HP Eventually Plans to Release New WebOS Tablets

They are just posturing / spinning / lying again. They have no real plans to release a tablet on an open source OS that has yet to be stripped of it's proprietary components only to have those sewn back in so that a device will market.
I
The HP track record is simply lies upon more lies. This is nothing more than a way to make the announcement appear positive.
Pat Horne

Yes, that day is upon me as well Rich. After Christmas, I'm go ing to probably get the Galaxy Nexus if it's coming to ATT. If not, I'll settle for an OS upgradeable GSII or maybe switch to VZW for the Nexus and the better coverage here in the south.

Pretty stoked about joining the world of the top-tier mobile experiences too. I love a lot @ WebOS, but it's truly over and I must surrender to the giant ecosystem.

Good luck in your iAdventure. Pretty amazing stuff there too.
Pat Horne

Khris,

The Nexus has the sick 4.65" HD SAMOLED+ screen. Only the lack of expansion and pedestrian 5mpx camera (who really cares > 2 or 3 anyway) are the only things about it not on the bleeding edge. ICS looks pretty sweet in the reviews too. As you say the beauty of WebOS is inevitably being overtaken. But, I hear the GSIIs are getting ICS upgrades, so I could live with that device too.

Not on ATT, but I'm going to check into switching my entire family plan to VZW, because I am sick and tired of traveling and dealing with EDGE 1/2 the time. VZW has 3g almost anywhere in the south and that's worth a lot to me. Don't like losing the SIM, but would love to lose ATTs dropped calls and generally crappy network.

Finally getting a little excited.

Pat Horne

We made a really bad decision to invest 1.1 billion into Palm, we thought within 1 year we would be able to create a tablet that would take the market by storm. This didn't happen and now we have this investment doing nothing but hemorrhaging money. We asked every possible handset maker if they would like to license it from us for a ridiculous amount of money. They all said NO...we then ask them all if they would like to purchase it from us for some ridiculous amount of money and they all said NO. Now, we don't want to sell WebOS for a loss because that would make us look bad(if indeed someone did buy it and make it work)...instead we want to hedge our bets that if some entrepreneuring individual takes the code and makes something useful out of it, that we will have looked like the nice people making it free and will then have the first chance to actually put it into a product. If (and the chances are large) that it never becomes anything more we will at least have earned the good will of having opened sourced WebOS.

The End.

Rich: so true. The smartest guys in the room only know how to destroy companies. The old HP was driven by engineering talent. Apple is driven by innovation. The whiz kids at HP only know capital destruction starting with the Compaq purchase.

After a year or so with an iP4, I am Ok with it: great at some things, so-so as a phone, Palm PIM still the best. Picked up a Pre3 for the heck of it as a spare....nice hardware and too bad the Pre3 wasn't released a few years back as the original Pre.

I just got my iPhone 4S. It is great. The os is more polished than Andy at this time. Hardware is excellent. No plastic there. It is an example of great American engineering. It reminds me of early Palm smoothness. Apple has some of the best software engineers in the world. Check my sig, I've tried most of them and this is the best you can get right now. Can't believe it took me this long to get there.
Have a nice day!
HP 41CX->HP 75C->Pilot 1000->Pilot 5000->Pilot Pro->IIIe->IIIc->M500->M505->M515->TC->T3->T5->Treo 650P->Treo 700P->Droid>Pre Plus>Droid>iPhone4S

I'd stick with the Droid as the backup device due its better hardware, bigger screen, and availability of custom ROMs "just in case". Glad to hear you are so pleased with the 4S thus far. It's a walled garden, yes, but what a nicely cultivated garden!!

Pilot 1000->Pilot 5000->PalmPilot Pro->IIIe->Vx->m505->T|T->T|T2->T|C->T|T3->T|T5->Zodiac 2->TX->Verizon Treo 700P->Verizon Treo 755p->Verizon Moto Droid + Verizon Palm Centro-> Verizon Moto Droid X2 + Palm TX

As a backup to your data an iPod Touch or iPad would be the best bet, they are 100% compatible. Android is plagued with compatibility issues, I have lots of Android users wanting BattSix ported to Android but they still can't get a reliable bluetooth HID profile implemented to cover all devices.

Gary
http://www.BattSix.com

Tech Center Labs
www.talestuff.com
www.iTalentProductions.com

I still check PIC once in a while but I think there are only about 5 or so of us left :-/
It's a shame how companies can start out so good then let the bean counters and new college grads take over thinking they can do without innovation, (Palm, HP).
I think we will see some new form factors from Apple, Steve Jobs had a tight rein on their products.

Gary
www.BattSix.com

Tech Center Labs
www.talestuff.com
www.iTalentProductions.com

I still check PIC once in a while but I think there are only about 5 or so of us left :-/

Make that 6!

It's a shame how companies can start out so good then let the bean counters and new college grads take over thinking they can do without innovation, (Palm, HP).

Indeed. The innovation of Jeff Hawkins (Palm Pilot, Treo, Cloud OS) was ultimately stifled by Palm... THRICE!

I think we will see some new form factors from Apple, Steve Jobs had a tight rein on their products.

I hope Apple doesn't go crazy and try to compete with Android in terms of form factors. The only new products I'd like to see added to the mix are a 7 inch iPad and a 4-4.5 inch iPhone (and maybe a 2.5-3 inch iPhone Mini). Everything else is OK as-is.

FJH

Sounds like you are starting to warm up to Apple a little now ;-)
I still can't find an Android developer, if I were looking for an iPhone developer they would be coming out of the woodwork (do people still say that?)

Have a great new year!

Gary
BattSix.com

Tech Center Labs
www.talestuff.com
www.iTalentProductions.com

..."they aren't the type to experiment"?

...what?? :D

What did I miss?

Not much: Palm died; Palm was resuscitated by EP; Palm died; Palm was resuscitated by HP; Palm was KILLED by HP.
Go back to sleep - nothing to see here, move along.

Still rockin my pimped out Visor Platinum with the Sprint Digital Link module. 12kbps is faster than the 9kbps from the VisorPhone, and let's face it: the dropped calls are usually a blessing. Can't beat 7 days on a charge either!

The Samsung i500 and European Sony CLIE TH55 remain the true caviar to the general. Not that you would know, Private.

FJH

FJH, what are you hearing about the "big" Playbook update coming soon? Is it still on track for next month? Is this near-mythical update truly going to address most of its inherent shortcomings? Adding a native email app would be massive.

Since I didn't care for the HTC Flyer's color scheme, I am now rocking an awesome black HTC Evo View 4G (no WiMax, just wi-fi mode) as my daily tablet and I LOVE it. It has replaced my Galaxy Tab and my Acer Iconia as my daily driver. Flawless HTC build quality, 1.5Ghz Snapdragon is fine for my needs, 1GB RAM + 32GB internal + microSD slot + charging over a standard microUSB port=bliss. For once, I prefer what HTC has done with Sense atop Honeycomb. This will absolutely hold me over very nicely until something more compelling arrives. I think something thin around 7.7" to 8.2" is the PERFECT tablet formfactor but for now I am fine with 7". A shame we never got to fondle a TouchPad Go. Given the proper infusion of $ and time, however, and I'd definitely pick up an iPad 3 in the coming months for a taste of the good life.

While I'm at it, might as well make my fearless predictions for 2012:

-Late 2012 is going to bring about a minor BB renaissance (at least from the die-hards and the reviewer community) when BB 10 devices finally launche and somehow manage to surpass expectations but it'll be too little, too late. The Playbook meets a quiet demise once existing stocks are liquidated mid-year.

-WebOS will remain dead, despite Whitman's promises to the contrary.

-Lazaridis and Batsillie are not ousted but are moved to a "secure location" as co-figureheads within the company. Again, too little, too late. Sanjay Jha is not ousted from Motorola Mobility, even though he should be. Balmer will get the boot from MS. After a quiet period, Rubinstein will again land on his feet...somewhere.

-Android will hit a pretty sizable rut amidst consumer complaints too many "me too" companies not supporting their devices with OS updates (Hello, Samsung) and unsucrupulous developers such as Gameloft not updating their apps in a timely fashion. Google TV will continue to be an unmitigated disaster with very little support.

-As it becomes increasingly clear that Google "sold out" Android to appease the telcos and their hardware partners, hardware manufacturers will rush to support Windows 8 tablets. ICS (Android 4.0) will take FAR longer to roll out than it should due to any number of the usual reasons.

-Amazon milks the Kindle Fire line to great success with new variants(higher capacity version, bigger screen version etc) while B&N's Nook Color/Tablet line slowly withers away, a victim of B&N's arrogance and complacency due to the Nook Colo'rs huge initial success in 2010 & early 2011. Apple first cuts the iPad2 price then counters with an iPad "mini" or an iPod Touch XL type device in the $300 neighborhood.

-Apple's Smart TV line is the company's biggest flop since the Mac Power Mac Cube, due to a stratospheric sticker price and expensive content. I expect a few of the traditional companies to leave the US market or turn into rebrands as knee-jerk responses to Apple's TV (Audiovox? Sharp? Funai? Toshiba?) but the remaining contenders will circle the wagons and undercut Apple in an area where it's not used to competing. Since 3D has not caught on like the industry hoped, expect cheap prices, integrated wi-fi and built-in integrated IPTV services to be the CE industry's counter to Apple's TV line.

-T-Mobile rebounds from the failed AT&T merger by entering talks with Sprint. Too early to tell if this will come to fruition but I would think it likely.
Pilot 1000->Pilot 5000->PalmPilot Pro->IIIe->Vx->m505->T|T->T|T2->T|C->T|T3->T|T5->Zodiac 2->TX->Verizon Treo 700P->Verizon Treo 755p->Verizon Moto Droid + Verizon Palm Centro-> Verizon Moto Droid X2 + Palm TX

Thanks for the comments!

Just for the record, I am not "in love" with Android and its ADD PIM apps, clunkily inconsistent UI or horribly fragmented landscape.

I simply hopped on board the original Droid 1 back in '09 because:

1. My Treo 755p was dying and I refused to go backwards with a Centro
2. Palm so foolishly stuck with their Sprint Pre exclusivity
3. The Droid had a big high-res screen, expandable storage, and a physical keybard
4. My brief flirtation with a BB Storm was an unmitigated disaster
5. Verizon only had WinMob rubbish for the rest of their smartphone lineup

I've invested a LOT in Android apps over the years and stick with it primarily due to the variety of hardware (where else can you get a big-screen LTE smartphone or a keyboard slider with LTE?) and the "openness" which sadly seems to be withering away on a daily basis.

Fragmentation and stagnant OS updates are rapidly undermining Android. I've known a number of first-time Android users who left for iOS or BB (or returned to those platforms) as soon as their contracts were up. On top of that, I have TouchWiz-owning friends who are jealous of their Sense coworkers or relatives or people like myself stuck with Blur who would give anything for vanilla Android and/or an unlocked bootloader.

Google should have cracked down HARD starting with ICS/4.0:

-No more $99 CVS or Asian no-name tablets not offering Maps, Gmail or Market access. Either let 'em all have access to the Market and the GAPPS or mandate that everything running 4.0 has to be "official". There are a lot of people out there who woke up very disappointed on Christmas morning to a Viewsonic, Sylvania, Coby or Pandigital "Android tablet" and found that it's a crude, pale imitation of the Android smartphones they have played with.

-Manufacturer UI skins are fine but Google should offer basic functionality in 4.0 to go "clean" and bypass all of the manufacturer UI elements

-The fragmentation madness is nearly unbearable at this point. I have a number of games that I purchased on my old Droid X or Galaxy Tab that do not appear for download on my X2, Evo View or Bionic. Yet if I sideload a warez APK of these titles I OWN, they play spectacularly! Google needs to offer a "YMMV" unsupported option to force install a purchased app to a user's device.

-Scale down the emphasis on widgets. I like the little "auto-rotate screen" or "3G/4G" data toggle widgets but not these bloated full-screen clocks or weather maps. Ugh.

-Mandate that every manufacturer support their devices (handsets or tablets) for a minimum of 12 months after its launch. Or pull an Apple and charge a minimal fee for OS upgrades. I would GLADLY pay $10 or $20 for a stable, supported official update to bring ICS to my Evo View . Instead, I am 99% certain it'll be stuck on 3.2 for the rest of its existence. (BTW, the wi-fi Flyer Honeycomb update came out earlier this week and the View's HC update arrived the day after Christmas or so). HC + Sense is a surprisingly nice spin on Android and the beefy CPU + RAM help plow through most tasks. And stylus integration is VERY nice (I would say that the stylus may make a small comeback in 2012 but people seem to DETEST them no matter what). If anything will bring the stylus back into vogue, it'll be the awesome Samsung Galaxy Note (imagine that running iOS, huh???)

But that still brings me to...

-Focus on OS responsiveness, smothness and battery life. Played with a colleague's iPad 2 last night and almost wept at how refined it feels. The Galaxy Nexus & ICS are decent steps forward but still far short of iOS.

************************
As far as RIM, I am not big on composing email on my tablet but I love to read it, especially if it's a nice 7" or 8" tablet like the Playbook.

I would LOVE to see a Transformer-style 7" or 8" tablet + keyboard dock (from anyone). If I am going to lug a 10" Asus TF around, I might as well carry a nice dual-core AMD Brazos Fusion netbook or ultraportable around and get some "real" work done.

If I had the choice between a $100 TouchPad or a $200 Playbook right now, I'd take PB all day and night long...

"Owning your OS is a differentiator and a Good Thing, which Samsung, HTC and the others suckered by Google now ruefully recognize". Truer words were never spoken!!

Do you think that a RIM sugar daddy with deep pockets will indeed step up to the plate to get QNX spit-shined and launched in a non-Palm circa 2009 fashion?

"Was webOS ever really alive?" For a few fleeting months (weeks?) post-CES 2009, yes it was very much alive and vibrant. NO ONE cared about the handful of HTC G1 Android devices at CES that year. The buzz was all about WebOS. Then 6-8 months later the vultures were already circling. Sad, sad, sad.

**************************
WWJD (What Would Jobs Do)? to kneecap Android in 2012? We can ask WWJD for just abut every situation imaginable.

For once, I honestly wish Apple would risk a bit of brand dilution or the potential of cannibalized sales to fill in the gaping void between the iPhone/Touch screen size and the iPad. But WWJD to respond to someone who requested a device with a 5"-8" screen size??

I am chomping at the bit to see what Apple manages to do in regards to LTE connectivity, for example. They can make a semi-compelling argument to stay with tiny 3.5" to 4" screen sizes. They cannot, however, afford to coast any longer than 6 months from now with just 3G connectivity. But as Moto's RAZR has shown, keeping an LTE connective alive will suck down a battery in record time, especially in a thin iPhone 4-esque formfactor. I can easily zap my Bionic's 2880 mAh extended battery in a full workday if I leave LTE on and brightness at 3/4. WWJD? My guess is some kind of intelligent (and seamless, if the handover goes quickly enough) switching between LTE and 3G depending on what task is being performed.

If you must have a tablet NOW, get a dirt-cheap Android 3.x tablet since retailers are likely swimming in unsold post-Christmas inventory. I recommend the View/Flyer or perhaps the Asus EEEPad TF101. Then hope and pray your device gets a timely 4.x update to extend its useful service life.

If you can wait a quarter or two, get an iPad 3.

Fort late 2012, Win 8 tablets will be the the hot ticket (perhaps perfectly timed with Balmer's ousting).
Pilot 1000->Pilot 5000->PalmPilot Pro->IIIe->Vx->m505->T|T->T|T2->T|C->T|T3->T|T5->Zodiac 2->TX->Verizon Treo 700P->Verizon Treo 755p->Verizon Moto Droid + Verizon Palm Centro-> Verizon Moto Droid X2 + Palm TX

My January, 2012 hardware recommendations:

Phone: iPhone 4 or 4s. Nothing else is even remotely close in terms of OS/apps/user experience/screen quality/build quality.

Tablet: 16 GB RIM PlayBook if you can get one for around $200. Otherwise wait for a Windows 8 tablet in a year or an iPad 3 in 3 months.

Android may just get sued into oblivion if Larry Ellison and the other vultures have their way over the next 6 months...

Fake Jeff Hawkins

Cannibalization? Tim Cook already said 1 year ago that they rather like it.
http://techcrunch.com/2011/01/18/apple-mac-relationship/

And I don't understand the bit about brand dilution. Every Apple product comes in different versions: Pro. Mini. 3G. 3GS. Shuffle. 24. Touch. Classic. Air. So, why would an, say, iPad Mini dilute anything?

T-Mob's already selling off their towers. They could sell their spectrum & misc assets to someone else and convert all of their users over to new Sprint LTE handsets.

Sprint is already moving surprisingly swift to dump the last vestiges of the old iDen stuff this year and I would expect them to start some mega-offers to transition their WiMax customers to new LTE devices.

I fully expect Sprint to be all CDMA + LTE by the end of 2013, with WiMax for all intents and purposes phased out by that time, perhaps even sooner, if they can get their legacy users to give up their old EVOs.

One thing I continue to be pleasantly surprised about is the speed and (relative) reliability of VZW's LTE network. Wherever I travel, its speeds are consistently good. Once the next generation of radios start to appear (better 3G to 4G handover, less power consumption etc) then we should really be ready for Hawkins' grandiose vision of your "LifeDrive" in your pocket...if it weren't for those nasty data caps & throttling.
Pilot 1000->Pilot 5000->PalmPilot Pro->IIIe->Vx->m505->T|T->T|T2->T|C->T|T3->T|T5->Zodiac 2->TX->Verizon Treo 700P->Verizon Treo 755p->Verizon Moto Droid + Verizon Palm Centro-> Verizon Moto Droid X2 + Palm TX

@ Tuckermaclain:

That is cool that you are still rocking your Palm TX. May I ask: which specific programs or apps are you currently using on that device?

Also, I would like to suggest this as a topic for our Palm Info Center forum here. Given everything that has happened to Palm, given that here we are, I believe that it would be valuable to "take stock" for a moment and discover who among us is still using a Palm OS device (either full-time or part-time).

As for me, I bought a Treo 650 not too long ago (mainly for the apps that the seller included), but I need to get my home-computer situation more established before I can HotSync and otherwise re-incorporate a Palm OS device into my day-to-day reality.

Given everything that has happened to Palm, given that here we are, I believe that it would be valuable to "take stock" for a moment and discover who among us is still using a Palm OS device (either full-time or part-time).

I've got a collection of around 50 PalmOS devices (several unopened) ready for museum duty. They cover the early models like the 1000, 5000, etc. and range up to the most advanced: TH55 and VZ90. A couple years ago I stocked up on Sprint Centro 2 when they were being blown out on eBay. (One of my lines is an old SERO plan and the Centro 2 is the last advanced PalmOS phone that you can activate on the SERO plan.) Nowadays it's easy to pick up some nice old PalmOS devices for next to nothing on eBay.

As far as active duty:

Samsung i500 - has been my main phone for several years, but I break one every 2 years (they all snap near the hinge) and I'll eventually run out of the backups I purchased when Sprint blew them out back in 2004 or 2005. DateBk5, Ultrasoft Money, Diddlebug and Launcher X are key apps. Unfortunately, text messaging doesn't work so well (you can't tell who sent you the message), the browsers (Blazer and then Novarro?) were deactivated several years ago, new apps are nonexistent and the screen is a pixellated 160 x 160. But the phone's voice quality and build quality are the best I have EVER experienced and the size is almost perfect.

Centro 2 - backup phone. Great size, easy one handed use, rugged.

Unlocked GSM Centro - backup travel phone. Far too plasticky compared to the Centro 2, though.

Zodiac 2 - scientific calculator and MP3 player.

Unfortunately, the iPhone 4 screen and apps have made it harder to justify sticking with Palm for any reason other than the voice quality of my i500. It's actually shocking to see the number of things you can do with a iPhone these days given its massive app catalog. And the "long tail" means there's likely to be an app out there to fit even the most obscure niche, incredibly usually for no more than $1. Even the legendary DatebK5/6 has difficulty competing with the flashy features found in the iOS app Week Cal.

You still can't beat PalmOS for PIM, speed, simplicity and one handed use, though. Pretty impressive for a 15+ year old OS.

FJH