[rcbtri]

With the upcoming holiday season approaching, I am in the market for a new tablet. Being a BB user for years, I have been considering and leaning toward a Playbook, but also considering iPad2.

Tonight I ventured out to 3 different local retailers that "carry" the Playbook. This endeavor was not successful. At both Staples and OfficeMax the units on display were inoperable. To the credit of the Staples employees they attempted to change the power supply to resolve the problem. They did state this was third demo unit to die on them. At OfficeMax, the manager encouraged me to come back tomorrow as they would have more people to help resolve the issue. At the time he was holding the discounts pricing sign for a sale starting tomorrow. At BestBuy the representative told me it had been pulled and not likely coming back to the store. This was odd since it is available online. The representative had been impressed with it during the training he received.

So how does RIM expect consumers to test drive their equipment when the demo units in stores do not work or exist? The whole experience has left me frustrated.

Anyone else have a similar experience or thoughts?

[anindoc]

ohh man this might be the tenth thread with similar issues,if u want it just buy it... we here at CB will help u rolling with the awesome PB....

[MrLynd54]

I have been to a Best Buy as well where the PlayBook was on display. It had all kind of fingerprints all over it, on the display rack it was the only one not powered on, and a salesperson told me they had been discontinued. My fience' and I both informed her that was only a rumor, while another sales man was showing my fience' a different tablet. For some reason the PlayBook has been pushed to the back of the growing crowd by the sales force in different stores. I think it is a lack of product knowledge. There is no marketing force out and about lecturing and training sales folks. Man, if RIM had a force out in the stores with boots doing demonstrations, I think they would have won over a big crowd. Now at the holidays is time to get the ball rolling, if its not already too late.

[FF22]

With the upcoming holiday season approaching, I am in the market for a new tablet. Being a BB user for years, I have been considering and leaning toward a Playbook, but also considering iPad2.

Tonight I ventured out to 3 different local retailers that "carry" the Playbook. This endeavor was not successful. At both Staples and OfficeMax the units on display were inoperable. To the credit of the Staples employees they attempted to change the power supply to resolve the problem. They did state this was third demo unit to die on them. At OfficeMax, the manager encouraged me to come back tomorrow as they would have more people to help resolve the issue. At the time he was holding the discounts pricing sign for a sale starting tomorrow. At BestBuy the representative told me it had been pulled and not likely coming back to the store. This was odd since it is available online. The representative had been impressed with it during the training he received.

So how does RIM expect consumers to test drive their equipment when the demo units in stores do not work or exist? The whole experience has left me frustrated.

Anyone else have a similar experience or thoughts?

Maybe rim has realized they can sell more units if no one can see the limitations and weaknesses of the current platform and its half-baked OS!

Well, the usual suspects are out in force defending the pb, so I thought I'd give the other side a reply to read!

[eric89074]

The Playbook is a victim of not being an iPad. Retailers shouldn't have to babysit demo units to make sure they work.

[blackjack93117]

Answer to OP question yes. Horrible retail and other marketing, disgraceful.

In addition to other factors such as early reviews by unqualified tech reviewers (Wall Street Journal??) who expected it to be exactly like an ipad only smaller, and tossed it aside when they couldn't figure out how to swipe the UI or navigate without a home button - and started writing the review to be the first on the block to review it,

Also, people believing things, buying prematurely, feeling ripped off and broken hearted and ripping up the forums vindictively ever since...

[blackjack93117]

Maybe rim has realized they can sell more units if no one can see the limitations and weaknesses of the current platform and its half-baked OS!

Well, the usual suspects are out in force defending the pb, so I thought I'd give the other side a reply to read!

Are you kidding ? Nobody sees that? How could they miss it it's in every post you make? and you are second top poster (right under me
Nobody denies it either,that there are limitations and missing features, BTW, even me. It just isn't fair to ignore what it CAN do because there are a minority of people who cant figure out what to do with it. It is worthy of defense.

[drecar]

rim is good at selling the steak not the sizzle. consumers respond to sizzle.
unfortunately all retail salespeople ive encountered are not aware of how to properly use a pb. what amazes me is the positive reaction to pb from everyone that has asked me about it. basically once its in there hands they say wow this is really nice. and believe me im not spending much time trying to hard sell them. i just want my pb back so i can get back to doing whatever i was doing.

[haydnmorgan11]

I live in the UK so i'm not sure what its like over in the US but a major problem is that it hasnt been advertised much over here., i mean there havent been any TV adverts for it or any adverts in the newspapers. Infact i was at College the other day on my playbook and someone said "ahh is that the amazon tablet?" but once i explained it was the playbook they thought it was really cool and wondered why they hadnt seen it anywhere. Bearing in mind that in the UK BBs are the most popular handset wouldnt it be a good idea to make people aware of it?

[Cantime77]

Rim have overpriced a device on promise that it will work better in a couple of months, they broke that promise and blown every deadline, they got fat and slow.
My co-workers and friends are fleeing off the blackberrys' and are either with Android or iPhone... no one is really planning to renew ...and no one , I mean no one is looking to get a playbook. This whole thing is only going to get uglier.
There is some serious work ahead of Rim.

[blackjack93117]

I live in the UK so i'm not sure what its like over in the US but a major problem is that it hasnt been advertised much over here., i mean there havent been any TV adverts for it or any adverts in the newspapers. Infact i was at College the other day on my playbook and someone said "ahh is that the amazon tablet?" but once i explained it was the playbook they thought it was really cool and wondered why they hadnt seen it anywhere. Bearing in mind that in the UK BBs are the most popular handset wouldnt it be a good idea to make people aware of it?

We don't see many here either and the ones that are out there pretty much don't say anything about the thing.

[FF22]

Are you kidding ? Nobody sees that? How could they miss it it's in every post you make? and you are second top poster (right under me
Nobody denies it either,that there are limitations and missing features, BTW, even me. It just isn't fair to ignore what it CAN do because there are a minority of people who cant figure out what to do with it. It is worthy of defense.

Good morning. Hey, even I went after a troll in a thread just now.

I generally throw in that it has great video and sound. And, yes, it has other good features. I want you to have something to do so ......