

JooJoo Tablet Is a Real Piece of DooDoo - rpledge
http://www.wired.com/reviews/product/pr_joojoo_tablet

======
vaksel
JooJoo was dead on arrival when they came out with a price tag that was double
the expected price

------
aditya
Wow. Tough crowd. This is a first product from a new company going up against
the established leader with a track record of putting out amazing products.
Maybe cut FusionGarage some slack, eh?

The review itself is a little strange: _Where the JooJoo does score is in the
picture quality of its gorgeous touchscreen. Scrolling is pretty smooth
(although not quite as fluid as the iPad) and videos play beautifully, thanks
to the included Flash support._

[... a little later ...]

 _Watching video on JooJoo comes with its own set of quirks and glitches.
Bring up YouTube or Hulu clips and they look fine in a small window, but click
into the full-screen mode and you'll get more stalls and sputtering than a
health care bill moving through Congress._

So, which one is it... is the video beautiful or stally and sputtery?

Anyway, I hope they sell a few of these or raise more money to iterate and
make it a worthy competitor to the iPad.

~~~
ErrantX
> So, which one is it... is the video beautiful or stally and sputtery?

Screen/Picture quality is unrelated to video quality. The frames may looks
gorgeous but if you only have 5 of them a second it won't be great video ;)

------
asnyder
I'm somewhat conflicted about the claim that there's no apps. It seems that
the JooJoo was meant to be one of the first devices to think of the browser as
the only necessary gateway to your apps. If we take the browser and web apps
into consideration the JooJoo has access to thousands of apps.

I personally think it's wrong to suggest that a "native" app is the only form
of app for a device. We were moving forward so nicely until the iPhone and
iPad showed up. It feels that we're moving backwards, back into the land of
the fat clients and desktop. Sad.

~~~
elblanco
I think people forget that the iPhone was originally supposed to be an app-
free environment (at least for 3rd parties) and instead rely on web apps.

~~~
pohl
That's an extraordinary claim, given that it's more likely that the secretive
& perfectionist Apple might have merely been quietly finishing and documenting
the SDK, only using the web apps story to placate developers and buy time.

~~~
elblanco
Blast from the past.

[http://www.tuaw.com/2007/01/10/apple-vps-confirm-no-3rd-
part...](http://www.tuaw.com/2007/01/10/apple-vps-confirm-no-3rd-party-iphone-
apps/)

~~~
pohl
Misdirection is a part of their secretive nature. They don't telegraph their
punches. Instead, we hear Jobs say that they can't think of what one would do
with a tablet beyond reading on the toilet and that people don't read anymore.

------
gchucky
There's a review on Engadget (<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1243630>)
that's mostly the same story.

After all the drama that happened with this tablet, it's really a sad ending
to what started out as a potentially great product.

------
cubicle67
I wonder if the reviews would be any different had the tablet been released
under its original moniker CrunchPad?

~~~
ErrantX
Yes.

if it had met the originally price point

and specification

(in all seriousness I suspect if the _exact same_ device had come out in a
blaze of glory from Arrington then the press would have delighted in cutting
it down to size)

------
SlyShy
Interesting that the major problems with the JooJoo can be fixed by a better
linux, whereas the major problems with the iPad... can be fixed by a better
linux. ;)

------
markkoberlein
I have to wonder if Arrington saw that the product wasn't turning out like he
had hoped and quietly decided that he didn't want the TechCrunch name on it.
Maybe that's why he didn't commit to a contract because he wanted the
relationship to dissolve while also making it appear that he was the good guy
by being pushed out of the relationship.

In any case, you can be sure that Arrington is at least a little happy that
the CrunchPad is not going up against the iPad.

------
ojbyrne
"Commenters will likely tear into this review, accusing Wired of being biased
toward Apple (we're not) and unfairly bashing a perfectly good product (which
this isn't)."

Its funny that the author exactly captures the spirit of his review in one
sentence. It really feels like - "the iPad, despite its many flaws, is
wonderful. The JooJoo, despite its many strengths, is awful."

~~~
ugh
The reviewer points out five things which shape her verdict:

    
    
      - too heavy
      - too slow
      - short battery life
      - limited usefulness beyond browsing the web
      - awful UI
    

Those seem like rather basic requirements to me. Most if not all people simply
won’t buy a device with those kinds of drawbacks. Make no mistake, the iPad
has very real drawbacks – I don’t see how this review ignores those – they
just might not be the same category of drawback. Lacking a USB port is hardly
the same as having a awful UI.

~~~
cubicle67
except you can't add a usb port via a software update

~~~
ugh
Your point being? I don’t see how that could change the review – it seems
pretty impossible to me to review software based on what’s possible, not on
what’s there.

~~~
dagw
Really? I've seen plenty of reviews that contain some variation of the line
"...but X should be easy to fix in the next firmware/software update, and if
they do that then..."

~~~
ugh
You can write that in a review (’coz it’s true), I just don’t think you would
be a very good reviewer if it influenced your verdict.

I just looked at Engadget’s iPad review again and they heavily scold the iPad
for lacking multitasking – mentioning that the fix should be easy sounds much
more like a criticism than a defense. If the iPad doesn’t get any leeway for
lacking software features the Joojoo shouldn’t get any leeway for its lacking
UI.

~~~
dagw
The amount of leeway one gives should be related to how easy the problem is to
fix. Fundamental problems with the hardware should not be judged equal to
easily fixed software bugs when counting pros and cons.

------
samd
But can we stick Chrome OS or Android on the JooJoo?

~~~
gvb
Theoretically. See <http://www.androidx86.org/> and
<http://www.android-x86.org/> and others.

Where you may run into problems is finding drivers for pieces of the JooJoo
hardware. JooJoo claims to be running a "custom operating system", which Wired
reported is actually linux-based.
[http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2010/04/first-look-joojoo-
is-...](http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2010/04/first-look-joojoo-is-no-apple-
ipad-killer/)

If it is truly custom, you likely would have substantial hurdles making it run
linux/android. If it is a customized linux port, you would have a hope of
finding drivers. Given the short and ugly history of the JooJoo, I would not
expect cooperation from Fusion Garage.

~~~
SlyShy
Honestly, nothing I've seen about the operating system leads me to think it is
actually very custom (insofar as you would call the EeePC's Linux "custom").
It probably just ships with a kernel compiled with the touchscreen drivers,
and other drivers. Seeing as how the touchscreen drivers apparently aren't the
greatest, I'd like to see someone write better ones, and then just write a
replacement OS for the JooJoo.

------
yanw
I can't trust a Wired review of an iPad competitor. This whole thing of
magazines and newspapers clearly championing what they think is their next
meal ticket isn't ethically sound.

~~~
ashleyw
Engadget video review: [http://www.engadget.com/2010/04/05/fusion-garage-
joojoo-revi...](http://www.engadget.com/2010/04/05/fusion-garage-joojoo-
review/)

You can see for yourself how buggy the UI is.

~~~
warfangle
Guy says the choppy flash is due to "not having hardware acceleration for
flash," which is flat out wrong.

Choppy flash video is well known to anyone who's tried to watch Hulu on a
Linux machine that isn't, say, a quad cpu dual core 4ghz with 16gb of ram.
(and even then, it only hits about 22 fps) </slight exaggeration>

~~~
tvon
I've heard the "no Flash hardware acceleration under Linux" repeated a lot but
can't find any concrete info.. could you elaborate?

~~~
wmf
[http://blogs.adobe.com/penguin.swf/2010/01/welcome_to_the_th...](http://blogs.adobe.com/penguin.swf/2010/01/welcome_to_the_thicket.html)

[http://blogs.adobe.com/penguin.swf/2010/01/solving_different...](http://blogs.adobe.com/penguin.swf/2010/01/solving_different_problems.html)

------
wendroid
> The tablet runs a custom operating system based on Linux.

That's an amazing claim. Or you don't know what an Operating System is.

------
PG-13
Title should be: CrunchPad Table is a real piece of DooDoo :)

