Hasta La Gadget!

RIM's BlackBerry PlayBook, a 7-inch tablet, is due for release April 19 — a bit behind schedule. Photo: Erik Malinowski/Wired.com

Research In Motion is preparing to release its much-awaited response to the iPad, the BlackBerry PlayBook tablet, a month behind schedule.

Among other reasons, Adobe Flash is probably contributing to the delay.

The PlayBook was supposed to be out the first quarter of 2011 but is now set to release April 19.

Some publications speculated on Thursday that the PlayBook’s late launch is related to touchscreen supply. The PlayBook also lacks a finished software development kit for making apps, and won’t have native mail, messaging and contacts apps.

Difficulty getting Flash to work properly on the PlayBook is probably another one of RIM’s woes.

Let’s take a look at the evidence. First, other tablet makers have had trouble with Flash. Motorola’s Xoom launched without it, despite the fact that Motorola highlighted Flash support as a key feature. Even though Flash Player 10.2 for Android is now available in the Android Market, the version meant for Android 3.0 Honeycomb (which the Xoom runs) is a prerelease version with significant limitations and lots of instability.

Second, sluggish performance and battery drainage have been problems for Flash before, and they’re the reason Apple CEO Steve Jobs gave for nixing Flash support on Apple’s mobile products.

The Samsung Galaxy Tab, which runs an earlier version of Android, is the only major tablet that currently supports a shipping version of the Adobe plugin.

Finally, Wired.com’s Erik Malinowski tried a PlayBook tablet at CES and reported that Flash performance proved to be a “choppy and (ironically) limiting experience.” RIM officials at the time were tight-lipped about the tablet’s expected battery life, saying only that it would be more than an hour. That was an early version of the tablet, but choppiness in one of its key features doesn’t bode well.

Without great Flash support, a PlayBook tablet would practically have nothing to do.

Last year RIM drummed up Flash support for the upcoming PlayBook, saying that it was going to deliver the full internet experience. That would, in theory, give the PlayBook an edge over the iPad.

“We’re not trying to dumb down the internet for a small mobile device,” says Mike Lazaridis, RIM’s CEO, during the PlayBook demonstration. “What we’re trying to do is bring up the performance and capability of the mobile device to the internet.”

In the video above, RIM demonstrates the PlayBook’s media viewer, which is written with Adobe Air, a platform based on Flash. So without a good Flash experience, RIM’s PlayBook would suffer a lot.

RIM’s planned April 19 launch lines up with Adobe’s claims that Flash will be available for tablets “within a few weeks of Android 3 Honeycomb devices becoming available.”

It’s been six weeks since Motorola released the Xoom, and April 19 is probably as long as Adobe can wait before Flash can no longer be considered “a few weeks” late.

Adobe and RIM didn’t respond to a request for comment on this story.

See Also:

• DOA: Blackberry PlayBook to Ship Without Mail, Messaging or …
• Video: Adobe Air, Flash Demonstrated on RIM PlayBook Tablet …
• RIM Unveils Tethered Tablet, the BlackBerry PlayBook

RIM's PlayBook will ship without the core functions that make a BlackBerry a BlackBerry. Photo: Charlie Sorrel

Oh, RIM! What are you doing? According to a leaked internal document, the BlackBerry PlayBook tablet will ship without native support for e-mail, contacts or messaging. To use any of these services, you’ll have to either hook up a BlackBerry handset, or access them through the web browser.

The document, a seven-page FAQ for the upcoming tablet, lays out the details. To use these core BlackBerry services you need to use “BlackBerry Bridge”, which displays the BlackBerry’s apps on the PlayBook’s screen. Here’s the full text from the relevant section:

Q: Will apps such as e-mail, contacts, calendar etc. be available natively on BlackBerry PlayBook?

The BlackBerry PlayBook can be used in conjunction with a BlackBerry smartphone or it can be used on its own (i.e. standalone).

The BlackBerry Bridge feature creates a secure Bluetooth link between a BlackBerry PlayBook tablet and BlackBerry smartphone allowing BlackBerry smartphone users to view and interact with the email, BBM and PIM apps on their BlackBerry smartphone using the larger BlackBerry PlayBook screen.

In addition, users can access their e-mail via the BlackBerry PlayBook’s web browser without any need for a BlackBerry smartphone.

In a future software update for the BlackBerry PlayBook, we will also provide native e-mail, calendar, and contact apps for those customers who prefer to have these apps directly on the tablet.

[Emphasis added]

Some might argue that this doesn’t matter, as a “future software update” will bring native apps. But what this document really says is, “We rushed it.” RIM is so desperate to get an iPad rival on the market that it is cutting corners. So many corners, in fact, that the PlayBook may just turn out to be shaped like a real Blackberry.

Let’s look at the evidence:

• The software development kit (SDK), which will allow developers to write native apps, isn’t yet finished.
• In order to bring what RIM’s CEO Jim Balsillie calls a “tonnage of apps” to the PlayBook at launch, RIM has added an emulator to run Android apps.
• The PlayBook will ship with Wi-Fi only, no 3G. To connect without Wi-Fi, you need to tether  a BlackBerry.
• RIM, whose business is built on messaging and communication apps, is shipping its tablet without messaging or communication apps.

Not enough? I got a chance to play — briefly — with the PlayBook at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain, and found it to be clunky and rather laggy. I tried the e-reader software Kobo, which will come pre-installed on the device. Kobo on other platforms is fast, slick and a pleasure to use.

On the PlayBook it was rather janky, and certainly not smooth. This may be due to the software being in beta. (Or not — I didn’t ask that question. It is also not a criticism of Kobo, which usually makes great apps.)

You can almost smell the desperation that has crept into RIM ever since the iPhone arrived on the scene. RIM went from making the best messaging devices on the planet to making the worst wannabe iDevices around. It started with the awful “touch” screen Storm and continues with the PlayBook — all products rushed to market before they’re finished.

If RIM wants to avoid going the same way as Palm, then it should stop trying to chase Apple and start making some new devices of its own. And it should maybe try to finish them before showing them off to the world.

Leaked BlackBerry PlayBook FAQ (.pdf)

BlackBerry PlayBook FAQs [Scribd. Thanks, AngryMonkeyGeek]

See Also:

• RIM Unveils Tethered Tablet, the BlackBerry PlayBook
• Hands-On With the BlackBerry PlayBook Tablet
• PlayBook Smokes iPad Browser in Blackberry Speed-Test Video
• Video: Adobe Air, Flash Demonstrated on RIM PlayBook Tablet
• Video: Blackberry Playbook Hands-On Demo

Each week Ross Rubin contributes Switched On, a column about consumer technology.

When Apple introduced the iPad, it had but a smattering of third-party applications, but the company stressed its own. As Apple iPhone software SVP Scott Forstall stated in the iPad introduction video, “We looked at the device and we decided: let’s redesign it all. Let’s redesign, reimagine and rebuild every single app from the ground up specifically for the iPad.”

Compare this to the strategy employed by RIM, makers of the upcoming BlackBerry PlayBook tablet. One year after the iPad’s debut, Apple’s head start in apps has proven a formidable advantage against the onslaught of slates announced by its competitors in the smartphone world. Some have chosen to latch onto Android and attain backwards compatibility with over 200,000 existing smartphone apps. HP, with its TouchPad as flagship, will circle its wagons of PCs, printers and phones around the webOS platform. However, the announcement this week that RIM’s BlackBerry PlayBook will support Android apps says much about how the company sees its position in the tablet wars.

Continue reading Switched On: The PlayBook polyglot

Switched On: The PlayBook polyglot originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 27 Mar 2011 20:10:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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In the dead of night … pre-orders happen. RIM has snuck out the first official pricing for its 7-inch BlackBerry PlayBook tablet and, true to its promise, it costs less than $500. A cent less than $500. The 16GB WiFi-only PlayBook is now up for pre-order at Best Buy and is coming to a vast list of other retailers soon. Staples, Office Depot and RadioShack are among the popular US store chains, while AT&T, Sprint and Verizon will also carry the tablet. No T-Mobile on that list. Canadian pre-orders for the same model are now live as well, also at $499.99, albeit in the local dollar currency. A 32GB WiFi model will set Canucks back C$600 and the 64GB model is C$700, which might be indicative of US pricing too if price parity is maintained throughout the range. The almost full press release (still no release date) follows after the break.

Update: A second press release has confirmed full US pricing for the WiFi versions: 16GB is $500, 32GB is $600 and 64GB is $700. Scheduled to be available on April 19th!

Continue reading BlackBerry PlayBook priced at $500 for 16GB WiFi model, pre-orders begin today (update: available April 19th)

BlackBerry PlayBook priced at $500 for 16GB WiFi model, pre-orders begin today (update: available April 19th) originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 22 Mar 2011 04:54:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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If we had a dime for every time Sprint CEO Dan Hesse (or spectrum partner Clearwire) has talked about a possible migration to LTE, we’d have… well, at least several dimes. A new rumor that’s popped up from a couple sources today — consulting firm Gerson Lehrman Group and GizmoFusion — claims that the LTE move is now a done deal, with Sprint signing contracts with infrastructure supplies Ericsson, Alcatel-Lucent, and Samsung to roll out service over the course of the next two to three years as it decommissions iDEN on its 800MHz spectrum. That said, CDMA isn’t about to go away: the company has already committed to upgrading its CDMA footprint with 1X Advanced over the next several years, too. GLG claims that Sprint’s going Lone Ranger on this — it’ll be looking to partner up with other companies like Clearwire or T-Mobile where it makes sense, but the decision to move to LTE so far has been purely internal.

On a related note, GizmoFusion is claiming that Sprint will start shipping the WiFi-only BlackBerry PlayBook between late March and mid-April ahead of the WiMAX version later this year, along with touchscreen / QWERTY hybrid and full-touch BlackBerry handsets — both of which we’ve seen rumored recently. LTE-compatible hardware, assuming this is all legitimate, is probably a ways off yet.

[Thanks, Stoopered]

Sprint ‘Project Leapfrog’ rumors claim LTE network upgrade is underway originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 16 Mar 2011 16:42:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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