
HP’s Slate Device - jacquesm
http://h20435.www2.hp.com/t5/Voodoo-Blog/HP-s-Slate-Device-Delivers-a-Holistic-Mobile-Experience/ba-p/54735
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chaosmachine
They do a nice job of showing everything the iPad is missing in 30 seconds.
USB port, memory expansion slot, two cameras, video output to an HDTV...

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rimantas
Cool. Now we have a choice: for those who spent most time interacting with UI
when browsing, reading and playing some games there is iPad, and for those who
spent most of the time plugging stuff into USB ports, expanding memory,
running around taking pictures with slate in hand there is HP slate. My guess
is that people will never stop judging quality of cameras by Mpx count and
devices by features list. Sadly, both metrics are mostly useless.

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aswanson
Configurability, not having to kiss the godfather's ring to get a piece of
software running on it, not assuming I'm an idiot that can't possibly grasp
the concept of a file or (God forbid) want to connect with another device.....
Yes, sign me up.

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bmj
The device has potential for "industrial" applications, assuming developers
have better control over the OS (or MS allows SteadyState to run). For those
of us that write applications for single-use devices (medical use, for
example), the Apple offerings look really awesome, but the lack of control of
the device itself is problematic. If MS and HP treat this device as a PC
(rather than a media consumption device), I am very interested.

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pbhjpbhj
I want one as a point of sale terminal for an independent retail outlet.
Basically, all I need is a cheap, compact touchscreen PC.

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adriand
Agreed, this sort of adaptable use would be good for me right now as well. I
could use this for a project I'm working on right now that requires access
control, where this would operate as a sophisticated keypad with included
video camera for additional security. That would be pretty sweet.

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elblanco
My prediction is that the hardware will be pretty spot on, but the software
execution will kill this.

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stcredzero
Agreed. Their tc1100 is still slick and usable after all this time. (tc1000
came out in 2001!) But little details in the execution of the pen tablet
software are infuriating. Example: I can't count all the times while posting
on HN when I wrote a line and pressed insert, only to have it disappear into
nowhere. But physically, that hardware still holds it's own. You can hot swap
the battery. There are very well thought out buttons. No accelerometer, but
you can switch orientation easily. Someone at HP is working on a par with
Apple in terms of industrial design.

Steve got it wrong, BTW. Having a SDHC slot on the device is more minimal than
having to attach a dongle.

The iPad has only given me a few annoyances so far. I miss resizable
textareas.

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glhaynes
Resizable text areas would be great! Safari on the desktop has them, where
it's a "nice to have" but they'd be far more useful on MobileSafari... on the
desktop, I almost always resize textareas UP whereas on mobile devices I'm
always wanting to resize them down to make them fit the screen better.

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zoba
I promised HP I would be a thorn in their side when they completely screwed me
over with two different laptops. The first laptop broke a lot and _every_ time
HP claimed to not know about my 3 year warranty. Therefore I had to fax in a
printout of my receipt (lucky I still had it) in order to get anything done.
This usually took 4 months for them to process.

I swore I would never buy HP again but was given a second HP laptop. It was
the TX 1000, which you may have heard of. It over heats and there are
thousands of customers whose laptops just die when the connections in the
machine melt from the heat. My laptop averages 113 Celsius. Of course, HP will
not do a recall.

In short: do not buy an HP due to terrible hardware and _unimaginably poor_
customer service.

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est
China recently had a mass crack down of HP customer service and product
quality. Especially their Presario V3000

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izendejas
heh. china cracking down? on a positive note, millions of people with smaller
budgets (and I mean way smaller than people are used to in this country) have
access to a computer thanks to the price wars by non-apple manufacturers.

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kaiser
Sad, you don't see any real ui interaction. Also remembering the N97 promotion
videos and reality, let's wait and see.

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MichaelGG
Check here: <http://www.youtube.com/user/hpcomputers#p/a/u/1/-p-RZAwQq0E>

At 1:40, you can see him use a website. It looks like a standard Windows 7
touchscreen (notice a tooltip comes up over the play button after he's clicked
-- the "cursor" stayed there I guess).

For me, Windows 7 touchscreens mean the number one issue is targeting UI
elements and entering input. Closing a browser tab with a 16x16 pixel target
isn't too hard with a mouse. But on Windows 7 touchscreen it can be
frustrating.

Because of this, I like having a convertible tablet, so I can quickly use the
mouse and keyboard when needed.

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hkuo
Thickness, weight, price, boot time, battery life.

Aside from the UI alone, this would have to answer each of these in order for
it to compete with the iPad.

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fierarul
I liked the Apple-like USB cable at about 0:13 in.

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pavs
From this very short video I get the impression that its quite a bit thicker
than ipad. At the end of the day, you can have the most power slate device int
he world but its the user experience that will make all the difference IMO.
Android seems to be the best UI for this kind of device.

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mambodog
Between this and the envy it seems like HP's strategy at the moment involves
looking like (but not being) Apple products... I wonder if they will raise the
same kind of ire from Steve Jobs that resulted in the Apple-HTC patent
lawsuit?

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pbhjpbhj
I had to do a little research on this as I thought that the HP Slate had been
announced first:

Engadget showed images of a HP Slate on 2010-01-06,
<http://www.engadget.com/2010/01/06/the-hp-slate/>

Whilst Engadget were still publishing rumours about an Apple Tablet,
[http://www.engadget.com/2010/01/20/apple-rumor-roundup-
summe...](http://www.engadget.com/2010/01/20/apple-rumor-roundup-
summer-2010-edition/), 2 weeks later. Apple announced their tablet 3 weeks
after HP at [http://www.engadget.com/2010/01/27/live-from-the-apple-
table...](http://www.engadget.com/2010/01/27/live-from-the-apple-tablet-
latest-creation-event/).

Not conclusive proof but to say that HP were waiting to see Apples spec is
wrong; unless you're considering industrial espionage.

Similar info graphically
[http://www.google.com/trends?q=%22hp+slate%22%2C+%22apple+ip...](http://www.google.com/trends?q=%22hp+slate%22%2C+%22apple+ipad%22%2C%22apple+tablet%22&ctab=0&geo=all&date=2010-1&sort=1)

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mambodog
I was refering to the visual styling. HP Slate might not be based on the iPad,
but surely it draws on the iPhone/iPod and/or MBP, just as the HP Envy does.
Not saying there's anything wrong with that, just that it seems to be a theme
in HP's latest products.

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catch23
Based on their video, it looks to be a camcorder with a really big screen.

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pbhjpbhj
.. and an iPhone is a small rubbish camera with a phone function?

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stcredzero
Plus iPod.

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swombat
Plus email, maps, web browser, apps and games.

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eogas
I love the shameless ripoff of coverflow.

