[mertin.m]

I guess this unofficial demo hasn't been posted yet.
BlackBerry PlayBook demo and hands-on by Mike Lazaridis - SlashGear

[wayoung]

Mike confirms that the playbook supports ethernet? That's new.

Iw as hoping (from the thread title) that this was an actual presentation, but it's jsut him showing it off to a few people ont eh floor. Which is still cool, but means nothing new like a release date or price

Edit: Thanks for the link - I'm going to add it to the playbook preview thread.

[howarmat]

ethernet thru usb? i dont get it either

[1812dave]

Mike confirms that the playbook supports ethernet? That's new.

Iw as hoping (from the thread title) that this was an actual presentation, but it's jsut him showing it off to a few people ont eh floor. Which is still cool, but means nothing new like a release date or price

Edit: Thanks for the link - I'm going to add it to the playbook preview thread.

he said "through USB"

[wayoung]

he said "through USB"

Yes he did. With an adapter. Somehow.

Personally, I don't really give a crap about ethernet, I'm going to use wifi (and don't understand why anyone would want to connect a 7" tablet to an ethernet cable) but there have been several people posting here over the last few months asking for that feature.

[1812dave]

Yes he did. With an adapter. Somehow.

Personally, I don't really give a crap about ethernet, I'm going to use wifi (and don't understand why anyone would want to connect a 7" tablet to an ethernet cable) but there have been several people posting here over the last few months asking for that feature.

I can't imagine my needing ethernet on it. maybe someone else wants it, but not me. heck, my laptop sits 4 feet from our router, yet it gets to the outside world via Wifi and still manages 20Mb/sec. Hooking up ethernet is simply a waste of time. OTOH, I can't get a good enough signal to some other rooms in the house for our Netflix-enabled Blu-ray players, so netflix movies were pixelated. I ran ethernet to each of them to solve that issue.

[wayoung]

My thoughts are if the usb is somehow configured that you can use ethernet on it, why can't they let us hook up an external hard drive? Is that really harder than turning a usb plug into an ethernet port? Especially since they originally said it was usb to go?

[lnichols]

I can't imagine my needing ethernet on it. maybe someone else wants it, but not me. heck, my laptop sits 4 feet from our router, yet it gets to the outside world via Wifi and still manages 20Mb/sec. Hooking up ethernet is simply a waste of time. OTOH, I can't get a good enough signal to some other rooms in the house for our Netflix-enabled Blu-ray players, so netflix movies were pixelated. I ran ethernet to each of them to solve that issue.

Having Ethernet connectivity as an option would be great for me. I work with networks where WiFi is not allowed. If I could plug a Playbook into those networks for troubleshooting IP issues, telnet to devices, etc. in a pinch then it would be valuable to me. Would also like to see USB to Serial Adapter support so I could console into routers and switches with this thing.

[1812dave]

Having Ethernet connectivity as an option would be great for me. I work with networks where WiFi is not allowed. If I could plug a Playbook into those networks for troubleshooting IP issues, telnet to devices, etc. in a pinch then it would be valuable to me. Would also like to see USB to Serial Adapter support so I could console into routers and switches with this thing.

right. which is why I said,"I can't imagine my needing ethernet on it", in lieu of saying no one needs it.

[barrist]

RIM still isn�t confirming which chip exactly is inside, though they�re not holding back from showing how powerful it leaves the PlayBook

Isn't it a Cortex a9?

[taylortbb]

My thoughts are if the usb is somehow configured that you can use ethernet on it, why can't they let us hook up an external hard drive? Is that really harder than turning a usb plug into an ethernet port? Especially since they originally said it was usb to go?

It's not hard at all to support hard drives if they're supporting ethernet. They originally said they were supporting hard drives, then changed to no (not ready to talk about it). From the photos on SlashGear that's quite clearly a Micro AB port, which means support for USB On The Go. They may not be ready to talk about it, and the initial renders may have a Micro B port, but the initial renders also didn't have the module expansion slot. I'm pretty sure at this point it's just RIM being secretive.

Isn't it a Cortex a9?

It's a TI OMAP4, which is a Cortex A9. They haven't stated it yet, but it's quite clear that's what it is. I even posted a screenshot of a YouTube video where they showed the settings page and it said OMAP4.

Yes he did. With an adapter. Somehow.

It's a network card that connects via USB rather than PCI, it's not hard at all. They're already widely available.

[Erandhawa]

If ethernet works through usb then hard drives will work as well its just a matter of time and testing rim probably hasn't tested hd through usb

Posted from my CrackBerry at wapforums.crackberry.com

[BBThemes]

It's a TI OMAP4, which is a Cortex A9. They haven't stated it yet, but it's quite clear that's what it is. I even posted a screenshot of a YouTube video where they showed the settings page and it said OMAP4.

texas instruments have now confirmed to BGR that its a OMAP 4430
and yea i saw ya post a fair while ago, fair play on that spot

Texas Instruments at CES walkthrough; confirms OMAP 4430 inside BlackBerry PlayBook | BGR | Boy Genius Report

[espresso1967]

Gig connection would be great as I work in a datacenter wouldn't mind a super fast connection to the PB.

he said "through USB"