Hasta La Gadget!

The WebOS nuts at PreCentral have received an anonymous tip-off that HP’s imminent slate won’t be able to edit Office docs out of the box. As much as we’d like to dismiss this as a retaliatory rumor put out by BlackBerry, it emits an unfortunate whiff of truth. While HP has previously made a big deal of the TouchPad’s inclusion of the Quickoffice app, it has only said it’s “working with Quickoffice” to include document editing, and it has never demoed editing in action. The company has recently been trying to boost its app count, but perhaps it should have put more effort into securing core functionality instead. A glimmer of hope, though: the same tip-off also suggested that at least some editing capabilities will be introduced “via a downloadable update in Q3 2011”. Hey, what’s the rush?

HP TouchPad rumored to lack document editing at launch originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 19 Jun 2011 09:23:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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HP reportedly in talks with major labels over cloud-based service originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 13 Jun 2011 12:23:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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HP is finally ready to unleash its response to the iPad.

HP’s TouchPad tablet will go on sale in the United States on July 1 this year, and will cost $500 for the 16-GB model and $600 for 32GB.

A few days later it will launch in France, Germany and the UK. Canada will get the tablet in mid-July and Italy, Spain, Australia, Hong Kong, New Zealand and Singapore will have to wait until “later this year.”

After a rash of frankly awful Android tablets, and BlackBerry’s absurd premature launch of the PlayBook, many think that the TouchPad will be the first real rival to the iPad. From the face-to-face (no touching allowed) demos we have seen, this could certainly be the case. The price is right, too, hitting the exact same marks as Apple.

The TouchPad is certainly the tablet I’m excited about, and despite the new features of iOS 5, it still appears to outdo the iPad in some ways. The notification and Touchstone tech (which lets you share content by bumping the TouchPad up against your Pre phone) don’t look so great now that Apple has its own notifications and iCloud, but the card-based app switching and stereo speakers are both real wins.

It also comes with a beta version of Adobe’s Flash browser plugin (some meaner people might say that all versions of Flash are beta).

Otherwise, things are just as we already knew. The TouchPad runs the web OS operating system developed by Palm, which HP acquired last year. The 9.7-inch screen sports a sensible 1024 x 768 display, much better for tablets than the tallscreen aspects seen in many Android tablets. There’s also the 1.3MP webcam on the front, which embarrasses the iPad’s sub-megapixel rear-facing camera, the dual-core 1.2-GHz Snapdragon processor, and the 740-gram weight (the Wi-Fi iPad weighs 601 grams, or 1.33 pounds).

Should you want to get your hands on a TouchPad on launch day, you can pre order from June 19th. A 3G (AT&T) model will arrive later in the summer.

Touchpad product page [HP]

See Also:

• First Look: HP’s Untouchable TouchPad Tablet
• Gadget Lab Podcast: HP TouchPad and Android Honeycomb
• HP Launches WebOS-Powered Tablet, Phones
• HP TouchPad, Keyboard – Wired

Palm HP still hasn’t told us exactly when the TouchPad is going to be shipping, but that’s okay. We have a pretty good idea. We earlier had a tip from OfficeMax stating July 17th and, while this morning’s info pointed to a June 22nd release, Amazon seems pretty confident that the former date is correct. Go to Amazon.com, search for “hp touchpad” and enjoy the little advertisement that appears saying “HP will release the sleek and sophisticated webOS-empowered TouchPad on July 17, 2011.” That’s about as concrete as you can get, meaning you have just over a month to save up.

[Thanks, Michael]

Amazon ad confirms HP TouchPad release date? originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 08 Jun 2011 21:13:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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The latest ComScore results from the last quarter are in, and the US mobile device wars were hotter than ever as 13% more people reported owning a smartphone. Google conquered most users’ territory with Android climbing just over five percent (now totaling 36.4%) and still claiming first for mobile software platforms. Apple’s iOS destroyer took second place (at 26%) partially due to RIM’s S.S. BlackBerry OS sinking about five percent (now 25.7%) to claim third, while Microsoft and HP / Palm rounded out the bunch struggling to stay in the fight with even lower single-digit scores. In the OEM region Samsung claimed first yet again (although slightly dropping to 24.5%), with LG and Motorola landing in second and third respectively, each keeping its place from the prior quarter. In the last two slots, Apple again bested RIM whose devices barely dropped half of a percent, but enough to let the slight growth of iDevices snatch up 4th. The source link below is waiting to be clicked if you want the full battle statistics.

ComScore: Android grows larger than ever among US subscribers, Apple belittles RIM originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 06 Jun 2011 04:29:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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