Apple and Samsung
This is the year of the tablet computer. Apple and Samsung tried to get ahead of the game late last year with the iPad and Galaxy Tab respectively, and didn’t do too badly in securing a market. Apple will of course never have a problem peddling any of its crap to its swathes of drones out there, but Samsung failed fairly miserably.
When I got my hands on the iPad I found it distinctly mediocre. The screen, something which all Apple touch products have buttressed their popularity upon, is, admittedly, fantastic. However, this is unfortunately where the praise ends. The battery life is poor, its form factor is uncomfortable to use, it has no HDMI output, no cameras and it can’t handle flash websites like iPlayer. Finally, a big problem I have with it, as with the iPhone, is the restrictive nature of the apps and almost complete disregard for developers. With the exception of the iPod which is up there with sliced bread, I hate Apple. I hate their products and I hate their image. Doubtless there are some overzealous fanboys out there who want to cave my skull in but I can say with confidence that for every product they have there is a cheaper better alternative on the market.
Now to the Tab. This wasn’t a bad attempt by Samsung, it had a smaller screen (7” versus iPad’s 10”) and resolved some serious issues like HDMI output, flash compatibility and the added bonus of both front and rear facing cameras. But the biggest problem, which brings me nicely onto my next topic, was its operating system; Android.
I’m sure you’ve all heard this word thrown around a lot, but I’ll give you a quick explanation of what it is. Essentially Windows is to computers what Android is to smart phones. The company was greedily snapped up by Google as they spied the mobile internet bubble on the horizon in 2005 and since, has gone from strength to strength. So what’s wrong with it on the Tab?
Well, Android is a mobile operating system, for mobile phones, not tablet computers. This essentially leaves the Tab as simply a glorified phone, along with the big question of why it did not wait for Android to improve its tablet support. In short, it was trying to bag as many consumers as possible before the next wave of tablets hit. These would have the new, improved, and most crucially tablet designed Android operating system: Honeycomb.
The Consumer Electronic Show or CES was at the beginning of 2011 and this was the platform for second generation of tablets to start showing off. There was an unbelievable amount of tablets here from all the big names like Motorola and Asus but one that stood out for me was something from a small Indian start-up which couldn’t even afford its own booth: Notion Ink.
Its product, ADAM, is one of the best pieces of equipment I have ever seen. Technology- wise, it has the new generation Nvidia Tegra dual core processor which could outstrip the iPad any day, an unbelievably long battery life and all the usual features such as 3G, Wi-Fi, GPS, rotating camera, etc. However, one of the most impressive parts of this product is the screen. Like the iPad, it is 10” with a decent resolution, but additionally, it has something called PixelQi which at the touch of a button transforms it into a matte eInk surface. This essentially means that you can use the regular LCD screen and then switch it to the same screen as the Amazon Kindle in order to reduce strain while reading books or anything else.
Perhaps the best thing about this is the price tag- it is just under £300 for the most basic model, or just over £400 for the top range one. Compare that to the iPad which ranges from £429 to £714. It will come shipped with the latest Android 2.3 (Gingerbread) and, when Google finally release it, you can update it to the aforementioned tablet specific Honeycomb.
I have been tracing the story of this tablet back from early 2010 and I literally cannot wait to get my hands on it. Its quality and community related spirit have given it a big following on the internet and I really recommend you check it out, even if it is to see what you could have had.
Source – nouse
