HP’s Windows 7-powered Slate tablet computer has seen more than its fair share of drama over the past several months. Ever since HP bought out Palm, questions have swirled about the potential future or lack thereof for the device, but HP has remained determined to get it to market. Sure, it’s taken longer than the Palm Pre took (for real), but things are finally getting close.

Evidence? CNET got their hands on a slide image from HP that finally gives us a glimpse at what kind of hardware the Slate packs. First things first, the screen is 8.9 inches, responds to finger multitouch and pen input (hooray?), and is 1024×600 pixels. The device itself weighs in at 1.5 pounds and packed inside you’ll find an Intel Atom Z540 clocked at 1.86GHz, a 64GB SSD, 2GB RAM, integrated Intel Broadcom graphics, the usual non-cellular connectivity, and two cameras: a rear-facing 3 megapixel shooter, with a smaller VGA camera up front for candid self-shots and video conferencing. Considering that HP intends to market the Slate towards the business crowd, we’d expect more of the latter. At least until the boardroom meetings start getting extra slow.

Now how much will this package cost you? $799, that’s how much. Yeah, that’s more than every version of the Apple iPad, excepting the 64GB 3G version, but that comes with cellular connectivity, which is not an option for the Slate. Granted, that $799 is for a different breed of device than the iPad or Samsung Galaxy Tab, and it also includes a handy dock with HDMI-out and a carrying case (for the Slate, not the dock).

Even with this device targeted exclusively at the enterprise crowd, it’s still a tempting proposition. A full-fledged full-portable computer for eight hundred bucks? We suppose the Slate’s success or failure will boil down to the user experience, or at least it would if it were being released in the corporate space. By focusing on the corporate space, HP only has to convince a few execs and IT chiefs that the Slate will make their business better. Still, we’d love to get our hands on one to give it an unprofessional uncorporate go.

Source: CNET, Engadget; Via: Engadget

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You know and love @MrKal_El on Twitter, now know and love him here as he gives us his opinion on how Palm and HP need to make a splash, and soon.

Recently I’ve been engaged in a bit of a debate (on Twitter, naturally) regarding Palm and HP at CES 2011 and potential for the reveal of the much-rumored PalmPad. If you were to ask me, I’d say that January of next year is too late to reveal the PalmPad in what is fast becoming a crowded tablet market.

So I’m going to take a moment to expand a bit on what I feel would be a agressive (but possible) release schedule for webOS hardware and software to succeed in the current market.

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HP has been on a shopping spree like a winning contestant on The Price Is Right, having recently acquired several tech companies at multi billion dollar prices. In an interview with Venture Beat at the DEMO Fall 2010 conference, HP Vice President and CTO Phil McKinney took some time to explain what all of this means to the consumer. McKinney said the purpose of all these acquisitions is to create a line of products that can be bought at one time and already work together seamlessly out of the box: “You integrate them and take the burden off the customers of doing that." He added that this would also reduce cost and add value.

The companies that HP has acquired recently are PC software and hardware makers that seem to have little to do with mobile products, but the fact that HP is thinking in terms of integrating its products together certainly makes one wonder what this means for smart phones and tablets. McKinney said that HP has "significantly expanded the staff" at Palm and that they are working as fast as they can to catch up with the iPad with their upcoming Slate and webOS tablets, scheduled for a late 2010 and early 2011 release respectively. When they are released, he pointed out, they will have tremendous reach with HP’s more than 100,000 retailers worldwide.

Once again webOS printers were mentioned and though printing from a webOS smart phone or tablet were not mentioned, he did say that sending quick print jobs like coupons would be very quick and effortless on one of these magical new printers.

Source: Venture Beat

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We’re waiting with baited breath for any news from Palm, and it seems we may have it. An email supposedly sent to developers (we have not been able to independently corroborate) from HP’s Peter Helm (now part of the Palm Developer Relations team) mentioned “tablet-style” devices. Here’s the excerpt published by Engadget:

“Now that we are officially part of HP, we are going full speed ahead with our applications initiative. Our proprietary operating system, webOS, is now the OS that will be used in HP’s mobile devices. This includes mobile handsets as well as tablet-style devices similar to the iPad. We will accordingly leverage Palm’s ability to innovate and the scale of HP’s vast install base and distribution network previously unavailable to us.”

Ignoring the strange wording here and there, it’s pretty clear what Palm and HP have in mind. But the iPad has set a very high bar, and despite being the most “tablet ready” mobile OS out there (our not so humble opinion), there are still significant hurdles facing webOS to properly make the jump from handheld smartphone to tablet. Then again, HP did say early 2011 for the webOS tablet, so maybe they’ve got those hurdles figured.

Source: Engadget; Thanks to everybody that sent this in!

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We here in Republic of webOS are looking with envy at our frienemies in Applestan and Androidia. It’s not their operating systems that are the object of our desire, though there are some features we’d like to copy. No, it’s the tablets that have drawn our eye. While Applestans may only have the iPad to play with, that certainly hasn’t stopped the 10-inch tablet from being a success.

Meanwhile, Androidians have to cope with a new tablet a week, from the 5-inch Dell Streak to the 7-inch Samsung Galaxy Tab to the just-announced ten inches of Toshiba Folio 100 (really, guys, Folio?). All this tablety fun has us longing for our own big screen webOS action here in the Republic, and thankfully HP has at least let us know that we can expect to see that mythical webOS tablet early in 2011.

Next year is still a ways off and while we’re sure it’ll be here before we know it, there’s still the question of how will the PalmPad/Hurricane/whatever look when it arrives. So we are asking you, of citizens of the Republic of webOS: what size screen do you want on your webOS tablet?

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Welcome to Point Counter Point, wherein Derek vents his spleen like the dour misanthrope we’ve all come to know and love, Dieter consoles us all with rainbows and unicorns, and the truth lies – as it always does – somewhere in the middle.

Today’s topic: What to make of all the pie-in-the-sky future talk we are hearing from HP instead of actual product announcements.

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An increasing number of companies are changing the way they serve up content on the web by moving away from Adobe’s Flash technology to HTML5 and/or direct streaming.  Two notable sites, NBC.com and Vimeo, have made it so any modern smartphone platform with a decent WebKit based browser can view their content.  Why are an increasing number of media companies making this move? It’s probably safe to assume that Apple and its recent success with the Flash-less iPad has something to do with it.  

As evidenced in the above video, performance isn’t terrific on my Sprint Palm Pre when using either site, as things bog down considerably when more than one browser instance (or just one browser instance) is open. Overall quality seems to be much better when viewing Vimeo content, as NBC.com content is consistently too compressed on both the audio and video fronts. Still, it’s great to have access to more of this kind of content without having to have Flash, because who knows when it’ll actually come the way of webOS.

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Over at sister site TiPb (The iPhone + iPod + iPad Blog), they’ve published a full review of the Apple iPad and the gist for Pre owners is this: it’s a perfectly reasonable decision to wait and see where it’s going with iPhone 4.0. Don’t think of it as competition to the Pre, it’s not a phone. Still, comparing multitasking on the iPad to multitasking on webOS is surreal: the one that feels more like a computer is a staccato singletasking experience and the one which is a phone feels like it has an operating system from the future. 

So far we’ve only seen the WiFi-only version of the iPad but since I’m a Verizon owner and Mobile Hotspot is completely free, the lack of cellular data hasn’t bothered me at all. It’s fast and easy to just toggle Mobile Hotspot on the Pre and get to 3G browsing on Verizon’s fast and reliable network with the iPad.

I’ve tried to make the case that free Mobile Hotspot means that business users should give webOS a second look. The ability to tether the iPad at no extra cost means that for dedicated Verizon users, the Palm Pre might be the best phone to go with this ‘mobile companion‘ known as the iPad (yes, I went there).

Anybody else in webOS-land pick up an iPad? I know more than a few of us are dreaming of the possibilities of webOS on a screen this large.

(Full disclosure: I contributed to the hardware section of TiPb’s iPad Review. And yes, I’m standing by that line about the teddy bear.)

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The big news of the week: clearly iPad. Our site for all things iPhone, iPod, and iPad, TiPb, has total coverage of the iPad launch and a huge helping of iPad app reviews. Stay tuned for a full iPad review tomorrow!

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Have a Palm Pre on O2, but find yourself envious of your American compatriots on Verizon running Mobile Hotspot left and right? Fret not, for your quandary will soon be quashed. In a tweet on one of O2 Germany’s official Twitter feeds, the following (translated into English) was posted.

Coming soon: the Palm Mobile Hotspot App. Thus the Pre becomes a UMTS Wi-Fi router with WPA or WEP encryption – ideal for iPods & iPads.

Zing! Especially considering that at launch won’t be able to get a 3G iPad in Europe at all. This is the first official word we have of the Mobile Hotspot app making the leap to another carrier. Because the Pre on O2 is a GSM phone, users will be able to still place and receive phone calls while running Mobile Hotspot, something their Verizon brethren can’t do. No word on pricing, though we expect the app to be free, and O2 Germany currently runs a tethering plan starting at €25 a month. Correction: Tethering is offered free-of-charge for O2 subscribers, but watch your usage to avoid going over your plan’s usage cap.

Thanks to Ruben for the tip!

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