Smartphones, upcoming tablets- any fans?

Two things that must eb hot this year are touch-screen smartphones and tablets.
There are already a lot of nice touch screen smart phones like i-phone, google nexus one, motorola droid, blackberry, samsung star etc. I currently have a non-touch Nokia N96 but I wish to buy a touch-screen Android phone next time( by Allah,s will).

Similarly I think after launch of apple tablet, many vendors will launch their tablets in competition and they might just replace the ongoing line up of netbooks. Crunchpad( JooJoo) is already released and many other vendors also seem to be ready to launch their tablets this year.

In all fairness, in fact I neither need a touch screen cell phone nor a tablet but still It will be really interesting to see the new trends being set by Apple and every one following them.

What do you think about these?

Thanks
( snaps from hothardware.com, gizmodod.com and cnet.com respectively)

 

While I don't see tablets going too far, seeing as how they been around already for years and never caught on, I am interested in the phones coming. Let me get two things out of the way though: 1. Google needs to get its act together with its phones. Email support is unacceptable. 2. IPhones, imho, are unnecessarily expensive, and, in my own personal experience, not that good.

Now that my opinion is out of the way, I'll toss in some facts, facts that can either make or break these "do it all" phones. That flashy, internet capable, everything but the kitchen sink phone you're holding in your hand, is, at the end of the day, a phone. A phone is only as good as the service it gets. If you want to pay north of 400 dollars for a "do it all" phone, but the carrier is trash...go buy a PC and get a normal, run of the mill cell phone from a better carrier.

That's the problem mobile phones have always had and will continue to have as long as the likes of IPhone sign exclusive deals with one carrier. People aren't jail-breaking their phones for the hell of it. I say look at the carrier before you look at the phone.

 

Just some advice...while the touch screen phones get all the "ah that's cool looking...wow...gee that's neat...wow, fancy" looks from people, just make sure YOU can work with the touchscreen in your daily use. I use my phone heavily with text and e-mails to our Exchange server, I have large hands...I've given touchscreen phones a few tries...but I always go back to real keys..a qwerty phone, currently my BB Tour.

My wife has a BB Storm...with her fingernails it's difficult. Her sister has an iphone...she does alright with it...but admits her prior phone with real keys was much faster/easier to type on.

Most cell phone stores will give you a 30 day return period....and you have to give yourself at least one week or two to get used to typing on them....so that gives you about 2 more weeks to see if you can really live with it, if heavy typing is needed.

 

Maybe if the tablets had one of those roll up keypads, but looks like the keypad takes up most of the screen!

I think something in size between a laptop and a netbook would go..

Peeps at work are all about their Kindles and their competition..

They like to link them to their phones, their cars, their home puter..
those are about the size of the tablets..

Personally, I would like something I could conceivably 'fix'..
not sure the $$ for repairs on all this newer tech would fit most peeps budgets..

 

Well, I've had an HTC Droid Eris pretty much since it's been released, and think it's pretty phenomenal. Right now, data package pricing is a bit high in the US, but it will settle over the next couple of years. After having it for a few months, there's no way I'm going back. Great for light surfing (catch new updates, quick look-ups, traffic updates, weather, general surfing when no broadband is available, etc.). Hope my OS upgrade from 1.5 to 2.0 or 2.1 happens sooner rather than later, but even as is, it's a winner.

I was waiting intently for the Crunchpad. The legal issues that followed when it morphed into the Joojoo, raised a lot of ambivalence for the specific product but not the category, as did the target price. That said, I do think there's a market for these, but I think it's similar to that for the Kindle (my wife has one - loves it) - you recover some costs with the hardware sale, but you need to make your money from the media channel and the details here are still being fleshed out. It will come, it's just a matter of good distribution ideas meeting the right pricing model (which is not a trivial thing). If you look at ebook pricing right now, it's a mix of OK to ridiculous. Once that and a number of other technical details get fleshed out (publishers will probably go kicking and screaming, but they need to realize that self-distribution is very viable for electronic media), it will be the preferred medium.

Blue

 

Thanks for the responses.

I think touch screen cell phones are not feasible if you are a heavy texter, e-mail user etc. But itm,s good if you are surf the web more( i feel touch easier while just surfing and harware keys easier while typing).

Tablets always failed in the past but I think now it may be the their time. Let,s see how it goes.

Finally I feel these devices are over-priuced ATM.

 

ud think that, but using one for about 2 years now and u get so used to it that u honestly start to type faster on a touch screen than a normal keypad.

 

Agreed. I have no issue, especially when I turn the phone to a landscape orientation, and I have reasonably large hands. Autocorrect/word prompt on the typing helps as well, as do some emerging technologies (e.g. Swype).

Blue

 

Talking to people is even faster though!
That's actually a question i want to ask you: what uses do you find for all these phone functions? I can imagine it's usefulness for people on the go, but is there something for everyone else?

I bought a laptop for computing, and i still have the same one from before i joined WSF. I upgraded the software though
And i still use the same Nokia, which allows me to call people and text short messages when i actually need it. When it breaks, i'll buy the next cheap/good phone.
Still i'd like to see what other people like in these phones.

 

i have the nexus one & love it! along with the decent touchscreen ANY part of the phone you can talk into it (email/messaging/search/navigation (anything that uses keyboard) ) and its mostly gets it right, maybe one or 2 basic edits now & again, but it saves a lot of time.

even when using the touchscreen though (only had it since last thursday) i am getting very fast..

my last phone was nokia n95 8gb, the nexus is my first android phone, and i am enjoying it very much.

 

Sure, but talking is synchronous and lacks privacy in a crowd or social setting, text is asynchronous and private/silent anywhere (I know - different set of downsides). That has value in lots of situations.

They can replace lots of things (calculator, routine camera, video camera in some cases, music player, handheld gaming system, etc.) if you wish. Most of those feature extensions use free/low cost apps. My prime uses - keeping in touch with the kids (both in college, one close, one not) and wife. Mainly text. Androids push gmail to the phones. I don't have a need, but both sons forward their various accounts to gmail and find late updates from profs (assignments, class changes) usually go out by email and that's now pushed to their phones. GPS/traffic and route guidance - not fully implemented in the Eris, should be with the Android 2.0/2.1 update. At that point, it will have full turn-by-turn direction capability. Ability to surf on demand is useful when traveling - get flight and other info on the fly as needed. Example - traveling, need to get a report now, and don't have broadband access - easy, push the pdf file to my gmail account and I can take it from there.

I have the same desktops I purchased ~8 years ago. Some upgrades over time. They work fine and the broadband connection is the real limitation in the whole system and will be for a while. I typically don't go with x.0 hardware or software. This is one case where I did. Part was cost (outfitted the familiy with 4 Eris' for $200 net - they'll make that back in data plan charges quickly), part was to have internet access on demand. Pure convenience factor here.

Blue

 

OK, Blue, now I have another thing on my 'want' list..lol!
That Eris sounds great..

I never realized how many things you could do with those phones either,
I can see a possible future where they are gonna practically be a necessity..
taking the place of computers, phones, gps, all that tech..plus mags, books n newspapers..

STILL, has anyone ever had major problems that aren't covered with warranty, or do they just plain work for you?
Can you tell I am still stuck comparing their tech to desktops puters n such..

 

Nexus one is top notch phone.

 

But I text with one hand a lot. Can u do it too?

 

I can see your point, even if i don't see major privacy issues. I won't pick on this, because i understand what you're saying.

Indeed, i never remember those things. I actually use a calculator in my phone and never remember it IS useful to have it. It's not a stone age phone, it was actually quite good at the time, when compared with the competition. It has an almost useful camera, and a few apps. When the battery goes almost without warning, i wish i had my old Siemens though, it lasted forever, and warned a few times in a reasonable time-frame, and i always had time to charge it. When i think of these newer phones, i have to wonder about that as well.
Will it die warning me 5 min. before it goes, and make me prize the one thing i really wanted the thing to do well?

It seems at least from this angle, we think alike. After that kind of usage, we actually get to see a reasoning to buy new, not just to get the new stuff. And actually research a bit before settling and buying.

Currently i'm watching closely USB 3.0 and SSD's evolution and adoption. There's obviously more exciting technologies being made, but they still seem a bit distant. Tablets don't exactly make me jump up and down

 

Nothing major. A couple of system locks that required a battery pull to reset. One son and I have seen this, wife and other son have not. All four of us have contemporaneous units. Likely a minor software glitch. No pattern yet to guide debugging.

Blue

 

The Eris decision was via my older son. He's an EE and gadget aficionado. His read was that it had the best trade-off in features/price after looking fairly extensively. The form factor is near perfect.

On all of these, it will come down to pricing (doesn't it always...). Also, I tend to view tablets as mainly for pulling down content, and very light on anything else, at least the in the context of the present discussion. Based on how much I use my netbook (as a convenience), there's a market out there, but I'd guess that it is very price sensitive, just like netbooks

Blue

 

Indeed. One either earns so much money that price becomes irrelevant, or one has to think a bit about how (if) useful, and how pricey it is.
In my case, i see no need to buy one. I still want a keyboard. If it has a touchscreen, i wouldn't say no, but i has to have a reasonable price, and somehow prove it's stable and durable.

 

I was thinking about getting an iPhone ... but when you compare hardware specs and restrictions (software and hardware) of the iPhone VS HTC and some of the other brands, like LG, Samsung, Nokia, I wasn't swayed. I prefer more hardware power to get a greater life span, especially for the money you're paying. HTC Hero is definitely a great phone ... 32gb max storage, and similar CPU and ram to the iPhone yet a lot cheaper price. If I was to buy an IPhone "killer" right now I'd probably get the HTC Hero.

Weirdly the HTC Hero is about the only one of the HTC line that have the 3.5 headphone jack at the top. The majority of phones on the market have the headphone jack at the side or on the bottom - I can't understand the design thought of that. I like to listen to music at work and stuff so is an essential box to tick ... A maker or breaker!

Here's a few I like.

1) HTC Hero

Memory (Built in): 288 MB RAM, 512 MB ROM
Memory (External): MicroSD

Processor: Qualcomm® MSM7200A™ 528MHz
OS: Android OS, v1.5

Battery: Li-Ion 1350mAh
Talktime/Standby: 7hrs/750hrs

2) SAMSUNG I8000 OMNIA 2. (great all round phone for the money)

Memory (Built in): 8GB
Memory (External): MicroSD (32GB Max)
Processor: ARM 1176 800MHz
OS: MS Windows Mobile 6.1 Pro

Battery: Li-Ion 1500mAh
Talktime/Standby: 10hrs/430hrs max

(phones jack on top as well)

3) The HTC HD2 or HTC Leo 100 (the big daddy and big daddy price unfortunately)

Processor: Qualcomm Snapdragon QSD8250 1GHz (1GHz, insane!)
OS: Microsoft Windows Mobile 6.5 Pro
Memory (RAM): 448MB
Memory (ROM): 512MB
Memory (External): MicroSD

Battery: Li-Ion 1320mAh
Talktime/Standby: 6.3hrs/490hrs max
Music Playback: 12hrs max


4) Nokia E72 (really nice phone but kinda dated technology of cursor navigation)

Memory (Built in): 250MB
Memory (RAM): 128MB
Memory (External): MicroSD 16GB max

Processor: ARM 11 600MHz
OS: Symbian 9.3; S60 rel v3.2 UI

Battery: BP-4L 1500mAh
Talktime/Standby: 12.5hrs/480hrs max

Another downside: Nokia insist on using Symbian OS - Which is way out of date. But it's a nice phone if you prefer Qwerty hardware keys for typing.

 

some potential spy photos? http://www.engadget.com/2010/01/27/is-this-the-apple-tablet

 

The new Apple tablet is, without any hesitation, my next purchase.

Apple iPad: Design, Specs, Video, Conference

Accessories:

iPad Keyboard: Image
iPad Case: Image

 

the proccesor of the nexus one is the fastest and make the device a really good mini PC

 

Why You'll Use a Tablet. Yes YOU!

http://itmanagement.earthweb.com/mowi/article.php/3862861/

Bill Gates criticizes the iPad

http://news.cnet.com/8301-17852_3-10451702-71.html

From said interview: