Apple iPad vs Huawei MediaPad & HP TouchPad - Hackers say this is As Good as it Gets

{2:22} And no man putteth new wine into old bottles: else the new wine doth burst the bottles, and the wine is spilled, and the bottles will be marred: but new wine must be put into new bottles.

Mark 2 vs 22, King James Version

The News of the launch of Telecom Equipment Maker Huawei’s first true Google Android OS 3.2 aka Honeycomb Tablet to become yet another contender in the Tablet Wars caught me by surprise.

So states the article “Huawei introduces first 7-inch Android 3.2-powered Tablet”, published June 20 2011 by ADAM ROSENBERG, DigitalTrends and the article “Huawei unveils 7-inch Android 3.2 Tablet”, published JUNE 20, 2011 7:47 AM PDT by Don Reisinger, CNET News - The Digital Home.

Quick stats folks!

This latest contender from Huawei, rather dryly called the MediaPad, is a 7" Tablet running Google Android 3.2 aka Honeycomb, not Android 2.2 aka Froyo like their previous attempt, the Ideos S7 Slim as stated in the article “Huawei unveils Ideos X3 smartphone, Slim S7 Tablet”, published FEBRUARY 14, 2011 5:32 AM PST by Kent German, CNET News - Mobile 2011 World Congress.

A little under one (1) pound, it’s a Dual-Core deal with a 1.2 GHz Qualcomm Processor, a trend that the Apple iPad started as observed in my Geezam Blog article “Apple iPad 2 – Dual-Core Easy Skankin’”.

It boasts a front facing 1.3 MP front-facing cameras and comes with a rear facing 5 MP with HD recording capabilities. The Huawei MediaPad is packing the usual six-shooter suspect with a HSDPA+ (High Speed Downlink Packet Access) wireless receiver for 3G wireless with Wi-Fi (IEEE 802.11n), Bluetooth and Flash 10.3 support.

It’s power draining 1080p HD Video playback and HDMI port, however, may go a good way to explaining its lackluster six (6) hours battery life, which would make any Tablet buyer think twice before investing in this Tablet.

Huawei, back to the drawing board with this one, especially as all Media releases do not even mention RAM (Random Access Memory) specs or even details of on-board storage!

Six (6) hours battery life? Really, Huawei?

Better make that twelve (12) hours, as the Apple iPad is packing that much with heavy usage! Plus, this smells like vapourware!

On a different note, I was also expecting the 9.7” HP TouchPad is to go on pre-order this Monday June 20^th 2011AD, as the article ‘HP TouchPad available for preorder, starting at $499”, published JUNE 20, 2011 10:33 AM PDT by Eric Mack, CNET News – Crave and the article “HP TouchPad available for pre-order”, published JUNE 20, 2011 by GEOFF DUNCANJUNE, DigitalTrends.

It too, has decent drool-worthy specs, which are listed in my blog article entitled ‘HP and the TouchPad - Book of Revelations and The Spy Who Shagged Me”.

The 9.7-inch 1024 by 768-pixel HP TouchPad sports a 1.2 GHz Dual-Core Snapdragon Processor under the hood with a 1.3 MP front-facing camera (sorry no rear facing, as its not a camera!!).

Accessories in the boot include Wi-Fi (IEEEW802.11n) and Bluetooth stereo speakers banging with HP’s Beats Audio technology. The usual bells and whistles such as a gyroscope, magnetometer (compass) and GPS (Global Positioning Satellite) round out the motley crue of The Usual Suspects (1995).

And as anticipated, WebOS is all over this Tablet, with its Deck-of-card feature that is reminiscent of a different class of device, namely a certain smartphone from Palm, which HP had acquired.

Slick HP, real slick!

Available on July 1^st 2011AD, it promises to be a much better and less rushed experienced than the Motorola Xoom, especially as HP’s confidence is on the up-and-up after the surprise success of the Windows HP Slate 500 in December 2010AD as stated in my Geezam Blog article entitled “HP Slate 500 and Microsoft Windows 7 Experiment – Oh Ye of Little Faith, HP”.

This as Motorola’s 10” Honeycomb heft of a Tablet had excellent specs on paper. Motorola’s “Best of Show at CES (Computer Electronics Show) 2011” as bestowed by CNET News, however, underperformed when it came to Marketing and Engineering working together to create a prefect synergy (Red Strip Brand Manager Grace Silvera, did I say that right?) as my Geezam Blog article entitled “Motorola Xoom – 101 on How to Beat the Apple iPad” points out.

Something that Motorola seriously need to work on, as they are getting hammered thanks to their lack of interest in the finer points of marketing and analytical data and how it ties together as stated in the article “In a data driven world, marketing and IT must come together”, published June 8, 2011, 3:04pm PT by Cortney Fielding, GigaOM. 

This problem still bedevils Telecom Provider LIME here in Jamaica as noted in my blog article entitled “LIME and American Tourist Data Avalanche - The US$80 Million Dollar CannonBall Run”.

But the spotlight is shifted onto HP TouchPad and its excellent WebOS which comes with all the innovative bells and whistles in a price that is still a tad high at US$499 and a threadbare App Sore begging for Developers as my Geezam Blog article entitled “HP and the TouchPad – Release the WebOS and the Developers will Smile” notes.

It’s Open Source nature may be its saving grace, as I am predicting that by the year 2015AD, WebOS will be No. 2 Tablet and smartphone OS in the US of A and the World as stated in my blog article entitled “Nokia + Microsoft vs HP Web OS - Gartner's Ocean's Eleven Plan to Rob the Casino”.

This bet of mine is prognosticated on the fact that HP is shipping Laptops, PC (might be extinct by then, might not!!) and Intel-spec UltraBooks running on WebOS as my Geezam Blog entitled “HP and Web OS – 2011 is the Year of the Linux on PC” points out. 

In point form:

1. HP is cleverly doing as Apple is doing with iOS on the Mac: building App centric Ecosystems interconnecting Laptops, Tablet, smartphone and PC from the Ground up.

2. HP can leverage their No. 2 PC Maker status to push Web OS Ecosystem to even Corporate users who wanted to use as Open Source OS but were apprehensive of Enterprise support.

3. HP WebOS, via this deep integration of its WebOS and solid Ecosystem, would bring Open Source to regular desktop users, even in the Enterprise and Corporate World.

Three (3) HP’s in a line!!

Now for the “versus” part of my post!!!

The Apple iPad is currently the only Tablet in the market, if the anecdotal pricing evidence presented by CNET News Editor Brook Crothers can be believed as stated in his article “The iPad is the Tablet market, for now”, published JUNE 18, 2011 7:48 PM PDT by Brooke Crothers, CNET News – NanoTech.

Apple’s spanking new ad on YouTube entitled “Apple - iPad 2 TV Ad - Now” shows as much.

Apple is on course to make PC’s extinct this Summer and Christmas of 2011AD as my Geezam Blog article entitled “Are we witnessing Laptop and PC Extinction?” states, with twenty eight million (28,000,000), of these puppies coming out  worldwide for the entire 2011AD. 

Make that fifty two million (52,000,000) if the CDMA (Code Division Multiple Access) version for Telecom Provider Verizon makes the light of day as stated in the article “Apple forecasts to sell 28M iPads in 2011, chipping away at PC Sales”, published Wednesday September 8^th 2010 by Neil Hughes, The Apple Insider.

So with London Olympics 2012 just around the corner on July 27^th 2012AD, these Tablets may not measure up to the Apple iPad, muchless be able to even hold a candle to their lead.

But HP and Huawei have an ace up their sleeve!

Despite the lack of specs and the disappointing battery life, Huawei’s technical know-how in building 3G equipment shines in their design.

This based on my experience from Telecom Provider CLARO working with their 3G equipment as stated in my blog article entitled “FLOW vs LIME, Digicel, CLARO and Municipal Wi-Fi - The Empire Strikes Back Part Deux”.

HP’s integration of printing straight out of the box, their WebOS Motorola blur-eqsue interface and their WebOS Ecosystem tying all their product lines together is also showing. “Corporate and Enterprise Ready” is written all over WebOS and their clever Laptop, PC and UltraBook Ecosystem, which is their target audience after all, being the next best thing as far as I can see to a Corporate-ready Tablet.

Glaringly so in light of the lack of a solid Windows 8 Tablet from the Redmond Virginia boys at Microsoft + Nokia tag-team as noted in by my blog article entitled “Nokia + Microsoft, Tablet and smartphone Prospects by 2015 - Three Software Musketeers”.

Next to a Windows 8 Tablet, such as the 12.1” Asus Eee Slate EP121, as stated in my blog article entitled “Asus Transformer vs Apple iPad 2 - X-Men First Class for Ludacris' Numba' One Spot”, HP and Huawei might actually help me to get some work done and be virus-phoebe at the same time, thanks to their Open Source roots.

But it is the modders or Hackers (1995) who might appreciate these Tablets the most.

The fact that they are Open Source means that they are rootable and thus reprogrammable. Throw in the growing market “White” Box Tablets as noted in my blog article entitled ‘Apple iPad vs “White Box” Tablet - Jason's Argonauts Home Improvement The Next Big Thing” for Hackers (1995), this is As Good as It Gets (1997)!