Motorola Xoom $799?

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HardLiner

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I was getting really excited to get this product but apparently at $799 (rumor?) it will cost way out of my price range, what would be the best option for about $500 it will be a gift for my mother...I've been saving up my money for a while now and want to get her something nice and easy to use for her Emails/Games and to browse the web.

http://tablets-planet.com/2011/01/22/bad-news-motorolas-xoom-tablet-will-cost-min-799-according-to-leak/

Will the Ipad 2 be the same price as the Ipad when it is released?
 
I would imagine that the iPad 2 will keep a simlar pricing structure but with perhaps more storage space at each price point. If I were to buy an Android device the Xoom does look nice and probably won't have much touble selling at that price. Honestly all of the good devices outside of the iPad aren't having much trouble selling out even if the numbers are much lower than the iPad.
 
If one is just looking for an easy to use slate device with no particular needs especially anything on the content creation side the iPad is the way to go. The iPad 2 will have a proabaly have a higher resolution screen and cameras, there's some debate about it's built in USB support.
 
iceredwing said:
if it only had flash =|
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Most iPadders say that this isn't a problem though I know that when I played with a borrowed iPad for extended periods of time it bothered the heck out of me, so much of the web is simply broken without Flash from my perspective though lack of Flash is a great ad blocker.
 
Wow. What I saw of the Xoom at CES was really poor. Even the display quality was inferior to the Blackberry Playbook's, and now they want to sell this for $800?

Inferior hardware (especially if the iPad 2 2048x1536 resolution rumors are true), inferior applications, and an inferior operating system. The only market for this device are people who want to make a hollow political statement by not buying an Apple product, so they punish themselves by buying something worse.

I saw all kinds of tablets at CES, and if I was behind any of those products I'd be quaking in my boots.
 
at $800 i think they are pricing themselves out of the mass market. i think anything w/ a contract is also fairly doomed.

apple set the bar w/ the ipad. inexpensive data service with no contract, quality OS, slim form factor, good battery life. these new tablets have to exceed the bar if want to compete. why these manufacturers are releasing devices with screens that aren't quality is beyond my understanding. were they not aware of apple's focus on screen quality for the iphone4? did they not think that that would be a future focus for apple? when people go to their cell phone shop the first thing they will notice is screen quality. every smartphone and tablet device released in 2011 should have a high resolution/bright screen that is comparable to the retina display. samsung at least recognized this now everyone else needs to.

the ipad 2/iphone5 will have these high quality displays as well as dual core processors. Of the devices announced at CES, only the motorola atrix seemed to not be playing catchup to the unannounced iphone5 haha and it will be on the same carrier as the iphone5!
 
iceredwing said:
if it only had flash =|
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This is the one main thing that has kept me from considering an ipad. I went to the local ATT store last month. I had made the comment to the sales lady there that I love Youtube and heard the ipad couldnt play it properly because the lack of Flash. She told me it would. She tried to get Youtube to play on three different ipads they had out for demos. Not one would play Youtube. I just laughed and told her to stop trying to make the sale. It wasn't going to happen. Maybe the ipad fans have found a work around to it but I have yet to see or read about it. Apple should come off its high horse and embrace Flash. :D
 
Skott said:
This is the one main thing that has kept me from considering an ipad. I went to the local ATT store last month. I had made the comment to the sales lady there that I love Youtube and heard the ipad couldnt play it properly because the lack of Flash. She told me it would. She tried to get Youtube to play on three different ipads they had out for demos. Not one would play Youtube. I just laughed and told her to stop trying to make the sale. It wasn't going to happen. Maybe the ipad fans have found a work around to it but I have yet to see or read about it. Apple should come off its high horse and embrace Flash. :D
Click to expand...

an old coworker of mine was an apple fan. he would bring his ipad in to work and use it for personal things. whenever someone would ask him about it he'd go into "salesman" mode and talk about how great the ipad was. i usually ignored him but one day i questioned it's lack of flash support and therefore it's lack of web content. his response was that he didn't get an ipad for web content, he got it so he could have "the experience that steve jobs designed". yeah, not talking to some people hehe.

apple wouldn't even have to embrace flash. all they would have to say is "whatever, you bought it, use it how you want to" and adobe would probably be eager to release flash support for it. its funny, you can buy a $500 ipad and use it as a hammer and apple's response would be "whatever, you paid for it" but when you say "hmm, flash would be nice" apple's response is "never, that is not what the ipad is made for".

i'd get an ipad if it had flash support.
 
HardLiner said:
I was getting really excited to get this product but apparently at $799 (rumor?) it will cost way out of my price range, what would be the best option for about $500 it will be a gift for my mother...I've been saving up my money for a while now and want to get her something nice and easy to use for her Emails/Games and to browse the web.
Click to expand...

This corroborates the UK info I have seen which indicated it would be about the same price as the 64MB/3G ipad.

I would either get an iPad 2, or an Asus Transformer.

The Asus transformer has similar specs to the Zoom and it is specified as having an IPS screen and starting price of $399 (wifi/no keyboard):
http://www.engadget.com/2011/01/04/asus-eee-pad-slider-and-transformer-are-here-for-those-that-can/
 
Snowdog said:
This corroborates the UK info I have seen which indicated it would be about the same price as the 64MB/3G ipad.

I would either get an iPad 2, or an Asus Transformer.

The Asus transformer has similar specs to the Zoom and it is specified as having an IPS screen and starting price of $399 (wifi/no keyboard):
http://www.engadget.com/2011/01/04/asus-eee-pad-slider-and-transformer-are-here-for-those-that-can/
Click to expand...

I was just looking at the Asus transformer and it looks pretty amazing for the price, as far as I can tell the only real difference is the Xoom has 1Gb of ram and the Transformer has 512mb but that wouldn't really make a difference anyway. The Transformer will also support honeycomb as well.

Are you sure the Transformer will cost $399? Am I missing something? How can Motorola charge twice the money as the Transformer with almost the same specs?

BTW is IPS screen better?
 
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Skott said:
This is the one main thing that has kept me from considering an ipad. I went to the local ATT store last month. I had made the comment to the sales lady there that I love Youtube and heard the ipad couldnt play it properly because the lack of Flash. She told me it would. She tried to get Youtube to play on three different ipads they had out for demos. Not one would play Youtube. I just laughed and told her to stop trying to make the sale. It wasn't going to happen. Maybe the ipad fans have found a work around to it but I have yet to see or read about it. Apple should come off its high horse and embrace Flash. :D
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I dont understand this comment, Youtube works fine, almost all videos are now encoded in HTML5, both the mobile and desktop site, There is a dedicated Youtube app that works brilliantly, I just went on youtube.com, clicked a random video, and it started to play without an issue. The only issue is that a few sites are made with flash only, and those ones are few (at least the websites i visit)

fpkEX.png


Most all websites I visit have changed most if not all their content to HTML 5, and it works quite flawlessly.
 
HardLiner said:
I was just looking at the Asus transformer and it looks pretty amazing for the price, as far as I can tell the only real difference is the Xoom has 1Gb of ram and the Transformer has 512mb but that wouldn't really make a difference anyway. The Transformer will also support honeycomb as well.

Are you sure the Transformer will cost $399? Am I missing something? How can Motorola charge twice the money as the Transformer with almost the same specs?

BTW is IPS screen better?
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The Transformer starts $399 But that will be with Wifi model.

Motorola with its ties to telcos is more interested in treating this as a Giant Cellphone and selling with a telco subsidy.
 
There is a wifi only version of the xoom coming out pretty soon as I recall... Oh, and the I pad 2 will have a 1 mp rear camera... Not very exciting. As for getting the resolution to 2048x1536, thats in the 24 + inch monitor range... Even if they *could* do it, not a chance in hell at their current price point...
 
Snowdog said:
This corroborates the UK info I have seen which indicated it would be about the same price as the 64MB/3G ipad.

I would either get an iPad 2, or an Asus Transformer.

The Asus transformer has similar specs to the Zoom and it is specified as having an IPS screen and starting price of $399 (wifi/no keyboard):
http://www.engadget.com/2011/01/04/asus-eee-pad-slider-and-transformer-are-here-for-those-that-can/
Click to expand...

On paper this looks like a much better option than the Xoom. IPS display and cheaper, I like it.
 
Eragon Dragonslayer said:
The only issue is that a few sites are made with flash only, and those ones are few (at least the websites i visit)
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Of course... Why would you keep beating your head against a wall and keep visiting sites that use flash?

Hey, on the bright side, when jobs dies, perhaps tim cook can make nice with adobe and you can have some flash?
 
The only issue is that a few sites are made with flash only, and those ones are few (at least the websites i visit)
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Plenty of media sites still use flash vs html5.

My concern wasn't about YouTube. Since we have the youtube App available, nor would i say Netflix, since it has an app for that too (i found like one of those retarded commercials).

But sites like ComedyCentral, NBC, NHL Live, and many sports streaming services only use flash. For a tablet (at least on my case), to be a complete entertainment device (which ipad falls under) then it would have to address such issues (either enabling flash or working with those companies to make apps for you).

I prefer the ecosystem of apps that iOS is covered around, but all those apps are very fleeting in terms of entertainment. I use my tablet devices for viewing media (both stored and streaming). And I was extremely disappointed that the iPad didn't have flash.

On the other hand, we have many developers who are trying to enable flash for the jailbroken iPads|touch|phone. So far, only flash games work but not streaming media
 
Skott said:
This is the one main thing that has kept me from considering an ipad. I went to the local ATT store last month. I had made the comment to the sales lady there that I love Youtube and heard the ipad couldnt play it properly because the lack of Flash. She told me it would. She tried to get Youtube to play on three different ipads they had out for demos. Not one would play Youtube. I just laughed and told her to stop trying to make the sale. It wasn't going to happen. Maybe the ipad fans have found a work around to it but I have yet to see or read about it. Apple should come off its high horse and embrace Flash. :D
Click to expand...

I wouldn't worry about it. Youtube works (maybe she should have used the app), as do most all of the major video sites out there (ABC, Vimeo, all the major news sites, UStream, JustinTV, BlipTV, GiantBomb, TED, Hulu Plus, Netflix, etc etc). There is a huge number of mobile devices out there that do not support Flash, and it is growing at an insane rate. This isn't only about iOS devices, this is about Android, Windows Phone 7, etc etc. Websites have reacted accordingly in order to support them.
 
iceredwing said:
But sites like ComedyCentral, NBC, NHL Live, and many sports streaming services only use flash.
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I tested NHL and that seemed to work fine. Are you talking about live streams of games? NBC is covered by Hulu Plus. It sucks that they don't allow for free streaming like ABC does, but then again I cancelled my DirectTV for Hulu+ and Netflix instead so it isn't a negative for me since I have it anyway. It is also very comprehensive, things like access to every single episode of Saturday Night Live ever.

ComedyCentral might be the biggest omission I've seen outside of Southparkstudios, and I didn't know that they didn't have non-Flash support yet. Either way, it's a matter of time given how many mobile devices are out there that don't support Flash. That or perhaps they are looking to monetize access with an app. That would be a mistake given that it is just one channel, while pay services like Hulu+ and Netflix covers much more content. Ads like they do now would be fine.
 
Skott: First, YouTube content does work on the iPad. Virtually all of it. Outside of the dedicated app, I've played plenty of YouTube embeds with no issues.

I'm not quite sure why people tout Flash support as a good thing -- right now. I've used the Samsung Galaxy Tab a fair amount, and so has a friend who owns one. Both of us agreed that enabling Flash might as well amount to the "make the web unusable" toggle.

Some sites work, but many are either too much for the 1GHz, single-core ARM chip or suddenly take an unacceptably long amount of time to load. The dream of playing Major TV Website X from your Android tablet often doesn't work out properly. Tegra 2 devices will hopefully be much better, but we haven't really seen them running optimized Flash (or Android) for that kind of performance. And with the exception of the Xoom, most won't even ship for the next few months. All talk and no walk.

People complain about Apple's attitude, but Adobe's is worse: it feels you must use Flash as-is, no matter how rough the experience might be. I don't like someone foisting a software decision on users, but Adobe's is worse because it insists a crappy experience is good for me.

As for the Xoom: if that $800 price holds, say hello to Apple keeping 75% or more market share in 2011. It's not just that it's $70 more than a 3G iPad (and I fully expect iPad 2 to eliminate any performance or major feature gaps)... it's that we don't know when the Wi-Fi only Xoom will arrive. I've heard it might be in a month or two, but if Motorola pulls a Samsung and takes a long time to get out a cheap version untethered to a carrier, Apple has won.

My guess is that companies like HTC and Motorola are too comfortable with the carrier model and might not understand that they have to break away to compete with the iPad.
 
Flash might as well amount to the "make the web unusable" toggle
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Actually, the question will be if websites will switch th HTML5 support before the handhelds and tablets become powerful enough to play them in flash. Truthfully, I can play a lot of flash streaming media from my Samsung Galaxy Tab. I do agree if you do let flash run without a toggle (which the android browsers let's you disable) then yeah, some sites are not usable at all, but it does let me stream a lot of media that i need (unfortunately not high resolution sporting events :( .

Considering that we are going to 1+ GHz with 2 cores, 1+GB Ram , and etc., i suspect that the hardware will be able to run it soon.

For the record, live streaming games doesn't work on the iPad. That was the first thing I checked when I was considering the iPad
 
Flash works great on my HP Slate, even 1080P playback in YouTube works pretty well when YouTube is clogged. Flash does seem to favor x86 and Windows, which is why I think some compalin about it.
 
Betauser said:
I'll wait for the playbook instead of this overpriced POS.
Click to expand...

I have no idea how the Playbook's application selection will be, but I do know that the screen on the Playbook (unless the Xoom display improves when it hits retail) is much higher quality, similar to the quality of the current gen iPad. I hope that it comes in at a good price, I really liked what I saw.
 
Price is listed as $699.00 on best buy via engadget.
Still hoping that is the 3g+wifi model... Should be able to knock another $100 off the wifi only
 
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Rune75 said:
Price is listed as $699.00 on best buy via engadget.
Still hoping that is the 3g+wifi model... Should be able to knock another $100 off the wifi only
Click to expand...

Still though $599 for the wifi only model is still $200 more than the Asus Transformer at virtually the same specs.

BTW The Xoom is coming out at Bestbuy February 17th, apparently.
 
HardLiner said:
Still though $599 for the wifi only model is still $200 more than the Asus Transformer at virtually the same specs.

BTW The Xoom is coming out at Bestbuy February 17th, apparently.
Click to expand...

Stuck in Japan til the 28th of Feb... urgh
 
HardLiner said:
I was getting really excited to get this product but apparently at $799 (rumor?) it will cost way out of my price range, what would be the best option for about $500 it will be a gift for my mother...I've been saving up my money for a while now and want to get her something nice and easy to use for her Emails/Games and to browse the web.

http://tablets-planet.com/2011/01/22/bad-news-motorolas-xoom-tablet-will-cost-min-799-according-to-leak/

Will the Ipad 2 be the same price as the Ipad when it is released?
Click to expand...

Get your mom an iPad for a little over $400 (http://store.apple.com/us/product/FB292LL/A?mco=MjAzMTE2MjQ) or a rooted nook color. The Nook color ($250) basically turns into an Android tablet with a great screen once rooted.
 
sugosugita said:
Get your mom an iPad for a little over $400 (http://store.apple.com/us/product/FB292LL/A?mco=MjAzMTE2MjQ) or a rooted nook color. The Nook color ($250) basically turns into an Android tablet with a great screen once rooted.
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Rooting the Nook color scares me a bit, I think I would rather just save up and pay the extra money. The refurbished Ipad for $429 sounds good but the Asus transformer at $399 seems to me like the best deal right now.

Will see though.
 
Betauser said:
I'll wait for the playbook instead of this overpriced POS.
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No built-in e-mail, calendar or BBM clients. Enjoy your value-packed PlayBook!

Seriously: I tried the PlayBook at CES, and while the hardware plus core OS is pretty good, you know full well that Apple has a dual-core processor and cameras on the next iPad. And messaging that doesn't require a separate smartphone.
 
Aurelius said:
No built-in e-mail, calendar or BBM clients. Enjoy your value-packed PlayBook!

Seriously: I tried the PlayBook at CES, and while the hardware plus core OS is pretty good, you know full well that Apple has a dual-core processor and cameras on the next iPad. And messaging that doesn't require a separate smartphone.
Click to expand...

I agree, the playbook looks cool and from the Youtube video's I watched has a good OS but I want the extra real estate and I'm not sure how their App World will pan out.
 
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