Why are you ignoring the Notion Ink Adams? It's not the finest tablet, but it is surely more real than a "non-production tablet on loan".
I bought the Notion Ink more for the intrigue of testing an Android tablet and the Pixel Qi technology. I can't say I recommend it, but it is not so horrible as to be completely ignored.
Also, who knows if ice cream sandwich might finally give it an operating system to properly perform on and give proper value to the fantastic technology they have locked up inside the device.
This is a non-production tablet that was on loan for Pixel Qi. Mary Lou Jepsen (Pixel Qi founder) spoke at our Books in Browsers conference a couple months ago. We borrowed it to test reading using the archive.org bookreader and took this pic.
The widescreen aspect ratio actually works better than expected. You can display a full page and still have room to display controls below the text without obscuring the page. Also, the Pixel Qi screen outdoors in full sunlight is great for reading!
This reminds me of the other big problem with tablets: touch resolution. Until I can use a stylus on a capacitive touch screen accurate to a few pixels, I'm still not ready to completely leave my paper pads behind. When taking notes, writing is still so much better than typing.
It would be even better if you could combine the capacitive touch tech with the other more accurate tech and switch between the two modes, so you can write one the screen with your hand touching it (another pet peeve of using a stylus with a capacitive touch screen).
I bought the Notion Ink more for the intrigue of testing an Android tablet and the Pixel Qi technology. I can't say I recommend it, but it is not so horrible as to be completely ignored.
Also, who knows if ice cream sandwich might finally give it an operating system to properly perform on and give proper value to the fantastic technology they have locked up inside the device.