[Banco]

Also, have you tryied to write on crackberry from your PB? The keyboard lag is terrible.

I don't have any keyboard lag at all. None whatsoever. Sent from my PlayBook!

[blueberrymerry]

And where the heck is Asian language input? Android and iOS have it, WP7 supported a few East Asian ones while WP8 adds right-to-left scripts, but the Playbook is pretty much Euro-only. The Unicode compliance means you can view most languages out there but there's no input support for Simplified and Traditional Chinese, for example.

How hard can it be to write input modules for these languages?

[RubberChicken76]

How hard can it be to write input modules for these languages?

Probably harder than you think or it would have been done by now.

[mysticmeg]

Why didn't the playbook gain much traction?

One answer;

Because it was from my point of view a flop that seemed too bland as when compared to an android tablet. Like I said this is just my own view!!! So don't kill me for my own opinion.

Sent from my BlackBerry 9360 using Tapatalk

[Stocklone]

I bought the Playbook when it was $300 for a 64GB tablet. You still can't that kind of deal on any other platform. I love the OS. Absolutely love it. No other tablet has a better experience due to the tablet relying more on gestures than tapping. I used to use it every day over my HTC Flyer. The web browsing experience was infinitely better. And I love shooting video with my Playbook. Fast forward to today, I think the Playbook has a better OS but internet loads WAY faster on my Galaxy Note 10.1. So I mostly use that now. I even recommended the Nexus 7 over the Playbook as a Christmas present just because the hardware is so dated, lack of Amazon support and the person had no interest in having a back camera. I really hope RIM does a sequel with it running BB10 and the latest hardware specs. I would definitely pick one up. For now I'll settle with buying the Z10. It would be great if BB10 made the Playbook handle the web quicker but I'm not counting on it.

[rafikiphoto]

I have had my PB for a year now and I love it. However a major deficiency for me is its inability to connect to external devices. I bought an Asus Transformer Infinity with keyboard so that I can transfer my photos from SD card to the tablet and, if necessary, either on to a portable HDD or into the cloud. The Asus does that for me.

I can now compare the Android tablet to the PB for general use and, for me, the PB wins hands down for speed, stability and smooth operation. If the PB had connectivity to external devices and perhaps more native apps it would be winner.

BTW I have found nothing Android to match the marvelous PB Print to Go.

[RubberChicken76]

Because it was from my point of view a flop that seemed too bland as when compared to an android tablet.

No complaints about your opinion, but a little more detail as to why it's "bland" compared to an Android tablet would be nice.

[RubberChicken76]

just because the hardware is so dated

There is a newer, faster PlayBook people.

<Beats head against wall>

[Stocklone]

Sorry. Bumping it up it to 1.5GHz, making it LTE and insanely expensive doesn't do me any good. I want a new wifi only version. So quit beating your head against the wall.

[RubberChicken76]

Sorry. Bumping it up it to 1.5GHz, making it LTE and insanely expensive doesn't do me any good. I want a new wifi only version. So quit beating your head against the wall.

Your comment made me chuckle. I must confess, the "PlayBook hardware is so dated" argument bothers me because a) they have updated it; and b) I don't feel inhibited by the specs it has now. Not the way I do with my iPod touch and not the way I did with my old Torch. I suppose they could make it "Quad Core", but what would that give it over the current 1.5 GHZ dual core in terms of performance? They could give it a retina quality display, but would you notice it on a 7" screen? What apps run on a quadcore tablet that make you say, "wow - my PlayBook or iPad can't do that???" I certainly haven't seen any.

I'd rather see BlackBerry 10 on it.

[howarmat]

Your comment made me chuckle. I must confess, the "PlayBook hardware is so dated" argument bothers me because a) they have updated it; and b) I don't feel inhibited by the specs it has now. Not the way I do with my iPod touch and not the way I did with my old Torch. I suppose they could make it "Quad Core", but what would that give it over the current 1.5 GHZ dual core in terms of performance? They could give it a retina quality display, but would you notice it on a 7" screen? What apps run on a quadcore tablet that make you say, "wow - my PlayBook or iPad can't do that???" I certainly haven't seen any.

I'd rather see BlackBerry 10 on it.

They dont need quadcore but yes you would see the difference over the dual core for sure. And yes the display is dated now. It has to be upped next release for sure. And the biggest thing is that the upgrades went to a device that probably hasnt sold over a couple thousand devices. Even ditching the PB name would help the product out on the next release.

[rog518za]

It was love at first Site. Sold galaxy tab immediately after bridging bb to store demo. OK, os2 was already out, so I was lucky wrt the missing native apps. As long as it's cheaper than other platforms it will being sold. Hopefully all new PlayBooks bought after bb10 launch will come standard with BB10 and also new adverts and support from carriers for PlayBook reloaded.

[RubberChicken76]

They dont need quadcore but yes you would see the difference over the dual core for sure.

It's certainly snappier, but not what I would expect it to be. But again, I'm of the bias that these manufacturers should spend less time trying to one up each other with hardware that isn't going to be utilized and more time on improving the battery tech. Just waiting for the "here's our 8 core, 1080p smartphone with the 96 megapixel camera, 5G connectivity and 9" screen. But it only runs for 30 minutes, the apps are about the same and your eyes can't perceive a difference"

And yes the display is dated now. It has to be upped next release for sure.

Sure, it would be nice to not detect the pixels, though I still question the viability of some of these displays on a small screen.

And the biggest thing is that the upgrades went to a device that probably hasnt sold over a couple thousand devices.

Yeah - this is the big unknown. Would love to ask Thorsten to give his honest thoughts on the PlayBook. is it a science project that dies once BlackBerry 10 comes out on the phones and you've cleaned up the retail mess (now mostly done), or will you revisit? I'm struggling with how they make money in that game. PlayBooks are not cheap to build and they don't have the brand/apps to command a higher price; nor the longterm ecosystem to use it as a loss-leader.

Google Nexus, Kindle Fire and yes PlayBook (and HP Touchpad) proved there's a market for a smaller, cheaper tablet and ultimately forced Apple to respond with iPad Mini.

But not sure how RIM makes money at it.

Even ditching the PB name would help the product out on the next release.

Maybe. They ditched the Storm too and replaced it with the Curve and Torch brands but those touchscreens didn't do so well. I'm not convinced PlayBook has a rep like the Storm. My reviews I saw of STORM were like, "What is this disaster???". Most PlayBook reviews were more like, "I see the potential but you left out key pieces". Likewise, a lot of people bought the Storm, hated it and many jumped platforms. Not that many were early adopters of PlayBook whereas a lot more got it after the price cut and after 2.0 came out.

[Stocklone]

I just want browsing as fast as my Galaxy Note 10.1. I don't think that's too much to ask. I'm not going to use the slower Playbook browser instead of my Note 10.1. I use what's best. And my Playbook is no longer it.

Again, an expensive 1.5GHz LTE version of the Playbook doesn't do me any good. I'm not paying extra for LTE I'm never ever going to use so I can get a CPU bump. I would also have to downgrade from 64GB to 32GB. How is that a good deal for me?.

I own a Note 10.1. Does it look like I care about Retina displays? I love the quality of the Playbook screen. Bumping it up to the same resolution as the Z10 would be nice but not necessary.

Maybe you don't feel inhibited because you don't have the Note to compare it to on a daily basis. The Internet loads way faster. I'm not sitting around for 50 seconds for a web page to fully load when my Note can do the same page in 6 seconds.

If BB10 can get it under 10 seconds, I would say the OS upgrade is enough. Otherwise they need a true sequel to the original wifi release. Having the Qualcomm S4 inside with 2GB of RAM like the Z10 would be great. Make a wifi only version that I can get for under $500 and I would gladly buy it.

[RubberChicken76]

I just want browsing as fast as my Galaxy Note 10.1. I don't think that's too much to ask. I'm not going to use the slower Playbook browser instead of my Note 10.1. I use what's best. And my Playbook is no longer it.

Which is fair. If you look at my othert posts, you'll notice I'm not pleased with the PlayBook browser either.

Again, an expensive 1.5GHz LTE version of the Playbook doesn't do me any good. I'm not paying extra for LTE I'm never ever going to use so I can get a CPU bump. I would also have to downgrade from 64GB to 32GB. How is that a good deal for me?.

Points are valid. My point (again) is that people keep forgetting there is 'newer PlayBook hardware'. That's it, that's all. I perhaps assumed you were one of those incorrectly.

I own a Note 10.1. Does it look like I care about Retina displays?

You're getting way too worked up about this.

Maybe you don't feel inhibited because you don't have the Note to compare it to on a daily basis. The Internet loads way faster. I'm not sitting around for 50 seconds for a web page to fully load when my Note can do the same page in 6 seconds.

Part of the thing here is that I don't feel that the hardware is the problem .... the implementation of the browser is. The iPad mini loads up webpages faster too. And the PlayBook loads up pages way, way faster the second you turn javascript off. This suggests to me that the browser implementation could be improved and get a much better result on existing hardware.

[Bold_until_Hybrid_Comes]

I'm happy with my playbook and I'm only looking forward. Its up to RIM to see and fix their past mistakes, not me.

[FF22]

They dont need quadcore but yes you would see the difference over the dual core for sure. And yes the display is dated now. It has to be upped next release for sure. And the biggest thing is that the upgrades went to a device that probably hasnt sold over a couple thousand devices. Even ditching the PB name would help the product out on the next release.

I guess I have to get out more! I really have not looked at other Displays. Maybe the old eyes would not notice much difference (which could be nice in some respects). I mean when I look at the pb, I see a really nice, crisp, bright, clear image. What am I missing? (don't tell me)

[RubberChicken76]

you can see the pixels on the PlayBook whereas its harder to on some of the higher end screens.

[rotorwrench]

" Why didn't the PlayBook gain much traction?"

Easy, one word: Tires ............ It always comes down to the tires dude.

[Michel Souris]

Fixed!!

Not fixed. Still VERY broken...
I don't know about you, but my PB still doesn't do email as well as any Android or Apple device. Still no full IMAP folder support, with ability to keep mail as long as I want. This remains a killer for me and thousands of others. Pitiful.

[blueberrymerry]

I have had my PB for a year now and I love it. However a major deficiency for me is its inability to connect to external devices. I bought an Asus Transformer Infinity with keyboard so that I can transfer my photos from SD card to the tablet and, if necessary, either on to a portable HDD or into the cloud. The Asus does that for me.

Indeed... I have an Android tablet with an SD card slot and full size USB so I can read camera cards, thumb drives and external drives with no problem. It has Bluetooth file transfer support so I can easily transfer files with other devices when I'm out in the field. The tablet also uses USB MTP to link up with the computer so I don't need to install extra drivers. The whole thing functions like a really light notebook with awesome battery life.

The PB doesn't do any of these. It has USB On-the-go which somewhat works on rooted devices, but computer connections need a special driver because the PB talks using SMB over USB. RIM could have just used USB Mass Storage or MTP but they went with this crazy proprietary solution instead. Bluetooth is only for bridging (I don't have a Blackberry phone) or headsets, no file transfers there.

As it is, the PB can't talk to my smartphone or other tablets directly. I need a Wi-fi network so the other devices can see the PB's fileshare. It's funny and annoying when I'm outside, my phone and PB are next to each other, but they can't talk to each other. I love the PB's design and OS2 is so easy to use but the hardware connectivity stuff really needs fixing.

[blueberrymerry]

Probably harder than you think or it would have been done by now.

Chinese and Japanese input has been available on Blackberry phones since... forever. Couldn't the same team that did that work on something similar for the Playbook?

Unless the Playbook OS team is just 5 people sitting in a basement in Waterloo

[goku_vegeta]

Chinese and Japanese input has been available on Blackberry phones since... forever. Couldn't the same team that did that work on something similar for the Playbook?

Unless the Playbook OS team is just 5 people sitting in a basement in Waterloo

Not one line of code works in BlackBerry PlayBook OS or BlackBerry 10....... Okay fine I lied, Webworks/HTML5 coding is actually quite similar from BlackBerry Java OS and BlackBerry 10/PlayBook OS, but I know for a fact it's not coded in HTML5, that's all done natively so not a single line of native code will work on the PlayBook OS or BlackBerry 10 from the BlackBery Java OS.

Now RIM has stated all the languages they currently support will be on BlackBerry 10 at launch, but with the Dev Alpha here I'm not seeing any Japanese input yet. Since I am taking Japanese language courses in University, having that input is VERY helpful, I use it all the time on my 9900 and used it in my previous BlackBerry devices, kind of a pain if my PlayBook has Japanese study apps but I can't input text in Japanese.

[RubberChicken76]

Chinese and Japanese input has been available on Blackberry phones since... forever. Couldn't the same team that did that work on something similar for the Playbook?

The PlayBook and the BlackBerry Smartphones are based on two entirely different platforms.

[howarmat]

with the outlook of summer being the soonest for bb10 on the PB its not going to "gain traction" IMO. They will need a new tablet to create a stir that they hoped for in the original PB