[Jtaylor1986]

I would be shocked if they released one in the next year. And once they have been out if the market that long they probably will never get back in it.

[amazingtoy]

I agree. Actually, I have been looking everywhere for a BlackBerry playbook in Toronto. It shows 2 places to go for - Telus and Wind. I have surfed both websites, but I am not able to get any information about the playbook. I want to get one.

[johnnyuk]

A BlackBerry 10 powered tablet would unlock the real potential of the QNX platform. Multitasking possibilities could be endless on a BlackBerry 10 Tablet.

Posted via CB10

As we saw with the PlayBook the multitasking possibilities of QNX are only "endless" until you run out of RAM, then apps spontaneously combust before your eyes or don't even load to start with.

That's because BlackBerry didn't implement virtual memory or a task unloading/reloading hybrid like iOS which is why PlayBook can't handle BB10 and all BB10 phones have to have a minimum of 2GB of RAM. Ooops eh BlackBerry?!

The big problem stopping BlackBerry having future success with a tablet is the small BB10 app ecosystem. Unlike smartphones, tablets rely almost soley on apps to make them useful (unless you just want to use websites) while a smartphone without apps is still useful as a phone. That's the big difference between the two types of device, no apps = no tablet sales. PlayBook taught the world that.

What BlackBerry should have done was launch their next gen QNX based OS on their phones first in 2011, get the app ecosystem going and THEN launch a tablet 12-18 months after (which would have put it head to head with Microsoft's Surface RT, easily beatable!).

Hopefully if BlackBerry can make good use of the new unlocked Android runtime and the installing of Android .apk files direct from the device by including Home screen shortcuts to 3rd party Android app stores in the OS as standard, for example, so Android apps can be installed as easily as from BlackBerry World, then the opportunity for a new BlackBerry tablet that actually has an app ecosystem and could actually sell may just appear.

Just don't call it PlayBook 2.



Posted via CB10

[Youssef7]

I think a blackberry 10 tablet would be amazing. But lets keep the focus on advertising and making another perfect q10 sequel

Posted via CB10

[bspence87]

It is possible the new CEO can unkill BB10 on the PlayBook. The claim was it was laggy, but who knows.

Posted via CB10

Ugghhhh, still?

Nothing lags worse than the PlayBook whining

[johnnyuk]

Ugghhhh, still?

Nothing lags worse than the PlayBook whining

PlayBook OS was very inefficient. You can tell from how well 3D games run on PlayBook at very high frame rates that it has a lot of power but BlackBerry didn't seem to harness all of that power in the UI or the laggy keyboard. I wonder if the UI just doesn't use any graphics acceleration.

BB10 could have been much less laggy than PlayBook OS on the PlayBook if it hadn't been for the lack of RAM crippling it. Few of us will ever know, early builds of BB10 did run on PlayBook but accounts and video evidence of what it was like are rare. I think there's a video on YouTube somewhere of BB10 booting on a PlayBook.

Posted via CB10

[imcurved]

Great idea but not now please.

Post via CB Z10

[stackberry369]

I think a blackberry 10 tablet would be amazing. But lets keep the focus on advertising and making another perfect q10 sequel

Posted via CB10

The problem is that the tablet market is saturated,how could blackberry even compete?before any of you call me a troll,I still use my blackberry playbook and still have my curve 3g.

sent from my galaxy note 3

[gariac]

As we saw with the PlayBook the multitasking possibilities of QNX are only "endless" until you run out of RAM, then apps spontaneously combust before your eyes or don't even load to start with.

That's because BlackBerry didn't implement virtual memory or a task unloading/reloading hybrid like iOS which is why PlayBook can't handle BB10 and all BB10 phones have to have a minimum of 2GB of RAM. Ooops eh BlackBerry?!

The big problem stopping BlackBerry having future success with a tablet is the small BB10 app ecosystem. Unlike smartphones, tablets rely almost soley on apps to make them useful (unless you just want to use websites) while a smartphone without apps is still useful as a phone. That's the big difference between the two types of device, no apps = no tablet sales. PlayBook taught the world that.

What BlackBerry should have done was launch their next gen QNX based OS on their phones first in 2011, get the app ecosystem going and THEN launch a tablet 12-18 months after (which would have put it head to head with Microsoft's Surface RT, easily beatable!).

Hopefully if BlackBerry can make good use of the new unlocked Android runtime and the installing of Android .apk files direct from the device by including Home screen shortcuts to 3rd party Android app stores in the OS as standard, for example, so Android apps can be installed as easily as from BlackBerry World, then the opportunity for a new BlackBerry tablet that actually has an app ecosystem and could actually sell may just appear.

Just don't call it PlayBook 2.



Posted via CB10

But the PlayBook was supposed to be a precursor to the phone. That is, they took an ODM tablet and made it into a development tool, more or less, for the phone. The tablet was one of three basic allwinner devices out at the time. The first Kindle Fire and I believe the Nook Tablet were the same basic design. In fact, I think the Fire had even less memory.

At this point, I'd just like to be able to root it and run Linux on it.

Posted via CB10

[SEAWARRIOR]

I think just a 12" touchscreen that interfaces to z30 would make more sense.
Tablets are lame. Just another device to waist time copying files to and get bothered when you loose lose it.

how do you lose a tablet??? have you looked under that pile of clothes in your bedroom??? also, imo, i can't see wasting money on "dumb" devices,,, what's the sense???

[alternator77]

I know ill hear a complaint or two from some here on specs but with the kindle yes kindle fire running a high res screen and a snapdragon 800 quadcore for less than an ipad mini they better not even consider it if it won't be cost competitive or spec competitive.

Posted from a phone....

[gg bb]

how do you lose a tablet??? have you looked under that pile of clothes in your bedroom??? also, imo, i can't see wasting money on "dumb" devices,,, what's the sense???

Its just a pointless device that does nothing a phone cant do. Only saving grace of the playbook was/is the bridge software . 7" tablet or 5.5" phone? Z30 makes more sense than a tablet and BlackBerry cant seem to sell z30s never mind tablets. Tablet market is over saturated, even less profittable than phone market and probably going to collapse like the netbook market did. Inovative products like microsoft surface pro havent even taken off. Apple manage to sell tablets but apples a designer label to I dont understand how many people who seem to collect the stuff like chavs with fake gucci handbags! Ps why would a teanage girl need to carry 3 gucci handbags?

[johnnyuk]

But the PlayBook was supposed to be a precursor to the phone. That is, they took an ODM tablet and made it into a development tool, more or less, for the phone.

Yep, that's what BlackBerry planned and did. It backfired horrendously on them and rightly so! Rather arrogant (maybe naive?) of them to launch what should have been an internal private Beta platform with no app ecosystem to speak of out in to the public expecting it to sell by the 10's or hundreds of millions don't you think? They hyped it at the time as the "Only Professional Grade Tablet", the iPad killer. What barefaced lies! They deserved to lose a Billion dollars for that stunt, they thought businesses would lap up their QNX Beta Tablet but it had so many software gotchas and flaws at launch it was laughed off the pitch.

The tablet was one of three basic allwinner devices out at the time. The first Kindle Fire and I believe the Nook Tablet were the same basic design. In fact, I think the Fire had even less memory.

Both those tablets launched with the ability to tap in to a pre-existing ecosystem of apps, content and user lock-in/buy-in through previous devices that built those ecosystems up gradually (the earlier Kindle and Nook e-book readers).

Kindle is Android in an Amazon walled garden so apps for them was like picking the juiciest apples off a tree. It didn't matter that the hardware wasn't as good as the PlayBook, it's what software was available to do things with it that matters. It's all about the apps!

Compare that to the PlayBook at launch. A tiny app ecosystem with no way to benefit from a pre-existing app store and little incentive for developers to port their BBOS iOS or Android apps, no vendor owned content libraries of e-books, music, and films, no way to check your email, calendar or contacts outside of using Web mail without owning a BlackBerry to pair it up with.

It was such a major miscalculation on BlackBerry's part. If they thought they were putting something out there to learn about QNX on in a live environment they got more that they bargained for. They got their public beta test from the BlackBerry hardcore but they also got a harsh lesson in marketing, PR, economics, the consumerisation of IT and how to nose dive your previously successful company with one product release.

Apple, Google and even Microsoft got the ecosystems right (or did better than BlackBerry in Microsoft's case) by building them up on Smartphones first before letting their big guns loose on tablets. It didn't matter so much on the phones that at first there weren't many apps because at first people were buying Smartphones because they were primarily phones. BlackBerry got it all back to front, the QNX phones should have come first.

At this point, I'd just like to be able to root it and run Linux on it.
Posted via CB10

That would be great, but it's never gonna happen. BlackBerry are never gonna unlock that bootloader, their reputation is built on security and unhackable devices used in the most secretive and data sensitive work places in the world.

Besides with such a tiny user base what's in it for them to spend the time and money working on it? They decided it wasn't even worth their time cramming or stripping down BB10 on to it and that could have brought in revenue at least by people buying apps again in BlackBerry World. Going to the effort of opening it up to Linux won't be on their project plans.

By the way I love all 4 of my PlayBooks I've bought, i was using 3 at once at work today!

Posted via CB10

[dosto]

I'm not sure if Blackberry needs to dilute their focus, but if they made a tablet, I'd definitely buy it.

Posted via CB10

[proudcdnguy]

With all due respect, BlackBerry has many other things it should be focusing on (such as ironing out the numerous bugs in BlackBerry 10 software) and, quite frankly, simply trying to survive as a company. The resources that were spent on the Playbook was a huge strategic mistake. If they would have been smart, they would have built the tablet with BlackBerry 10 in mind in oder to allow for a seamless upgrade once the software was released. Instead, they were forced to write off tens of thousands of tablets.

Frustrated Q10 user (Telus, Official10.2.0.1791)

[WorldwideRemix]

Lol without main apps, there would be no use of a Blackberry 10 tablet.

Posted via CB10

[johnnyuk]

If they would have been smart, they would have built the tablet with BlackBerry 10 in mind in oder to allow for a seamless upgrade once the software was released. Instead, they were forced to write off tens of thousands of tablets.

Frustrated Q10 user (Telus, Official10.2.0.1791)

They did build the PlayBook with BB10 in mind but they goofed back in 2010 and didn't spec it up with enough RAM for their plans. They forgot about the extra things a phone needs to run software for like the phone functionality and mobile network stack, and didn't bother with smart things like virtual memory or background task unloading/loading depending on what the user is doing at the time like "other mobile OS's" did. Oops.

Life for BB10 in 1GB of RAM started out OK on Dev Alpha phones as it was just PlayBook OS being developed in to something bigger and better but it soon got too big once the hungry ever running Hub arrived and that was the end of the chances of BB10 ever running well on PlayBook.

It would have been a different story I think if the PlayBook had been a huge success, it would have been a case of making BB10 work in 1GB of RAM no matter what, probably by having to retrofit a virtual memory hybrid. But as it was a sales disaster it could be left behind and forgotten about by Thorsten much more easily.

Posted via CB10

[web99]

As much as I'd love a BB10 tablet (a PlayBook 10 perhaps?), I really think that BlackBerry needs to focus on their superphone efforts and really get some decent footing before expanding.

That's is my thought as well. BlackBerry needs to increase their market share and the BBOS to BB10 adoption rate before before getting back into tablet business.

Sent from my Samsung Galaxy Note Tablet

[gariac]

They did build the PlayBook with BB10 in mind but they goofed back in 2010 and didn't spec it up with enough RAM for their plans. They forgot about the extra things a phone needs to run software for like the phone functionality and mobile network stack, and didn't bother with smart things like virtual memory or background task unloading/loading depending on what the user is doing at the time like "other mobile OS's" did. Oops.

Life for BB10 in 1GB of RAM started out OK on Dev Alpha phones as it was just PlayBook OS being developed in to something bigger and better but it soon got too big once the hungry ever running Hub arrived and that was the end of the chances of BB10 ever running well on PlayBook.

It would have been a different story I think if the PlayBook had been a huge success, it would have been a case of making BB10 work in 1GB of RAM no matter what, probably by having to retrofit a virtual memory hybrid. But as it was a sales disaster it could be left behind and forgotten about by Thorsten much more easily.

Posted via CB10

I'm not sure how smart virtual memory is when all you have is SSD. On my SSD computers, I work hard to limit useless writing to increase SSD lifetime.

A tablet without cellular connectivity doesn't need the software to use the cellular network.

Posted via CB10

[Youssef7]

Well they would have to cater to books business

Posted via CB10

[Youssef7]

Alanything is better then an ipad. Ipads are not made for files or docs.

Posted via CB10

[johnnyuk]

I'm not sure how smart virtual memory is when all you have is SSD. On my SSD computers, I work hard to limit useless writing to increase SSD lifetime.

Yeh it would be a worry. I think that's where iOS stores its 'frozen' unloaded apps though, if it works for Apple....

A tablet without cellular connectivity doesn't need the software to use the cellular network.

Posted via CB10

Yep. Even so everything else grew so big in BB10 removing that isn't enough to fit it in 1GB of RAM. Plus all running apps have to stay in physical RAM at all times. Not an efficient design for a mobile device!

Posted via CB10

[slickvguy]

Zero chance. The absolute last thing blackberry needs is another device that will sell in small quantities. They have to stop losing money on hardware. A few handsets is all they need. The future is software and services.

[gariac]

OK, how about taking an Android tablet and set it up for BB10. I don't like Google snooping on me. I'd pay about $50 for a bb10 license I could plop onto a cheap Nexus tablet.

Posted via CB10

[birdman_38]

a comprehensive playbook update would give us this, (someone had to say it, might as well be me, )...

Agreed, but on 2 1/2 year old hardware?

Unless you were being facetious.