Pew Research has an ongoing project on Internet and American Life, and one of their questions is do you own a Tablet computer or eReader.  The latest December/January questionnaire was recently competed and the data suggests that the number of people who own at least one of the two items has doubled over the same period last year.

29 percent admitted owning at least a tablet or an eReader.  This is up from 19 percent last year.  The percentage of people who own a tablet jumped to 19 from 10 between mid-December and early January. E-book reader ownership also rose to 19 percent from 10 percent of U.S. adults.

Men and women were equally likely to own tablets, and the likelihood of tablet ownership was higher for people with higher household incomes, the report found. Those with higher levels of education were also more likely to own tablets than those who completed fewer years of school.

E-readers, meanwhile, were slightly more common among women.

The data from Pew Research is of a high quality.  Their samples on these questions runs form 2000 to 3000+, so the confidence in the sample results is much higher than from a typical political preference survey which usually run around 500 responders in the sample.

The two leaders in the equipment owned by the respondents is the iPad for tablets and Kindles for eReaders.  There are other brands, of course, but these two are the undisputed leaders in their respective categories.

The most surprising result is the similarity of eReaders and tablets, both being about half the total respondents.

For those of us who those who own both an iPad and a Windows PC or laptop, it is not possible to use the iPad for Microsoft’s Office Suite of programs.  Microsoft has not written a special version of their legacy software for the iPad, so one must find a workaround if you ever want to use the iPad for writing or editing Word-compatible documents. 

There are workarounds, but none are very convenient.  I use Dropbox extensively, since I have more than one Windows machine, and it is possible with a companion app, DocsToGo,or QuickOffice to work with Word for Windows documents contained in the iPad’s  Dropbox app.  Is is convenient that Dropbox also works on the iPad , but it takes some doing to get the documents in its file system in a Word for Windows format when using it.  It can be done, but there are more steps to perform, and more steps slow you down, and still do not give you the formatting options available in Word.

Over the weekend, though, I picked up a new cloud application, OnLive Desktop, that allows me to use Word, Excel, Power Point and Paint on my iPad and have the files accessible to my other Windows computers.  Onlive Desktop is not like DocstoGo  or QuickOffice, where the iPad editing is done in a text window that is formatted for Docx use only when saved.  Onlive Desktop uses the actual Windows versions of Word, etc. to do the document creation and editing.  It’s all in the cloud; your documents are not stored on the iPad or your windows machine, but they are accessible from all your Windows and iOS devices.

The visual screen on the iPad is exactly what you see when viewing Word for Windows on your PC, and the commands and key-stroking are the same.  All the formatting options are there, too.  Even the Windows key short-cuts for selecting texts, cutting, moving to the clipboard and pasting are active.

One minor inconvenience, though, is that these commands are not usable when you leave the cloud environment and return to the iPads domain.  For example, it is not possible to copy an Office document to the clipboard and then paste it into an app on an iPad– no emailing or pasting into the iPad’s iWorks apps. 

However, if you use your PC to open or edit the document, the cut and paste works fine.  You can copy you Windows document from the cloud and paste it into a new Windows document or email screen on your PC.  You can also “save and send” the document from a PC but not from the iPad—that option is  “grayed out” on the iPad file menu.

The good news about Onlive Desktop is that it is free, at least for 2GB of cloud storage.  So you can download the app to your iPad at no cost.  The bad news is that it cannot be activated until you open an account on your PC.  Plus, once this step is taken, you can still not log on to your account with the iPad until you get permission from Onlive Desktop via email notification.  It took a day or so for all this to go through—it seems Onlive has a limited capacity to add new users so they tell you when it is your turn to get on board.

Once these preliminary steps are taken I have had no problem in logging on or off with any of my devices.  After using it for a day or two I find it was worth the effort because of the ease of use and seamless syncing between devices. 

As far as creating documents on the iPad, the relatively commodious iPad virtual keyboard does not work in the cloud, but a small one is made available by the cloud app when you need it.  But entering text on any virtual keyboard is too onerous to think about, so I tried my blue tooth  keyboard.  The good news is that it works fine with the cloud app.  Also the iPad keyboard that physically connects to the iPad—the one sold by Apple– also works with the cloud app, if you don’t mind turning your head sideways to read your text.  The Apple keyboard for iPad mounts only in a vertical, portrait, mode.  But the cloud app displays only in the landscape mode.  Forget using the Apple keyboard for the iPad—blue tooth is your only option.

One last note for those who may have an Android tablet: my heterogeneous environment does not stop with iPad and a Windows PC.  It also includes the Samsung Galaxy Tab (7-inch version) which runs under Android.  Although their Android app is not yet available for Onlive, it will be according to their Desktop site.  No time frame is provided, however.  Not that I would like to use such a small device for word processing, but I can envision a time when it would come in handy, especially with an external keyboard.

Overall, the new app is a welcome addition to my iPad.  I can now press it into a production mode if I have left my laptop behind.

 

 

The  research firm IDC has reported year-to-date sales on tablets, and it revels a 264.5 percent surge in tablet sales worldwide from the third quarter of last year to this year.  Third quarter shipments for this year are estimated at 18.1 million units.   This amounts to a growth of 23.9 percent from the second quarter of this year.

Apple’s iPad led the field with 11.1 million units shipped during the 3rd quarter.  This is just over 61 percent of all tablets shipped during the period.  Samsung’s tablet line, which includes both 10.1 and 7-inch models, was in second place with 5.6 percent of the total worldwide shipments. 

HP’s quickly discontinued TouchPad placed third by shipping 903,000 units, yielding a 5 percent market share. 

The Kindle Fire did not begin shipping until the middle of November, so they had no 3rd quarter shipments.

Apple’s dominance of this market is expected to diminish in the 4th quarter, however.  IDC estimates that Android-based tablets, which include the Samsung tablets and the Kindle Fire, will increase their market share to 40.3 percent  and the iPad will fall to 59 percent.  Much of the increase for Android devices is attributable to the amazing success of the Kindle Fire.

Specific estimates for the Nook Color and Nook Tablet were not provided, but it is widely believed that these Barnes and Noble products will also contribute to the decline in market share enjoyed by the iPad.  Both of their tablets have enjoyed strong sales over the final quarter of the year.

The data leave little doubt that there is a wider market for the 7-inch form factor than has been seen before the Fire and Nook tablets were introduced.  Certainly the price points of $199 for the Fire and Nook Color and $249 for the Nook Tablet have had much to do with the surge in popularity of the smaller devices.  Prior to this development, the 7-inch models were listed at $499, and they had failed to move.  Amazon and Barnes and Noble changed that dynamic with unambiguous clarity.

2011 looks especially good for this new form factor.  IDC estiates that by the end of the year total worldwide shipments will come in a 63.3 million units shipped.  Next year should be even better.

The honor of being the first tablet running the new generation quad-core processor belongs to Asus.  Using the brand-new Tegra 3 (you remember, the Tegra 2 had two cores, so the Tegra 3 has four?), the new Transformer Prime blows away all other tablets running on an ARM-based chip.

There are several preliminary reviews out, and all of them remark on how blazingly fast the new chip is.  J.R. Raphael, reviewing the new Transformer for Computer World said: “. . .at first impression, the Transformer Prime just flies. I mean, this tablet is fast. I’m honestly not sure quad-core is something an average tablet user truly needs at this point, but for a power-user, gamer, or anyone who just wants top-of-the-line technology, the added processing muscle puts the Prime in a league of its own.”

Other reviewers have said about the same thing.  There will be other quad-core tablets coming out by the beginning of the year.  The iPad3 may have one, too.

But that is not the entire story of the Transformer Prime.  It has been significantly slimmed down from its earlier form, and the build quality is uniformly praised.  Android 3.2.1 is the version it is shipping with now, or will on December 19th.  But Asus promises an early upgrade to the newer version 4.0 soon.

Notice from the picture above that the tablet part of the Transformer docks with a keyboard and becomes an almost regular notebook computer.  The picture below is blown up a bit to give a better picture of how the two items work together. 

Of course, it is not mandatory that a buyer of the tablet purchase the keyboard dock.  It runs an extra $150, but it includes both a full sized USB 2.0 port and SD slot.  It also included an extra battery that adds an extra six or so hours to the otherwise long battery life of the tablet.  The tablet itself has a mini HDMI out and mini SD port.

The full review can be read by clicking on this link.

The new Transformer has a suggested retail price of $499, which puts is squarely in the iPad2 camp.  Quite obviously Asus feels that with its full slate of attributes it can go head-to-head with the Apple product.

Asus does not have a full monopoly on a transforming system.  Apple, Samsung, Motorola, and Toshiba all have special keyboards that fit their tablets.  But, these are simply keyboards.  The Asus product is a full-fledged dock.  It has all the docking facilities we expect, including enhanced battery life and other ports.

This development also points out another problem that is infecting all of today’s tablets, except those that run Windows.  The problem is that there is not a full-fledged word processing application that runs on the ARM systems. 

Microsoft has promised that it Microsoft Office suite will soon be re-written to run on the ARM architecture, but no specifics about features, prices or when it will be available. This leaves tablet owners with the distinct disadvantage of not being able to bring full production capabilities to this form factor.  And with the power of a quad-core processor, surely ARM could handle the Office suite’s heavy processing requirements.

Once these legacy applications are brought to the tablet, then an entirely new group of buyers will be drawn to this new phenomenon, and tablet sales will become stratospheric compared to what they are today.  At that point, a transformed tablet will be the equivalent, or at lease near-equivalent, of a laptop computer.

The iPad at least has Pages, its native word processing application.  And, it sells for $10.  Although it is anemic compared with Word or Word Perfect, it does allow a reasonably competent system of creating a text document with graphics, too.  But getting Pages data into a Word document requires multiple steps.  A native Word for the ARM world will solve many problems, and I am sure the hardware folks are licking their chops at the prospect.  It will probably be done sometime in 2012.

There are many rumors about the iPad3 (the Maxi) due to debut in March/April of next year.  And there are old rumors, now being recycled, that Apple also has a 7-inch version of the iPad coming—the Mini.

The maxi is well established, with reports of a new, higher resolution screen already shipping to manufacturing plants in Asia, getting ready for its first or second quarter debut.

But the specifications of the maxi are not settled.  The latest rumor, reported by Forbes Magazine, is that the iPad3 will be a high performance machine that will feature  not only a higher resolution screen but voice recognition service, Siri, as well.

This is big news, because Siri, accepting complex voice commands to do things in the future when certain conditions are met, is shaking things up in the smartphone market.  Much of the high demand for the iPhone 4S is attributable to this new feature.  If introduced to the next generation iPad, many existing owners would have a huge incentive to buy a new one.

The Forbes article goes on to report that there may be substance in the rumor for the mini.  The 7-inch market has seen frantic activity lately, with suppliers from Asia, North America and Europe rushing for a place on dealer shelves this year and next. 

The take by Forbes is that Apple would use the 7-inch device to secure their hold on all segments of the tablet market, using the smaller form factor to supplement their dominance in the larger screen size. 

One rumor insists that the mini will be first out of the starting block, but this seems unlikely.  No support screen shipments support this rumor.  Surely, if Apple had such a plan, suppliers would already be hard at work.  And once factories start churning out specific parts for a future product, the news leaks out.

Whatever, rumors are great fun, and tweak our interest in the not-to-distant future.  I, for one, would love to see Apple’s design ingenuity put to work on the stogy 7-inch market.

 Ray Hendon

For the last two years I have wanted to begin each article about e-readers or tablets with a phrase about how rapidly things are changing in the industry. But, it is now and it always will  be that way. Technology is changing fast, and the longer we have experience in a particular technology, the faster change takes place. It’s a sentiment that is true in every segment of industry that is touched by computer technology.

This article is about the seven inch tablet, a segment of the tablet industry that has not in the past seen the tectonic eruptions that have defined the 10-inch segment. The iPad, of course, dominates the 10-inch segment, and, so far no other single tablet has managed to mount a significant challenge to the dominance established by the Apple product.

The seven-inch market, however, is not the same. Although Samsung probably owns the lion’s share of the smaller form factor today, their dominance is going to change soon. Samsung was the first major designer to bring a high quality device into this space, the Galaxy Tab. Their first 7-inch tablet was almost alone for the first nine months to a year of its existence. But, the price point Samsung chose for their entry was too high by half, so its sales paled with that of the iPad by more than 10 to one. Dell, who also had a 7-incher in the market, made a serious design flaw in giving their product a poor screen resolution, and even with their newer version, they still don’t get it, offering a measly 800 X 480 resolution while the market demands better.

The latter half of this year, however, has seen interest in the smaller form factor explode, not so much with sales but with other manufacturers jumping into the market with their own devices. Apparently they see something there that consumers do not. Of course, Amazon’s decision to go with the smaller screen for their first tablet has created more excitement than anything that preceded their announcement.

Below are nine of the best of these new devices, including one expected before the end of the year.

Acer Aspire Iconia A100

The technical specifications of the A100 are a little on the low side of most of the other tablets shown. It supports a dual core ARM A9 at 1 GHz speed, and its screen resolution is less than the best: 1024 X 600 is still being sold but 1024 by 800 is where it is headed. The A 100’s storage memory is light at 8 GB, although it does have a micro SD slot to boost the external memory.

Other specs include a weight of 14.7 oz, a TFT-LCD multitouch screen, two cameras, WiFi, blue tooth, 2 USB ports, HDMI out and GPS. It also runs Android Honeycomb and retails for $329 at BestBuy. AT&T has a 3G model that they sell with a data services contract.

Reviewers generally like the device but think it is priced too high for its specs. I agree, but I hope that as the end-of-year selling season progresses we will see a price reduction closer to $200. With the Kindle Fire going for $199 and the B&N Nook Tablet for $249, it doesn’t make much sense for spending a hundred or hundred and fifty more for the A100. It was unfortunate that Acer brought out its new model just before either the Fire or Nook Tablet came on the scene. Acer and every other tablet seller will have to do some re-thinking on their price points.

Lenovo Idea Pad A1

Priced on sale at $220 today from Lenovo, this model was also introduced before the Kindle Fire or Nook Tablet, so it suffered a little from being overpriced for the modest specs it has. But, the assumption would be that it is a well-built device, coming from Lenovo. It features:

Texas Instruments OMAP 3622 ( 1GHz )  single-core processor derived from the ARM A8 Cortex family.

· 1024×600 screen

• Android 2.3

· Optimized for the Web with full Flash® support and instant synching

· More than 10 preloaded apps, with more available via Lenovo App Shop and Android Market

· GPS navigation in offline mode

· Integrated front (0.3M) and back (3M) cameras

· Trendy design available in black, white, pink or blue

· Integrated Bluetooth® and 802.11b/g/n Wi-Fi

· Measures 7.7” x 4.9” x 0.5”

· Micro-USB connector, microSD card reader

Its weaknesses are the single core processor and a lack of full Android Market Place support and running an older version of Android, v 2.3.

Its strengths are in GPS, cameras (not great, but OK), and good connectivity with USB and microSD memory capability. Lenovo may find traction for their new entry at a $150 price point. But Lenovo has failed to adjust its prices yet.

Samsung Galaxy Tab 7.0 Plus

Samsung’s lead in the 7-inch segment of the tablet market is based on its original machine, The Galaxy Tab. The picture to the right is its replacement. While it looks about the same, it is thinner, lighter and speedier.

The Tab 7.0 Plus includes a 1.2GHz dual-core processor; the older model had a 1Ghz single-core ARM Cortex A8. The new machines also uses Android Honeycomb 3.2 operating system; vs. 2.x Hummingbird for last year’s model. The screen resolution remains the same at 1024-pixel by 600-pixels. One of the cameras is up to 2.0 megapixles from 1.3. Video resolution remains the same at 720p.

A major upgrade over the older model is as a media center. The new one can be used as a remote control for many tv, etc. Samsung has also added a USB port, a nice improvement.

The new model will arrive at retailers on November 13.

The Wi-Fi-only Plus model with 16GB of storage will cost $400 at Best Buy, Amazon and Tiger Direct. A 32 GB model is also available.

There can be little doubt that the price of the new 7-inch Tab will have to come down. It is one of the best of the current crop of 7-inchers, but at twice the price of Amazon’s Kindle Fire, and with only marginal improvement in performance, it is unlikely to sell many of the new machines. I would look for big price reductions as the final selling season gets underway.

One other thing in its favor is the year’s experience Samsung has in working out the kinks of this small form factor and in enhancing its feature set.  Their 7-inch Tab was and is a well made, sturdy device.

 

Huawei, SpringBoard

The 1280-by-800 screen

Mobile hotspot 3G

1.2-GHz dual-core Qualcom Snapdragon processor

1 GB RAM and 16GB storage

 

Huawei’s tablet is probably the best of the new breed. Good screen resolution, hotspot capability and a fast, dual-core processor.

It is a fine machine. It is fast, great graphics and a full feature set. But it is beset by two major problems, at least at this writing.

First it is too expensive. Again, the Amazon $199 price will cut it off at the knees at its advertised price of around $400.

Second, for now it is available only through T-Mobile—the weakest of the four major national service providers of cell phone service. Part of its problem is that its T-Mobile pricing is quite complicated. You make a down payment (with approved credit) of $229.99 and get a card for a $50 mail-in rebate. Then, on top of the charges for a data plan the owner must pay $10 a month for the next two years. This totals to $429 over the course of the contract, and by that time, of course, you will want to get a new device, given the rapid changes going on in the industry. One must also pay for the data services.

Below is a cut and paste from the T-Mobile site as to its features:

5 Megapixel Camera

Bluetooth® connectivity

Calculator

Calendar

GPS with Navigation Capability

HDMI Out

Music player

QWERTY keyboard

USB Tethering*

Voice recorder

Wi-Fi enabled*

This is a good batch of specs except for external memory capability or USB connection. It is also overpriced when compared with an iPad2 or other tablets. I would like to see it sold with WiFi only, but Huawei seems to be putting all its eggs in the T-Mobile basket for now.

PC world has a hands-on review here. Generally the reviewer was impressed with its speed and ability to stream videos without hitches. But, the reviewer had only a few minutes with the device, so we must wait for a more comprehensive review.

 

Amazon Kindle Fire

The Kindle Fire has generated more interest in tablet computers than any other product except the iPad. Kindle e-reader customers have suffered long with their eInk, non-touch readers, and there is obviously a large number of Amazon customers who were waiting for a full-color tablet. Amazon recently upped their initial production run to 5 million units that they expect to sell before the end of the year. Pre-orders have apparently gone well.

Video Review:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u3Opi9VZt8s

Written hand-on review from Associated Press: http://news.yahoo.com/review-kindle-fire-sacrifices-under-200-050342124.html

Hands-on review from Wired: http://www.wired.com/reviews/2011/11/kindle-fire/all/1

Specs on this $199 device are not outstanding. To get the price $300 lower than the iPad, they had to leave out things like cameras, high resolution screen (1024 X 600), 3G access and unmolested Android. But, the total package will probably work well for many users. It will surf, is tightly integrated with Amazon’s movies, music and electronic books. It will stream video, check e-mail and have some form of text entry for notes and letters. And Amazon has created its own browser that promises to be fast and capable. The video of a demonstration is impressive.

It also stores your movies, books and music on Amazon’s cloud storage facilities. This means you don’t need a lot of internal memory, thus saving more on production costs.

With Amazon’s marketing muscle and decent machine they will have a hit and probably end the year with the second place in tablet sales behind the iPad. In terms of pure specs, the Fire is more toward the low end of the market rather than the high, but when the build-quality and software integration is included in the definition it is not a low-end machine. It has a reduced feature set, but it does a great job in what it does.

 

Nook Tablet

The Nook family of e-readers and tablets is shown below, with the newest entry, the Nook Tablet shown on the right. Its specs are better than the Kindle Fire—it has a faster dual core and higher screen resolution, and it has more internal memory. It is also priced at $249.99, $50 more than Amazon’s product.(Click Here for  Review of Engadget)

For a more comprehensive review,see PC World’s Review Here.

Who can say how it will fare next to the Fire. Probably it will do OK. B&N gained credibility with their Nook Color as a fairly competent Android device, although it was marketed as a full-color e-reader.

I don’t think it will sell near as many as the Fire. Amazon has a larger customer base, and the integration with Amazon’s content will be attractive to many of their loyal customers. Nevertheless, B&N has a loyal customer base, too, so I expect they will do well with their new Nook Tablet.

HTC Flyer

The Flyer is a great 7-inch tablet. It is light, slim and has a great processor and screen. I wish all the 7-inchers were this good. It’s major problem is that it is a little too good. HTC has included pen-input capability, and this adds to the cost. While it is nice, not everyone needs it, and I wonder that it woldn’t have been better to offer two models, one with and one without this feature. But, that is only one person’s guess.

A hands-on review was published at Engadget (Click Here). It is a great machine. “. . . the 7-inch Flyer, the most unique of this year’s Android tablet offerings, opting for a 1.5GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon processor, a sturdy aluminum construction that doesn’t even try to compete in the race for extreme thinness, and a Magic Pen to make you forget it’s running Gingerbread and not Honeycomb (yet).

Its display goes with the 1024 X 600, but it looks great. I have used it for brief periods—it is fast, bright and responsive. Viewing angle is much better than many, and it feels good in the hand.

When it first hit the market a month or so ago it was priced at $499—a killer for a 7-inch tablet. But it sat on dealer shelves until the price was reduced to $399. But it is still a notch too high, in my view.

It comes in two versions: 3G and WiFi only. Amazon sells a 3G version for $500, but it must be unlocked. None of the major carriers are selling it with a service plan for now.

Looking ahead:

The most interesting new 7-incher headed our way is the Samsung Tab 7.7. The new tablet, from the specs I have seen, it looks great.

· 7.7" SUPER AMOLED Plus*· 1280 x 800 WXGA· 197 pixels per inch (ppi)· 4-way rotation· Live Panel · Mini Apps · Clipboard · Hub for music, video (1080p), etc · WiFi, 3G, Blue Tooth · Front and back cameras · 1 GB memory + micro SD slot · 1.4 GHz dual core processor · Flash and Mobile Office suite · Sensors for proximity, GPS, Accelerometer, and others e-reading, games and remote control · WiFi, 3G, Blue Tooth · Front and back cameras · 1 GB memory + micro SD slot · 1.4 GHz dual core processor · Flash and Mobile Office suite · Sensors for proximity, GPS, Accelerometer, and others

The only problem with the nifty new device is that when and where it will be available is an unknown, apparently even to the executive suite at Samsung’s headquarters. Apple got an injunction against Samsung that prevents selling it in Germany and Australia.  Perhaps Samsung is fearful of the same thing happening in the U.S. The basis of Apple’s complaint was patent infringement, so this is a bothersome issue that may be a while before it is settled.

I will be first in line to see it if it ever makes it here. It may be a block buster of a product if it is priced right and the courts eventually allow it to be sold.  Otherwise, Samsung will have to pay some royalties to Apple on each unit produced.

The 7-inch market looks to come into its own this year and next.  I have found many uses for this size tablet, but it does not replace the iPad or other 10.1 Android tablet.  The screen size is simply to small to do a good job surfing in a serious manner.  I have also noticed that many power users have both sizes, so I am not alone in my opinion of its usefulness.

It is much preferred over a 10-inch tablet.As an e-reader, hotspot, email checker and some other functions,   It will be interesting see how this plays out.  Will the 7.7-inch make a splash?  Will Samsung’s other entry into the less than 10-inch market, the 8.9-inch Galaxy Tab 8.9, make it as a viable alternative?

I took the picture to the left at a local BestBuy showing my 7-inch Galaxy Tab below the Galaxy Tab 8.9.  The larger screen will not fit into my back pocket, but it certainly makes a better web browser.

I will be watching this new form factor closely to see if it finds traction in the market.

The ability of electronic devices to morph from one form to another is a source of confusion in the minds of consumers. For decades there were tablet computers, but there were no electronic readers. Then electronic readers were introduced, and within a few years browsing capabilities were added, more or less as an afterthought but not done well.  But, the distinction between these two categories was blurred just a little.

Then the tablet computer morphed from a very expensive pen-centric business device that was a sub-category of a laptop into a hand-held device that is now a category of its own. It wasn’t long before Amazon and the other eBook sellers developed reader applications that allowed these new tablets to read eBooks, too. When you put a Kindle reader on an iPad, the iPad becomes an eReader, even though it was an afterthought of the designers.

Now we have two categories of devices that have inched closer to each others’ afterthoughts. The old distinctions are gradually melding into a commonality that makes it hard to make meaningful distinctions between them.

This confusion is not only demonstrated by the buyers of these devices. It is also on display by the blogs and eMagazine sites that keep track on the industry. As an example, notice what the data below shows how differently the different blogs and eMagazines treat this distinction.

PC World: Single category: Tablets/E-Readers.

Engadget: Separate categories: (1) E-Readers, (2) Tablet PCs. The Nook Color, by the way, is reviewed under the E-Reader category, although it could just as well be classified as a tablet.

Computer World No classification of either device

ReadWriteWeb No classification of either device

ZDNet Three categories: (1) iPad, (2) Tablets, (3) E-Books and E-Readers

Crunch Gear No specific classifications. They use “Mobile” and “Gadgets.”

Laptop Magazine Separate categories for Tablets and eReaders

Cnet Separate categories for Tablets and E-Book readers as a sub-class of Tablets

Tabletreaderinfo Single category: Tablet/eBook Readers

Sometimes our classification system fails us. And recently the original eInk providers, Amazon and Barnes and Noble, have introduced what are in fact tablets, but were designed and promoted as eReaders as their primary function. They also include tight integration of the eBook seller’s sites and all the electronic media capabilities. Still, they are tablet computers underneath and eReaders by heritage.

I don’t have a solution for this failure to clarify. Although there are two clear divisions between these categories: eInk vs not eInk. But, this is not convenient terminology for anyone, although it does describe the difference fairly accurately. We will probably have to live with this confusion for a while until one or the other either disappears or does some more morphing closer to the other.

On my site I find that I spend more time lately reviewing the eReading capabilities of tablets than I do reviewing pure, eInk readers. The market is clearly moving away from eInk, although it could make a comeback. But, I can’t see how. It is a hassle to carry two devices with you when one is enough, and the way the technology stands today, the clear winner is the tablet with eReading software. I almost never use my old Kindle anymore. My 7-inch Galaxy Tab or iPad has taken over this function.

Nevertheless, there are many avid readers who prefer their old eInk devices, and they are the best way to read if you are out of doors. But I don’t see a bright future for this old technology. I am most curious as to how this plays out.  But confusion will reign for a while longer.

Ray Hendon

eBooks have been rewriting the rules about how, when and where we read. The convenience and low costs of reading in electronic formats has made headway among the reading public, and In terms of book sales, eBooks are now a major force in today’s market.

But it has been only recently that America’s public libraries have joined the revolution, but now they have.  11,000 public libraries across the U.S.A. now allow their members to borrow electronic editions of books, and a few weeks ago Amazon joined the chorus and allowed its Kindle readers to borrow from public libraries.

Early Friday, about 9:00am, I made a trip to the local Lake Charles library, filled out a form for a library card, and about half an hour later, sitting at my desktop, I borrowed my first eBook, John Grisham’s The Confession: A Novel.  The entire process was painless and simple; this article is an account of how to do it.

First, one does not have to have a Kindle reader to use Amazon’s borrowing service.   I have a Kindle, but for almost all of my eReading I use the Kindle application  on my iPad or Galaxy Tab 7 rather than the Kindle device.  It is too easy to read on my other devices that I happen to have with me, so my old Kindle mostly gathers dust these days. 

If you do not have a Kindle Reader, just download the Kindle Reader Application through Amazon for your desktop or laptop or through the Android Market if you use Android, or Apple’s App Store if you have an iPhone or iPad.

Free Kindle readers are available Here for the devicdes shown above.

Once your account is set up with Amazon, you are ready to proceed, assuming, of course, that you are a member of your local library.  If not, then join and get your member number.      Also, since the lending is done on-line, you must get a PIN number at the same time.  When these two things done, you are ready to proceed to the next step.

The second step is to get the appropriate software from site that handles electronic lending for all the libraries that lend eBooks—Overdrive (Click Here).  This is a great convenience to have a professional firm to provide a consistent interface to all public library eLending.

Once on the Overdrive page you will notice a box on the top right of the screen:  You can see that the service is available for desktops, laptops as well as many mobile devices.  Don’t confuse the Mac software for what you will need for the iPad or iPhone.  If you want to read on you home computers and on your mobile devices, you will need the software install on each device you plan to use.

Once the download is completed and installed, you are ready to borrow a library book on your Kindle reading app or your iPad/iPhone Overdrive app.  Sign on to Overdrive with your library membership number and enter your PIN, and you will then be able to search for the title or author of your choice.

When you are signing up with Overdrive you will select what lending period you would like. I chose the 14-day option. If I finish reading the borrowed book before that time, I can return it so it will go back into circulation sooner.

I noticed that the Lake Charles library (Calcasieu Public Library) they often have only one digital copy of a title.  The book publishers are holding the feet of the public libraries to the fire and require that they can only lend the number of books they have purchased.  So, if it is checked out you may put it on hold so you will be notified when it become available.   

With the Kindle, you chose Kindle as your reader on the Overdrive site, so when you select the title you want to borrow and continue with checkout, the Overdrive site lines up your download with Amazon’s website and switches your browser to that site so you can tell Amazon to which device you want your copy to be downloaded.    I chose the Galaxy Tab 7, and by the time I turned it on and synced it with Amazon it was in my archives files.  I simply clicked on the archived copy and the download was completed and then appeared on my Kindle library, ready to read.

For the iPad/iPhone device, rather than choosing Kindle, you need to choose Adobe ePub format which is the DRM enabled ePub format.  In this case, the file of the borrowed book is downloaded directly into Overdrives reader application, and the icon is displayed on the iPad’s/iPhone’s screen.  You simply open the reader app and the books you have borrowed appear in the library, ready to be read.

This same procedure will work with Nook and Sony readers, but they may also have their own way of handling borrowed book that allows you to use their proprietary reader apps in place of the Overdrive reader.Borrowing for these devices will be covered in a later piece.

Below is a video that goes through the process for Kindle.  If anything is unclear about the process, it may help to clear it up.

Video on Borrowing eBooks from you Local Library

Good reading.

9/30/2011:  Samsung Galaxy Tab 7.0 Plus Coming

The Galaxy Tab 7.0 Plus was unveiled today, delivering an Android 3.2 Honeycomb tablet that comes with a 7-inch display and a 1.2GHz dual-core processor. Boasting 802.11n wireless support as well as HSPA+ compatibilities, the new tablet also comes in two sizes: 16GB or 32GB with a microSD slot to add more storage.

No pricing is available yet which is not surprising given the blockbuster pricing announcement made by Amazon a couple of days ago.  It is rumored the Tab 7.0 Plus will sell for $200 with a 4G data plan contract with T-Mobile., but this has not been verified, nor has the availability of this new tablet.

It will be rolled out in Australia in October, and, presumably, later in the U.S. market.

9/27/2011:  Samsung Galaxy Tab 8.9 In Next Few Days

The Galaxy Tab 8.9 will be available for sale in the United States beginning October 2, according to Samsung.  Along with the announcement of the new device’s availability Samsung also mentioned a 4and 5-inch media player that will be available soon after that.

The price of the Tab 8.9 is said to be $469 for the 16GB version, with higher prices for more memory.  The new model is also apparently a WiFi-only model.  Perhaps 3/4G versions will be offered later.  Screen resolution is strong, at 1280 X 800, so the graphics should be great.

8/26/2011: Motorola Xoom in New 8.2 and 10.1-inch Models?

The rumor mills are flying now with photographs of two new Motorola Xooms in the factory. The top picture above is of the new 8.2-inch Xoom, supposedly to be called Xoom 2 Media Edition.  The second picture is of the back sides of the 10.1 and 8.2-inch Xoom 2.

The current preproduction models are said to be full of bugs, so it may be some time yet before we see these new machines.

The original Xoom does need an update to be faster and have more capacity, as well as lose some weight.  My first guess is that we will see both these new devices before December.

The news of the leaks have been reported in several blogs this morning.

9/24/2011:  Color Kindle Announcement on Wednesday?

All eyes will be on New York, N.Y. this coming Wednesday as Amazon convenes it recently announced press conference there.  The timing of the announcement and the mailing list of invitees strongly supports the supposition that the announcement will be about the Color Kindle, the highly touted potential competitor to the iPad2.

It is no longer a secret that a Color Kindle is in the works.  This has been confirmed by the top executives of Amazon.  Neither is it doubted that the new device is slated to be available for the upcoming holiday sales season.  Given this state of affairs, an announcement of its future availability will help put a stop to some of the early Christmas shopping for tablets, especially for Kindle aficionados.  It would be a major mistake to wait much longer before at least announcing the details of their new gadget.

It is possible, of course, that they could be announcing a new thinner touch Kindle or some other item.  But this scenario seems decidedly unlikely.  October is less than a week away.  The Christmas selling season is looming large.

I look for a seven-inch device, more like the Nook Color in design and price than the iPad2.  But I don’t know.  It could actually be more than one form factor—perhaps a seven-inch and a 10.1, too.

9/22/2011: Kindle Accepts Library eBooks

Amazon’s Kindle, for most of its existence, has been the leader in both sales and features of electronic books and book readers.  But for the last year or so it has lost the feature leadership to Nook and Nook Color.  The Nook was one of the first to joint the public library eBook lending.  Even the stodgy old Sony Reader series could borrow books from a public library.  Kindle was left out of this important ability, as is has in touch control.

But this changes today.  Now Kindle owners can set up a borrowing account with their local library and “borrow” an eBook for two weeks.

This move was done in the face of a clear trend for public libraries to get into the eBook business—pushed, of course, by the many eReader owners.  The growth statistics of library lending of eBooks is impressive.  From January to September of this year, according the to New York Times, the number of e-books checked out from public libraries increased by 75 percent over the same period last year.

There has also been an astounding growth of libraries around the nation that offer access to eBooks.  Two years ago only 12 percent of public libraries had this ability.  Today it is 67 percent.

Forrester Research estimates that roughly 15 million eReaders would be purchased in the U.S. this year, which will increase the demand for electronic services even more.

It is good to see Amazon responding to this new wrinkle in the electronic reading market.  The strength of the Kindle brand will contribute significantly to the growth of electronic reading of books and magazines, and it will help the Kindle stay competitive to an increasingly effective competition from Barnes and Noble and other reader sellers.

9/22/2011:  RIM’s BlackBerry PlayBook Sales  About 1/4th of Projections

In April of this year, RIM forecast sales of 4-5 million PlayBooks in 2011. Unfortunately, RIM shipped fewer than 800,000 units during the first half of 2011 and monthly shipments have dropped to about 100,000 units in the third quarter, according to their manufacturer in Taiwan.

The discrepancy in the difference in forecast and actual sales is attributable to several factors:  features on the PlayBook were decidedly lacking, depending on owning a BlackBerry smartphone to even get one’s email or access to contacts, and the price was too high.

The PlayBook was originally priced at $499—the price of a low-end iPad, but the owner would get only a fraction of the screen size for the same money, not to mention fewer features and a more stable operating system.

In an earlier article I noted that the 7-inch tablet cannot reasonably be expected to sell for the same price as a full-sized tablet.  And, it appears, RIM is getting the picture.  They are offering some Canadian citizens who work for one of the primary cell-phone service providers a half-priced PlayBook.  I hope this price will stick, because that is probably the only way they can begin to meet their inflated sales expectations.

9/20/2011:  Samsung Galaxy 8.9 to Launch Sept. 22 at Best Buy

Samsung has announced that its new 8.9-inch tablet will be offered at most Best Buy stores on September 22.  Some stores will not get their inventory until the 25th, however.

This is a new form factor that places the screen size just under the iPads’s 9.7-inches and 1.3-inches above their new 7.7-inch device.

In my testing I find the 7-inch form factor to be almost unusable for ordinary surfing, since a full web page cannot be viewed in a readable font size.  But, the 8.9-inch may solve this problem, although there will be much added weight.

But the smaller dimensions are handy for eReading, eMail and other activities where the screen size is less critical. The small size make for easier hand holding and stuffing in a back pocket. The industry will, some day, settle on some standard sizes, but in its current stage, every brand seems to be searching for the best size for customers.

The specifications for this new form factor include overall dimensions of 9.1” X 6.2” X .3”.  Weight is under one pound.  This may be a viable product, but the final verdict will have to wait until some hands-on time.  I will file a report as soon as my local store gets its inventory. Comparing a couple of other small screen form factors.

Length/Width	Screen Size	% of iPad 2	Brand
9.1 X 6.2	56.42 Sq.Inches	81%	Galaxy Tab 8.9
7.48 X 4.74	35.45 Sq.Inches	51%	Galaxy Tab 7
10.1 X 6.9	69.69 Sq. inches	100.36%	Galaxy Tab 10.1
9.5 X 7.31	69.44 Sq. Inches	100%	iPad 2

The price of the 8.9-inch tablet is said to be $470 for the 16GB model, which is 94% of the iPad2’s $599.  This makes it more expensive per square inch of screen size, but apparently Samsung is counting on the benefits of the smaller screen and weight to make up for this discrepancy. 

9/16/2011:  RIM BlackBerry Playbook Heading for Lower Price

The rumors are that the BlackBerry Playbook, RIM’s 7-inch tablet, will soon fall in price, although no one is saying how much the price cut will be.  Sales of the Playbook have been from half to one third projections.  About 900,000 have been sold, but the units are nor measured in sales to customers but in sales to stores.  So no one knows yet how many have actually reached customer hands.

RIM’s profits for the last quarter were down over 50% from the previous year, so something must be done to correct the problem.  Since a brisk selling tablet was part of the company’s strategy for success this year, adjustments must be made.

The rumors are also stating that a coming software upgrade will bring a native email application and other enhancements, so the upgrade should help push sales when combined with lower prices.

Prices on 7-inch tablets has been dropping lately, so I would look for a $399 price or even lower. 

9/13/2011:  Windows 8 On Display on Tablet

Windows 8, the new OS from Microsoft that represents Microsoft’s answer to the touch interface of Apple’s IOS, is demonstrated in the video of Engadget. Click her for video and article on a hands-on demo.

5/20/2011:  eBooks at Amazon Outsell All Print Copies

Amazon announced that since April 1 of this year, sales of Kindle books at their site have exceeded sales of all print titles.  According to their press release, for every 100 printed books sold, 105 eBooks are sold.  Furthermore, free books are not included in the sales figures.

This change has been building for several years.  eBooks sales exceeded hard-cover sales last year.  But now both hardcover and paperbacks combined sell fewer copies than the Kindle books.

5/11/2011: New Android Releases To Be Consistent

The Android Operating System has been an astounding success.  According to Google, 310 different devices run on Android, and there have been more than 100 million activations of the OS to date.

But there have been problems.  There are so many versions of Android that work on only one devices, and the versions between devices is confusing to everyone, developers and the public. 

Google announced that a new release out later this year will be of a new type.  Any application written for any Android device will work on any other Android devices.  To accomplish, the app will adjust itself to whatever device it runs on.  Thus, a developer who releases an app for a smartphone will find that the same application will work on tablets and television sets.  The version number will no longer relate to any specific device.

This is huge for Android.  Not only developers but those who use the app will also gain much from this consistency.

5/06/2011:  Kindle to Walmart Stores Soon

Walmart has been selling eReaders for a long time, but they have not sold the most popular eReader, Amazon’s Kindle.  Walmart offered the Nook and a cheap Kobo to their shoppers.  But that deficit will be remedied with a couple of weeks as the nation’s largest retailer picks up the nation’s most popular eReader, the Kindle 3G and the cheaper WiFi-version that is ad-supported.

This is probably the final stage of the life of the Kindle and other E-Ink readers.  Tablets have been eating into their once sacred domain, and recent data from Nielson suggests the transition from a single-purpose reader to a multi-talented iPad, or Xoom or Galaxy Tab is strongly under way.  Only steep price drops will keep the E-Ink devices in the game.  Perhaps we will see a $75 Kindle in the future, or even a $50 price tag for the low end units.

5/5/2011: Barnes and Noble With a New eReader?

Barnes & Noble has filed an 8-K form with the SEC that reveals its intentions to introduce a new e-reader.

“The form, filed earlier today, says that the company "indicated it expects to make an announcement on May 24, 2011 regarding the launch of a new eReader device. . ." Considering the Nook Color just got Froyo, is it possible we’ll be seeing a Honeycomb version come the 24th?” (Engadget)

Nothing more is known about B&N intentions, but I will be monitoring this with great interest.  Is it possible they will beat Amazon to the punch again by bring out a full-fledged Android tablet to market?  Stay tuned.

4/28/2011:Moto Xoom Sells 250K Units 1st Month

Motorola reported that they sold 250,000 Xooms in the first month of its young life.  Apple’s iPad 2 has sold about 4.7 million over the same period.  There is some speculation as to whether Xoom is a success or a failure, although it is impossible to say unless the sales goals Moto had for its tablet were known. I have yet to read a single review of the Xoom that put it on parity with the iPad, so given its high price and limited configuration offerings, it seems like a moderate success.  Motorola expects to sell 1.5 to 2 million units for the full year.

A better test of Android’s operating system 3.0 will be when Acer, Asus, Samsung and Toshiba announce the sales of their10-inch tablets.  By the end of the first half of the year, we will have a better picture.

4/27/2011: Archos’ Arnova 8 Tablet Now Available

Archos, the maker of cheap tablets and other devices, has their latest tablet, the Arnova 8, a $161 budget tablet, available for shipping at Amazon now.   The tablet has an 8 inch, 800 x 600 pixel display, Google Android 2.1, 4GB of storage, and support for 720p HD video playback.

These are not impressive specs.  It has has a resistive touchscreen rather than capacitive and has an estimated battery life of up to 5.5 hours of video playback.

This device doesn’t qualify as a quality tablet, but at $161 plus shipping it may be of interest to some buyers.  It could do email, for example, and it has WiFi g.

Asus Eee Pad Transformer Sold Out on First Day

“The tablet just went on sale in the States, and it’s already out of stock at most retailers. Buy.com, Amazon, B&H, TigerDirect, DataVision, Newegg, and Best Buy all show the tablet as either out of stock or available for pre-order.”  source: Liliputing

It isn’t known how many units the retailers had in stock when the sale began, but it must have been few.  But all of them running out so soon seems to indicate a strong potential demand for the new tablet/keyboard combination.

4/25/2011: World’s Only Typewriter Factory Closing

The last standing typewriter factory in the world, Godrej and Boyce, is closing its plant in Mumbai, India.

Typewriter sales have plummeted in the past several years: the company sold less than 800 machines in 2010, down from the 50,000 it produced every year in the 1990s.

The last models produced were for the Arabic language.

Time marches on.

4/24/2011:  Nook Color Upgrades to Android 2.2, Adds Apps

Barnes and Noble is sending out an over the air upgrade to its Nook Color owners.  The upgrade will install Android 2.2 on their device and give users access to the Nook Color’s own app store.

The new app store has about 125 appst to begin with, some free, some paid, including Angry Birds, as you can see from the upper right icon on the photo to the right.

The new app also include a default email application, which, when added to an upgraded web browser, brings significant enhancements to the eReader that make it closer to a standard Android 7-inch tablet.

The upgrade will be rolled out over the next few weeks to existing Nook Color owners.

Dell Streak 7-inch Tablet, WiFi Only for $399

Dell is ready to begin selling its 7-inch Streak with WiFi-only for delivery in a week or so.  Dell’s price for the WiFi model is $399.  Amazon is charging $20 less on their site.

04/23/2911 $499 HTC Flyer 7-inch tablet pre-sale next week at Best Buy

Best Buy will begin taking pre-sale orders for the HTC Flyer 7 inch Android tablet on Monday, April 25th. The tablet will be available in the US later this spring at $499.

The HTC Flyer features a 7 inch, 1024 x 600 pixel capacitive touchscreen display.  It joins a fairly limited field of 7-inch screen tablet.  The Flyer will also accept pressure-sensitive input from an included stylus.  This ability gives it an edge against Samsung’s Galaxy Tab and the BlackBerry Playbook, neither of which accept pen input..

The tablet has a 1.5 GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon single core processor and runs a customized version of Google Android 2.3. An Android 3.0 Honeycomb update is expected later this year.

/22/2011: Kindle eReader App for Android Up-dated For 3.0

The original Kindle eReader app for android was for smartphone-sized screens.  Although it would work on the Honeycomb 3.0 version, which was designed for tablets, it did not take advantage of the many features of the new OS.

Amazon has now fixed the problem by releasing a 3.0 version of the Kindle eReader software for Android.  This is good news for those who are in the market for one of the many new Android tablets coming to market.

The new tablet version offers a new layout for newspapers, magazines and is optimized to take advantage of the larger tablet form factor.

This was an essential update if Amazon want to continue its “buy once, read everywhere” policy.

4/21/2011;  Asus Eee Tab Transformer in U.S. April 26th, $399

This is good news for tablet buyers.  My earlier article (Click Here) provides the specifications and a couple of reviews.  A keyboard that attaches in a way to give it a notebook look and feel is said to cost another $150.  When Microsoft brings out an ARM based Windows this will be a viable product for laptop replacement.

4/20/2011: Amazon To Allow Kindles to Join Library Lending Services

Amazon announced Wednesday that it would join a library loan program for electronic books. The press release didn’t say the precise day the program would begin, but simply said “Later this year.”

More than 11,000 libraries in the United States participate in this electronic-book-loaning program, managed by a company called OverDrive. To see if your library has a contract with OverDrive, go to overdrivesearch.com and type in your ZIP code.

Amazon is late to the lending party. The Barnes & Noble Nook and Sony Readers already allow users to check out digital books from their local libraries using the service. The company offers more than 400,000 digital books and has had a library loan program for e-books since 2003.

The electronic-book checkout process is similar to that for real-world books. Eligible books are checked out for a certain period of time — two weeks in many cases — after which they become locked and inaccessible on a person’s e-reading device.

One needn’t own a Kindle to use the service, but it is necessary to have the free Kindle app on the device you want to use for reading the book.  This can include Android smartphones, iPads, PCs, BlackBerries, Macs, iPhones, iPods and Windows Phone 7s.

4/19/2011: LG G-Slate on Sale Tomorrow at T-Mobile

LG’s G-Slate for-Mobile goes on sale in the US tomorrow, for $529.99 after rebate with a 2-year service plan. It will run $729 with no contract..

The G-Slate features an 8.9 inch, 1280 x 768 pixel HD display, a 1 GHz NVIDIA Tegra 2 dual core processor, 32GB of storage, and runs Google Android 3.0 Honeycomb. It features an HSPA+ modem for speedy mobile interenet access.

It also has a 3D camera.

The early reviews for the tablet are in, and here’s what people have to say:

• BGR: The G-Slate has excellent build quality, but there still aren’t many apps designed specifically for Android 3.0 tablets. The 3D video feature apparently works well, but BGR dismisses it as a “novelty.”
• Laptop Magazine: The 8.9 inch display makes the tablet smaller than other tablets, but it weighs just as much as the Apple iPad 2. The viewing angles are great and the screen is very bright, but text seemed a bit too sharp on some web pages. (That’s a problem I experience regularly on 10 inch netbooks with HD displays).

• Android Community: The tablet is one of the fastest around in terms of benchmarks, and the battery life is on-par with the Motorola XOOM.
• TechnoBuffalo: The form factor is great, but T-Mobile’s HSPA+ isn’t as fast as Verizon’s LTE.
• SlashGear: Aside from the pointless 3D feature, SG seems to like the tablet — but not the price tag.
• Engadget: One of the few reviews to run a real battery life test, Engadget found the tablet ran for over 8 hours when playing HD video. That’s about the same as the Motorola XOOM but it falls short of the Apple iPad or iPad 2.

Also, Edgadget rated it:

Narrower profile fits nicely in the hand
Lighter than the Xoom
Solid 4G speeds

Plasticy back
No WiFi version available
Poor cameras

it weighs 1.3lb;

Review of Engadget: Click here.

4/15/2011:  E-Book Sales Take Over

From a CNN report:

“The publishing tide is shifting fast: E-book sales in February topped all other formats, including paperbacks and hardcovers, according to an industry report released this week.

E-book sales totaled $90.3 million in February, up 202% compared to the same month a year earlier, according to a study from the Association of American Publishers. That put e-books at No. 1 "among all categories of trade publishing" that month — the first time e-books have beaten out traditional publishing formats.

Update on BlackBerry Playbook Reviews

For an answer to the recent criticism of RIM’s new PlayBook, the BlackBerry CEO, Jim Balsillie, said in a Bloomberg interview that  "We’ll have an over the air email client to announce very very soon. We haveBlackBerry World — our user conference — in a couple weeks. Stay tuned for all capabilities we have coming out on this stuff."

The reference to the email client was the absence of that critical application on the PlayBook itself.  Owners of BlackBerry phones can link their devices to the new PlayBook and take advantage of the phone’s email capabilities, but this was not seen as sufficient for most users.

The reference to BlackBerry World was referring to the absence of many apps for the new device.  Although they promise Android apps and the legacy BlackBerry apps will eventually work on the PlayBook, it is just a promise.  For those buying today, that isn’t much consolation.  If the “couple of weeks” prediction is true, it means that there will be some apps available when the new gizmo begins selling later this month.

RIM stock declined 3% yesterday after the raft of middling reviews were absorbed by investors.

New Generation 13.4-inch ultra-portable announced by MSI

My recent post about the new generation of 11.6-inch ultra-portables can be updated for a new entry into the market, although with almost two additional diagonal inches of screen real estate. MSI, the originators of the netbook, announced their new 13.4-inch ultra-portable, the X370.  Their new gadget uses the same AMD Fusion dual-core processor that Lenovo, HP and Sony use, the E-350.

4GB of memory, a 500GB hard drive, HDMI-out are included along with a 1.3MP webcam, a 4-in-one card reader and an 8-cell battery for about 7 hours of use time. It weighs 3.8 lbs with the 8-cell battery.

Listed at $599, Amazon is taking orders for $579.

My review article of the new generation of ultra-portables is seen Here.

For a Laptop Magazine review of the new MSI, click here.

4/13/2011: Video of The New WebOS Emulator in Action

An instructive video of how HP’s WebOS will look and feel when the HP Tab is released.

 

 

4/11/2011:  Kindle Price Falls to $114 With Ads

Amazon announced today that the new Kindle with Special Offers will sell of $114 — $25 less than the currently lowest-priced Kindle.  The price reduction comes at a cost, however, as ads will be shown at the bottom of the device’s home page and its screen savers.  The new units will begin shipping on May 3, and it will also be sold in Target and Best Buy stores on that date.

This is another of a long line of price reductions of the Kindle, which began its life at a price of $399 in 2007.  No word on the Nook, yet.  It will be interesting to see if Barnes and Noble responds or keeps the Nook ad-free.

4/8/2011:  Acer Joins The Tablet Fray:  $450 10-Inch Model

Acer has announced its entry into the tablet world with its Iconia Tab A500 that will be available for sale in Best Buy and other retailers on April 24th for $450.

The new tablet will run Android 3.0, and the specs are impressive, essentially duplicating the Motorola Xoom:  a dual-core 1GHz Tegra 250 SOC, a 10.1-inch 1280 x 800 LCD screen, 1GB of RAM, 16GB of flash storage, a 5 megapixel camera around back and a 2 megapixel imager up front, HDMI-out, not to mention a pair of 3260mAh batteries that Acer claims are capable of eight full hours of life while playing HD video.

No reviews are out yet, but I expect some soon.   This is important because it breaks the $500 price barrier for a full-featured tablet.

Apple Applies For Patent on E-ink/LCD Switching Display

According to information released by the United States Patent and Trademark Office, Apple has applied for a patent that will allow displays on a screen to switch between LCD full color and an e-ink paper.  The device would detect when an eReading environment was needed and switch from internal illumination to e-Ink, making the display easier on the eyes and be capable of being read in direct sunlight.

This must be sending shivers through Amazon’s R&D department, for it would completely obviate the need for a separate Kindle-type of eReader in addition to, say, an iPad.

The sketch to the right is from the patent application according to AppleInsider.

This is only a patent application, so it is far from being a product, but it seems like a sterling idea to me.  I am one of those who likes to read on the light-weight Kindle with its e-Ink screen, so I have to carry it with me if I’m traveling.

Admittedly tablets are heavier and can’t be held as long as the Kindle, but it would still be a big advantage not to have to carry two devices.

 

4/7/2011:  Samsung Galaxy Tab WiFi for $350

The Galaxy Tab has not been a good seller for Samsung.  It was priced too high, way too high, and its feature set was good but not outstanding.  The prices of its 3G models have been slipping, and now the WiFi-only version is to go on sale April 10 for $350.  This price puts it $100 above the Nook Color, but its design and feature set may justify a slightly higher price, but the specs on it are less than compelling than they were last year.

It includes a 1 GHz Samsung Hummingbird processor, a 7 inch, 1024 x 600 pixel capacitive touchscreen display and runs Google Android 2.2. It has 16GB of storage and weighs 13 ounces. It’s also one of the few Android 2.2 tablets to come with access to the Google Android Market  and Flash video.capabilities.  The tablet has 802.11b/g/n WiFi, Blueooth 3.0, and a USB 2.0 port.

The press release mentioned that it will be available at multiple retailers for that price

4/6/2011: Moto Xoom and Atrix Not Selling
Well

A report from analyst James Faucette of Pacific Crest says that neither of these new tablets are selling well.  The Xoom is priced too high and was up-staged by the introduction of the iPad 2.  The Atrix is also too expensive, and dismissed by some as a gimmick. Reviews have been mixed.

The sales of both are well below forecasts, with competition from the iPad 2 and from a welter of new Android tablets contributing to these high profile flops.

4/5/2011:  Dell’s 10-inch Win 7 Tablet Delayed

According to leaked documents from Dell, there is a new 10-inch tablet under development that runs Windows 7.  Its code name is Rosemount.

A recent insider story from Forbes indicates that the Rosemount tablet will be not see its first sale until the fall of this year.  Past rumors had it appearing in the summer months.

This will be a tablet aimed at the business user, and given Dell’s recently released five and seven-inch tablets, Rosemount will not make much of a ripple in the tablet-hungry population.  It appears to be more like the HP Slate rather than the iPad.

3/28/2011:  Samsung’s New Series 9 Challenge MacBook Air

Apple has owned the “Wow” factor for years in the ultraportable category of laptops.  The MacBook Air has been in a class by itself with the thinnest, sleekest, sexiest design available. Although there has always been a tradeoff between thin and performance, the MacBook Air keep its balance in an acceptable zone for those who demand a super thin and light ultraportable.  The image at right has the MacBook Air on the left facing the 13-inch Series 9.

Samsung has now joined the competition with its Series 9 laptops.  The two models are thin, light and powerful with a Sandy Bridge design i3 or i5 Intel processor.  Both the 13-inch and 11.6-inch models are drawing rave reviews for their looks and performance.  Price, as usual, though, is high.

The 13-inch Series 9, shown on the right side of the above graphic, is priced at $1,649.  I have no word on the price of the 11.6-inch version which is to be available in early April.

CNet has reviewed the 13-inch model and has a video of their demonstration.  I like their early statement: “. . .if ever a Windows 7 lover dreamed of getting his or her own MacBook Air, the Series 9 is it.”  This sets the tone of the review.  The new Samsung takes only three seconds to awake from hibernation, for example, and compares well in other categories.

CNet Hands-on Video Here

Their full review can also be read on the same site as the video reference.

3/25/2011  RIM BlackBerry Playbook to Run Android Apps

In an important achievement, Research In Motion announced on Thursday that users of its PlayBook tablet will be able to run Android and Java applications.

If the RIM’s new 7-inch tablet is to be successful, it must be able to have a wide library of applications available to its users.  With a brand new operating system, QNX, however, there would be few to no apps available for the Playbook.  By making the new OS capable of running Android apps, then, RIM has taken that objection away.

The details of the announcement state that the Playbook will be able to run Android apps of version 2.3 and later, and they will not be available on the Android Market.  Publishers will submit their apps to RIM who will make them available in BlackBerry’s own app site.

Rumors now stress mid April as the release date for the Playbook.

 

3/22/2011:  Amazon to Open App Store Tomorrow, We Hope

An unnamed "trusted source" has told Wired that their App store for Android devices will launch Tuesday, March 22. Customers will be able to purchase apps both online via the Amazon website and through a native application designed for Android devices.

It is already known that the store’s launch will come with at least one major exclusive: the latest in Rovio’s Angry Birds lineup, Angry Birds Rio, will launch first in the Amazon App Store before being distributed to other online outlets.

It will be handy to use Amazon’s “One Click” buying procedure on Android Apps, whether for paid or free content.  Also, a hacker got a look at the App Store earlier and found that many of the app prices are lower on Amazon than on the Android Market.

 

3/21/2011:  Asus Eee Pad Transformer in America Soon

Asus has a good idea in its new tablet design.  It may be bought with the optional keyboard that transforms it into a conventional netbook-like device.  Notice that the tablet mounts on the keyboard in a horizontal mode rather than vertical.  Good for Asus: I dislike the iPad’s vertical mount.

The specifications are familiar: A 1 GHz NVIDIA Tegra 2 dual core processor and a 10.1 inch, 1280 x 800 pixel IPS capacitive multitouch display. It comes with 1GB of memory and 16GB to 32GB of storage. While it will run Google Android 3.0.  802.11b/g/n WiFi, Bluetooth 2.1, a mini-HDMI jack, audio jack, and microSD card reader complete the  basic configuration.

If the keyboard looks and preforms as well as it appears in the picture, this will be an important innovation in the tablet sphere—possibly ending the existing division between netbooks and tablets, although tablets cost much more to buy, a combination would be preferable for those who value the extra flexibility gained by a detachable keyboard.

The new device will be available in Taiwan by the end of this week and in America soon thereafter.

3/20/2011:  Amazon Working on Android Tablet Reader

The rumor that never dies: Amazon is developing a color eReader that competes with the Nook Color and the iPad.  There is a good reason this rumor refuses to die:  Amazon needs to offer a more comprehensive solution to eReading than its black and white eInk Kindle. In the latest round of competitive moves, Barnes and Noble clearly beat Amazon when they introduced their Nook Color. 

The color tablet fro B&N has proven popular, although precise sales figures have not been published.  In the blogosphere many in the technical press have praised the $249, 7-inch eReader/tablet.  It has been rooted and seems to make a credible alternative to other tablet designs.  Surely Amazon has been reading the tea leaves about a color device.  It appears that B&N beat Amazon badly with their Nook Color.

The new  rumors are fueled by hiring ads for Amazon’s Lab 126 website.  The New York Times reported: “At least five new jobs were added in the last week alone seeking developers with Android programming experience.”

Although Android programmers could be doing many things, the arrow seems to point to a new machine, and few would argue with the need for such a device from Amazon.  They have nothing on the market to counter B&N’s tablet/eReader, and they need one.

If Amazon is working on a competing device, I hope they go all the way with it and omit the proprietary layer of software that surrounds the Nook Color.  A pure Android OS would, in my view, be a much more competitive device.  It would capture some of the pure tablet market as well as conventional eReading, and Amazon’s marketing muscle could help them gain a foothold in this new market.

3/16/2011:  Motorola WiFi Only on March 27th

Motorola has officially announced that a WiFi-only version of the XOOM tablet will be  web available in the US starting on March 27th for a retail price of $599.  The WiFi + 3G model currently sells for $799.

Amazon, Best Buy, RadioShack, Staples, and other US retailers are reported to be authorized resellers and should be available in those stores on the launch date.

3/15/2011: HP Touch Pad With WebOS in June

The new CEO of HP, Leo Apotheker, announced that the TouchPad will be available for purchase in June.  HP announced the Tab in February for Summer availability. The Tab will sport a 9.7 inch display, a dual core 1.2 GHz processor, WiFi, Bluetooth, a 1.3MP camera, and a 6300mAh battery.

Significantly the tablet will be the first device to run webOS 3.0, a version of HP and Palm’s webOS smartphone operating system optimized for tablets

The new OS is what excites most of the technology  community.  The forerunner of this new OS was written by Palm for smartphones, and the reviews of it from the technical side were quite good.  It was praised by programmers as friendly and competent.  HP has spent the last year working on it to make it usable on larger, tablet-sized screens.  This device will be as highly anticipated as the Xoom was for Motorola and the Playbook for BlackBerry.

3/9/2011:  Samsung Galaxy Tab 8.9” Set For 3/28 Debut

Samsung has made it official.  Their 8.9-inch Tab will be unveiled at a special press event on March 28th.

This side shot shows an exceptionally thin tablet, so it will rival the iPad2 thinness.The bulge is to accommodate the headphone jack, so you can get an idea of how thin it is if you look closely.

Samsung also has a 10-inch model that will be revealed sometime soon, giving them a total of three models: 7-inch, which has been out for months, a 8.9-inch and a 10-inch model yet to be shown.

 

Nook Color Gets GPS App Via Smartphone Tether

In a novel adaptation of a software app for the Nook Color, you can now use a $2.99 app to tether your smartphone to the Nook Color and get driving directions on the larger screen.

TetherGPS is available from the Android Marketplace for $2.99.

 

3/4/2011: Motorola Xoom WiFi Only for $539 as Sam’s Club?

An employee at Sam’s Club has leaved a photo of a large sign showing the Motorola Xoom with WiFi and no 3G for sale for $539.  This may or may not come to pass, but if it does it will relieve some of the pressure against Motorola for pricing its new baby too high. A $40 premium over the iPad 2 is certainly justified by the huge advantages of more storage memory, external ports and system memory on the Xoom.

3/4/2011:  Windows 8 Will Run on ARM Chips

Microsoft announced that the next versions of Windows, Windows 8, will run on System on a Chip (SoC) processors, including ARM.  Microsoft also demonstrated Office applications running in native mode on an ARM SoC device.

For the entire press release: Click here..

This is huge for the entire industry.  ARM chips are powering most of the tablet computers, such as the iPad, Motorola Xoom, Galaxy Tab and RIM;s BlackBerry Playbook.  ARM chips also run almost all smart phones. And most of these devices run either Android, iOS or RIMs older OS,  With this move, Microsoft has made itself a player.

Using tablets and smartphones with native Windows applications will open up portability of documents between architectures for the first time.  It will eliminate the often clumsy and time-consuming steps of converting documents from Word format, e.g., into Pages format for the iPad or other word processing apps on all the other ARM based tablets.

Partners on the new SoC project include NVIDIA, Texas Instruments, Qualcomm, Intel and AMD.  I would expect a rush of all the other OEMs to jump on this bandwagon soon, as it would be a huge competitive disadvantage not to have the ability to read and write legacy Windows application programs.

The big looser in the long run may be Android, which is now the leading operating system for tablet and cellphone devices.  The ability to run Word, Power Point and Excel files will give Google a serious run for its money.

The release version of Windows is expected in 2012, with Beta release expected in the second or third quarter of this year.

3/1/2011:  Barnes and Noble Selling Nook Color for $199 on eBay

Engadget reports that Barnes & Noble is currently selling itsNook Color on eBay with a $50 coupon code.  This bring the final price down to $199, which is $50 less than it sells them for in stores or on its own website.

This may be B&N’s way of testing the waters for how elastic demand is for their flagship product.

2/28/2011:  AT&T To Sell Kindle 3G in March

AT&T announced today that they will carry the Kindle (3) with 3G and WiFi connections in their company-owned stores in the United States.  Sales are set to begin on March 6, one week away.

The 3G part of Kindle relies on AT&T 3G signals, so it is natural for them to sell Kindles.  This will certainly increase the availability of Kindles, but the price will stay at $189.  For a video of a Kindle commercial look below.

2/25/2011:  Google Books Available on Androids and PCs

Google has created a new Books section of the Android Market. The Books tab shows up if you’re running the Market app on a tablet with Google Android 3.0 Honeycomb (such as the Motorola XOOM which hit the streets today). But you can also browse the book listings in the web version of the Android Market by visiting market.android.com/books in a browser.

You don’t need an Android tablet to use the new books directory. You can select any title and click the “Get it Now” button to add it to your Google Books account. From there you can read the title on any computer with a web browser, or access the books from a mobile device running the Google Books app for Android or iOS. The Barnes & No

 

2/23/2011:  New iPad to be Announced March 2nd

Apple has scheduled an event for March 2nd, and according to Kara Swisher at All Things D, the company will likely unveil the second generation iPad at the event.

There isn’t much speculative about Apple’s plans to up-grade the iPad with new features.  This has been in the works since the day after the first iPad was introduced.  Rumors about new features include a much higher resolution screen, dual-core processor, and two cameras.  Light Peak ports are also talked about as well as multiple 3G mobile broadband capability.

2/17/2011:  Kobo Assures its Borders Customers All is Well

It was some months ago that Borders decided not to develop their own eReader hardware or  its own library of electronic book titles.  Rather than make a major investment in the new technology, Borders farmed the entire job out to a third party, Kobo.

It was Borders’ attempt to get by on the cheap; in retrospect, probably not a good idea.

Now that Borders has filed for bankruptcy, Kobo is out with a note to their Borders clients that there will be no interruption to their reading experience.  Kobo is financially independent of Borders and can continue supporting their clients.

I wonder without the draw from Borders how Kobo will do in the future.  Of course, Borders will emerge from bankruptcy eventually, but their long term survival is by no means assured.  Their management was too far behind the curve to make the cut in the new electronics world.

I have followed the efforts of Barnes and Noble to establish its place in the eReader market since the introduction of the original Nook in February of last year. Although their original Nook got off to a shaky start, several upgrades and refinements have made it a credible competitor to the Kindles of Amazon. But their homerun, using a baseball analogy, was the Nook Color, formerly known as the Color Nook.

This seven-inch eReader is in fact an Android tablet computer disguised as an electronic reader. Not that the eReader part of the package is less than excellent; it’s just that this little device’s abilities as a tablet computer are so under-stated. B&N priced the color machine as an eReader, trying to stay price competitive with its eReader competition with Amazon and Sony. This established the Nook Color as an eReader in their minds, at least, but not in the minds of their more imaginative customers.

Less than a year on the market, the Nook Color is B&N’s rising star and giving them untold credibility in both the tablet computer market and the eReader market at the same time. Amazon completely missed this opportunity. B&N simply outdid them with their desperate attempt. Perhaps Amazon needs a little desperation themselves if it would allow them to think out their eReader box.

To put some heft to these remarks one has only to look at the latest sales figures estimated by Digitimes. (Click here for the Digitimes release) According to the suppliers of Nook Color parts and pieces, one million of these new gadgets have shipped in last year’s fourth quarter, and 600,000 to 700,000 have shipped in January and February of this year. Over is life of less than one year, it has sold about 3 million units.

These figures are, to me, astounding. When viewed as a tablet computer, the Nook Color now accounts for one half of all sales of devices competing with Apple’s iPad. Given that there are many such competitors, and the total mounts daily, Barnes and Noble has demolished competition for a device they didn’t even know they were competing with.

The troubled bookseller has finally recognized what a stellar product they have on their hands, and they are taking steps to bolster the Nook Color’s credentials as a tablet. In April they will bring out a new software update that take more advantage of being an Android tablet. They are adding a dedicated email app, for example, and they are strengthening the apps for their eReader that are more appropriate for tablet use than as a pure eReader.

Hackers have also taken a liking to it. They have rooted the device to allow it to run a full Android OS, including Android 3.0. It is uncertain that B&N will ever go that far with their authorized version—they insist on adding a proprietary overlay to Android, and they restrict the apps that will run on it to those that have been modified to fit its own customization. Hopefully B&N will realize one day that all their proprietary efforts are counterproductive and release a version that is a full Android Tablet.

The end result of B&N’s efforts are a rousing success, and now Amazon is hurrying to play catch up. It’s amazing what a difference one year makes in today’s dynamic market for electronic devices.

To read my first article on the Nook (not the Nook Color) Click Here

First review of the Nook eReader Click Here for Not Hooked on Nook

Re-review of Nook Color (November, 2010) Click Here