at the $600+ price points they have been. It's like they're ignoring the 8000lb rhinoceros in the room and seeing how much they can sell these things for.

fangblackbone wrote:

I just don't get this. Are we not an in an era of sub $300 netbooks? Did tablet makers not get the memo?

AnimeJ wrote:
Malor wrote:

I think Apple's getting their usual 40% margin on the iPad, so you'd think there'd be plenty of room to undercut on price.

Which is why I'm blown away by companies launching tablets at the $600+ price points they have been. It's like they're ignoring the 8000lb rhinoceros in the room and seeing how much they can sell these things for.

Exactly. All I'm interested in is a wifi-only tablet at $400 or less to use around the house. Maybe by the end of the year this will become a reality.

MeatMan wrote:
fangblackbone wrote:

I just don't get this. Are we not an in an era of sub $300 netbooks? Did tablet makers not get the memo?

AnimeJ wrote:
Malor wrote:

I think Apple's getting their usual 40% margin on the iPad, so you'd think there'd be plenty of room to undercut on price.

Which is why I'm blown away by companies launching tablets at the $600+ price points they have been. It's like they're ignoring the 8000lb rhinoceros in the room and seeing how much they can sell these things for.

Exactly. All I'm interested in is a wifi-only tablet at $400 or less to use around the house. Maybe by the end of the year this will become a reality.

So... the Notion Ink Adam? Too bad the preorders sold out in December. And there's still the Viewsonic GTablet.

But what's the interface like on them?

unntrlaffinity wrote:

So... the Notion Ink Adam? Too bad the preorders sold out in December. And there's still the Viewsonic GTablet.

Thanks for the heads up. I previously haven't had any desire for a tablet and haven't been paying attention, but the buzz from CES has me interested.

AnimeJ wrote:

But what's the interface like on them?

I found some reviews for both the Adam and G-Tablet, and at least in their first iterations, they seem to have some issues.

Adam meta review with videos

G-Tablet video review

It's still early and I'm not in a big hurry to get one, so I'll wait and see how things go over the next couple months. With iPad2 approaching, if the original iPad gets a significant price cut ($350 or less) soon, I may be tempted to get one of those, but I'd rather have an Android-powered tablet.

I mean, of course there are issues. If you want Apple quality interfaces and hardware that undercuts the actual Apple product by 20% or more, then obviously you're going to be waiting awhile. Look at MP3 players.

That's how most of these trendy products work, you either buy Apple, or purchase the more "open" and less polished equivalent, accepting that you'll have to tweak it a bit yourself. The G-Tablet default UI blows, but can easily be flashed to a new ROM.

If all you want is a "wifi-only tablet at $400 or less to use around the house", then they already exist. That's all I'm saying. If you want the iPad, but made by Microsoft or Google at half the price, you're going to be waiting a lot longer than a year.

This is where I stand as well. I'd still like to have a portable sketchbook/painting device without restrictions. No need for 3G/4G either. I'll wait for as long as it takes. :)

If you don't have to have capacitive touch, and you're not primarily concerned about how you'll appear at Starbucks, why not a tablet/slate like a motion computing or the Fujitsu comparables?

Touch is for internet browsing. There's no beating a pressure sensitive stylus for drawing.
The le1700s outspec an Ipad, it the discussion at conceptart.org is accurate. You just have to be careful which software you try to kram into it. Like apple makes sure the apps that you can get run to spec on their hardware.

unntrlaffinity wrote:

I mean, of course there are issues. If you want Apple quality interfaces and hardware that undercuts the actual Apple product by 20% or more, then obviously you're going to be waiting awhile. Look at MP3 players.

I've never owned any product whose name has an "i" in front of it, so I don't have any first-hand experience with "Apple quality interfaces and hardware," let alone need one. I have owned a few mp3 players that served me just fine, i.e. play my mp3s.

unntrlaffinity wrote:

That's how most of these trendy products work, you either buy Apple, or purchase the more "open" and less polished equivalent, accepting that you'll have to tweak it a bit yourself. The G-Tablet default UI blows, but can easily be flashed to a new ROM.

I don't consider myself a consumer of "trendy" products, and I have no problem with "tweak it a bit yourself" to make my "more 'open' and less polished" product perform more like I want, as long as doing so doesn't require an expert level of technical knowledge.

unntrlaffinity wrote:

If all you want is a "wifi-only tablet at $400 or less to use around the house", then they already exist. That's all I'm saying. If you want the iPad, but made by Microsoft or Google at half the price, you're going to be waiting a lot longer than a year.

All "I'm saying" is not that I "want the iPad, but made by Microsoft or Google at half the price." Again, I've never used the iPad, and "I'm not in a big hurry to get one." I just want a sub-$400 wifi tablet that has a good user experience out of the box, with little or no tweaking needed. While I disagree that I'm "going to be waiting a lot longer than a year," I don't mind waiting up to 4-6 months.

unntrlaffinity wrote:

I mean, of course there are issues. If you want Apple quality interfaces and hardware that undercuts the actual Apple product by 20% or more, then obviously you're going to be waiting awhile. Look at MP3 players.

That's how most of these trendy products work, you either buy Apple, or purchase the more "open" and less polished equivalent, accepting that you'll have to tweak it a bit yourself. The G-Tablet default UI blows, but can easily be flashed to a new ROM.

If all you want is a "wifi-only tablet at $400 or less to use around the house", then they already exist. That's all I'm saying. If you want the iPad, but made by Microsoft or Google at half the price, you're going to be waiting a lot longer than a year.

Honestly, the real lesson here is that I am not an early adopter. It doesn't have to be Apple level of refinement, I think what Samsung did with the Tab S is fantastic. The issue I have is them charging and arm and a leg by comparison, and there's a lot of folks following in those footsteps.

Honestly, I think tablet PCs now are where eReaders were 3-4 years ago, and still an immature technology. As time goes on, prices will come down, and the products will continue to improve.

AnimeJ wrote:

Honestly, the real lesson here is that I am not an early adopter. It doesn't have to be Apple level of refinement, I think what Samsung did with the Tab S is fantastic. The issue I have is them charging and arm and a leg by comparison, and there's a lot of folks following in those footsteps.

Honestly, I think tablet PCs now are where eReaders were 3-4 years ago, and still an immature technology. As time goes on, prices will come down, and the products will continue to improve.

The market value of tablets is an arm and a leg right now, though. Not having the Apple logo doesn't change that.

And I agree with the early adopter outlook. But I found nitpicking the kinks in the Eden UI, despite seeming like it's an otherwise quality sub-$400 tablet (the primary desire expressed previously), humorous. Kind of like those 1-star reviews you see on TripAdvisor questioning the quality of the conditioner provided by the Pokipsie Holiday Inn. I mean, it's a sub-$400 tablet.

Edit: What I'm trying to say is that in my experience whenever I see the phrase "I just want" or "All I want", people don't actually mean it. Because that "just" or "all" becomes available, and it's met with another requirement, and another, and another...

It's hyperbole, probably, and an exaggeration, definitely, but still funny to watch unfold. Not in a mean way, in a thing-you-recognize-we-all-do way.

The iPad officially launches here today at seriously tempting prices. Don't have the money to run out and buy one now, but I won't pretend I'm not tempted. It's funny how I'm not interested in an iPhone, but the iPad seems more sensible.

And while other tablets like the Playbook and Galaxy Tab look good Apple makes real quality appliances.

unntrlaffinity wrote:
AnimeJ wrote:

Honestly, the real lesson here is that I am not an early adopter. It doesn't have to be Apple level of refinement, I think what Samsung did with the Tab S is fantastic. The issue I have is them charging and arm and a leg by comparison, and there's a lot of folks following in those footsteps.

Honestly, I think tablet PCs now are where eReaders were 3-4 years ago, and still an immature technology. As time goes on, prices will come down, and the products will continue to improve.

The market value of tablets is an arm and a leg right now, though. Not having the Apple logo doesn't change that.

And I agree with the early adopter outlook. But I found nitpicking the kinks in the Eden UI, despite seeming like it's an otherwise quality sub-$400 tablet (the primary desire expressed previously), humorous. Kind of like those 1-star reviews you see on TripAdvisor questioning the quality of the conditioner provided by the Pokipsie Holiday Inn. I mean, it's a sub-$400 tablet.

Edit: What I'm trying to say is that in my experience whenever I see the phrase "I just want" or "All I want", people don't actually mean it. Because that "just" or "all" becomes available, and it's met with another requirement, and another, and another...

It's hyperbole, probably, and an exaggeration, definitely, but still funny to watch unfold. Not in a mean way, in a thing-you-recognize-we-all-do way.

Yep, absolutely. I suppose if I were to write it down, then here's my list:

- Android
- 7" screen minimum
- Wifi only
- Angry Birds
- Good battery life
- Sub $400 or less

And honestly, given all that, I'm really better off sticking with my laptop, because I can play angry birds on it