#1. Its smaller and even more lightweight. The iPad weighs 1.6 lbs (60% more).#2. It has BlueTooth access so you can use it with your BlackBerry to access the internet. The iPad doesn't offer BlueTooth.
#3. It can use Flash, Adobe and a variety of video/interactive formats. The iPad doesn't have the software or applications to do those things.
#4. It comes with two cameras (one on the front and another on the back) so you can use it for photography. The iPad doesn't have a camera of its own, you have to buy a camera connection kit separately.
#5. Electronic Arts is developing games that can be used on the BlackBerry PlayBook and other compatible tablets. The iPad doesn't allow third-party game developers.#6. There will be plenty to go around since the tablet market is starting to become flooded. When the iPad was first released in April 2010 demand outstripped supply and stores ran out.
RIM unveiled the BlackBerry Playbook (aka the BlackPad, the BlackBook, the BerryBook) yesterday in San Francisco at a tech conference. It will hit stores in the USA around February 2011 and international markets by approx. June 2011, although the release dates is not specific.
There is only one silver lining for Apple's iPad... they still get Christmas 2010 to sell more of their crappy iPads. By Christmas 2011 the market will be flooded with alternatives which are not only better, but cheaper.
See Also: BlackBerry CrackBerry
“We are in the first 12 months of a tablet market that will last decades. The fact that RIM is shipping this in January or February rather than November or December is unlikely to be a big deal in the long run. There are still key things that we don’t know. What will the price be? What will the battery life be? Who will distribute this? We don’t know enough about what other players will be offering either.”
ReplyDelete-Duncan Stewart, director of research in technology, media, and telecommunications at Deloitte Canada
“The tablet category remains highly speculative. RIM is about to be in very crowded company. Virtually all of RIM’s competitors are developing similar types of devices, almost all are based on Google’s Android operating system.”
-John Jackson, an analyst at CCS Insight told Bloomberg
“A lot of the things that it does address some of the shortcomings of the iPad. The screen is high-def capable. It’s easier to attach the device to your large-screen television. RIM is making it very clear the market for this device is the enterprise buyer. The corporate buyer wants simplicity, wants it to work out of the box.”
-Carmi Levy, independent technology analyst
“There were so many offerings coming out in the market and it started to look like an apparent gap in (RIM's) offering, so they filled that — at least virtually — for the time being. They've obviously done a lot of work to understand how the iPad is positioned in the market and took aim at some of the weaknesses and innovated to fill those gaps in the market.”
-Tony Olvet, analyst with IDC Canada told Canadian Press
“There are a lot of things in the BlackBerry [operating system] that developers have complained about for years, and it seems RIM has picked an OS that inherently doesn’t have those problems,”
-Marlon Rodrigues, director of alliances at developer Polar Mobile, a software developer for the BlackBerry, told the Wall Street Journal.
“It will be integrated easily into the BlackBerry server environment. From a system integration and security perspective, it’s a great move to have the Playbook available for the enterprise environment.”
-Oliver Bussman, chief information officer at business software maker SAP AG.