Hasta La Gadget!

Twiddling your thumbs in anticipation now that you’ve placed your PlayBook preorder? Why not put yourself to good use by teaching that dusty cranium how to use it? At first glance, this guide for retail salespeople looks like it could have been thrown together by us, complete with a tour of the ports and a helpful reminder that you can use the touchscreen in both landscape and portrait mode. But it’s in the sales simulation section that things really start to get interesting. For all the talk about how the PlayBook is an obvious companion for BlackBerry owners, it’s clear RIM got the memo about making it palatable to consumers, too. For instance, the company would rather reps say it “offers stunning multimedia, true multitasking, and access to the whole internet — no exceptions,” than “[It] gives you the business tools you need to transform the way you work.” Hit the source link to get acquainted and do pay attention — like a third-grade spelling lesson or visit to the DMV, it comes with a quiz (or eight).

[Thanks, Velkcro]

Leaked BlackBerry PlayBook training manual appears online, Bill Belichick yells ‘innocent!’ originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 12 Apr 2011 14:27:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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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

Whether or not you agree with their tactics, lots of companies are finding it quite lucrative business to spend more time in the courts than in the research labs. CSIRO got some tasty settlements back in 2009, while just a few months ago Wi-LAN received “a significant amount” in a settlement from Intel. Now it’s Mosaid’s turn, a Kanata, Ontario-based company that bills itself as “one of the world’s leading intellectual property (IP) companies, focused on the licensing and development of semiconductor and communications technologies.” Indeed it just licensed some of those properties to LG on the 15th, but the very next day it filed suit against a 17 defendants for infringing on six of the company’s patents, relating to network discovery, multiplexing, and other wireless techniques. Among those companies is RIM; which has its Torch, Style, Curve, Pearl, Bold, Storm handsets called out; and Asus, which has a long line of motherboards, routers, and other products said to be in jeopardy. As ever it’s hard to draw the line between the patent trolls and the legitimately infringed, but that the lawsuit was filed in litigation-friendly Marshall, Texas doesn’t leave us with a particularly good feeling.

Continue reading Mosaid gets into WiFi patent game, sues 17 companies including Dell, Canon, Asus, and RIM

Mosaid gets into WiFi patent game, sues 17 companies including Dell, Canon, Asus, and RIM originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 18 Mar 2011 13:19:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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We’d heard sweet, sweet rumors that RIM would include a Java virtual machine in the BlackBerry PlayBook and even bring Android apps on board — and lo and behold, Bloomberg‘s corroborating those claims with no fewer than three anonymous sources. Where the new rumor diverges is that the Dalvik virtual machine used in Google’s OS reportedly won’t be part of the formula; RIM considered it, these sources say, but decided it didn’t want to get involved in the Oracle / Google legal fracas. Apparently, the company’s working on this secret project in-house and targeting a possible release in the second half of the year. We have to say, the ready availability of roughly 200,000 Android programs could be quite the shot in the arm if WebWorks and AIR don’t produce killer apps right away.

Bloomberg: RIM working to let BlackBerry PlayBook run Android apps, but Dalvik’s not the way originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 11 Feb 2011 01:12:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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After an exhausting and exhilarating week at the Consumer Electronics Show in Vegas, the Gadget Lab is back with a full report on what was hot at the show.

CES 2011 saw an explosion of tablets from manufacturers big and small, and a multitude of new smartphones that connect to the new 4G cellular network.

Motorola and Research In Motion hogged the media spotlight with their tablet offerings. Due for release in the middle of this year, Motorola’s Xoom will run Honeycomb, a version of Android tailored for tablet devices. The problem was we didn’t get to try it, because Motorola isn’t done making the Xoom yet.

RIM’s BlackBerry PlayBook, on the other hand, was a real, working product. Dylan got his hands on the tablet and was very impressed.

I personally found the new Android smartphones to be the coolest part of the show, namely the Motorola Atrix 4G (even though I had some trouble dealing with Motorola). It features an Nvidia Tegra 2 dual-core processor that makes it very powerful. Even more interesting, it plugs into a dock that turns it into a desktop-like computer that you can control with a mouse and computer.

We close the podcast with a quick peek at Apple’s next operating system upgrade for the iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch: iOS 4.3. We gained access to a developer beta, and the coolest new feature is multitouch gesturing to multitask on the iPad. (Don’t forget to read our close look at iOS 4.3 beta.)

Like the show? You can also get the Gadget Lab video podcast via iTunes, or if you don’t want to be distracted by our unholy on-camera talent, check out the Gadget Lab audio podcast. Prefer RSS? You can subscribe to the Gadget Lab video or audio podcast feeds

Gadget Lab audio podcast #99

http://downloads.wired.com/podcasts/assets/gadgetlabaudio/GadgetLabAudio0099.mp3