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[iPad] Apple Announces Slate Tablet in March

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What has been rumored for so long has finally become reality. Apple today introduced the iPad or as Apple would put it: the magic experience of the internet. Worldwide product launch will be in March 2010.

Hardware
The iPad is a multi-touch device with a 9.7″ TFT display, without keyboard, but with a design and handling similar to the iPhone. It is run by an ARM 1GHz CPU and comes in flavors of 16, 32 or 64GB flash memory.

Prices
It comes as a WiFi only version or as a WiFi and 3G version.

  • iPad 16GB = 499US$ (629US$ incl. 3G)
  • iPad 32GB = 599US$ (729US$ incl. 3G)
  • iPad 64GB = 699US$ (829US$ incl. 3G)

European prices have not been announced yet. In contrast to the iPhone the iPad seems not to distributed with carrier lock, but still via AT&T in the U.S.

Compatibility
App Store applications are in many cases compatible to the iPad, aswell. An external keyboard can be bought seperately. An e-book store called iBookstore will be available at product launch in march, aswell.

Our opinion
The display size and ease-of-use known from the iPhone will be nice for browsing the web from the sofa. It lacks a camera. The integration into Apple’s eco-system of products and services makes the iPad a danger to Amazon’s Kindle, we suppose.

Sadly from the aspects of an internet device, we suspect it will not support Adobe Flash, as it it rumored to be based on the iPhone kernel, as it prohibits multi-tasking.

This in turn will also mean that the platform will be be utilizing a similar chain of trust like the iPhone. Hello GeoHot? Got some time again after playing with the PS3? A new jailbreak might be required soon ;-)

What missing? Yes, Mr. iGAF. Sadly we haven’t read anything from him yet. But the ultimate test, why the iPad is so inferior to all Microsoft Windows based Slates will come. Be sure, not to miss Uncle Mossheimer on AllThingsD when it’s story time again…

And finally here’s Apple’s iPad propaganda vid. It’s become magical ;-)

[e-Biz] The Slate Tablets Are Coming

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Tablet PCs seem to be the next big thing. After Apple’s smartphone revolution with their iPhone, it seems the next big market revolution might be the Tablet PCs.

Steve Ballmer of Microsoft introduced one of the Tablet PCs – a prototype of the HP Slate – last week on the CES 2010. In his presentation the HP Slate is of course running Windows 7, what else, but there are rumors it might also be shipped with Google’s Android. We suppose Amazon’s Steve Bezos will not really like it, because Steve Ballmer showed the HP Slate running the PC Kindle application.

Dell seems also be ready to enter the Touch PCs’ market with the Dell Slate. Gizmodo.de got photos of a prototype of Dell’s Slate. Dell’s Slate has a 5-inch screen, most likely an OLED, a SIM slot and a 5 megapixel camera.

If Apple was a typical tech company they would also have showed something to the public on the CES, but Apple isn’t. Anyway there are enuff rumors floating around about Apple’s Touch-Mac – rumored to be named Apple iSlate. According to Reuters Apple might be launching the iSlate in Q2/2010. It is expected to have a 10 or 11-inch display and a aluminium case. TheStreet.com reports that Apple’s Slate will be shipped with a P A Semi CPU, instead of Intel based Atom CPUs. This could be also the reason, why Atom CPU has been removed from Mac OS X Snow Leopard’s latest update 10.6.2. It is widely expected that Apple will announce the iSlate on Januar 27th, 2010.

Kara Swisher of AllThingsD interviewed Mr. Podfather Prefather Jon Rubinstein of Palm at the CES. Although he seems to have been highly involved in the development of Apple’s iPhone back in the days when he was Apple’s senior vice president of hardware engineering, he said he never used an iPhone. Well… All in all he wasn’t telling too much, but when Kara asked him, if Palm will do a Tablet aswell, Rubinstein answered: “(..) we designed webOS to scale and it could be used in different form factors.”