Tablets

The global smartphone tipping point: '$100 or less'

BARCELONA, Spain--These days you'll be hard-pressed to find people who remember when personal computers were luxury items that few could afford. Now smartphones are increasingly headed in the same direction, continuing to become cheaper and more ubiquitous for everyone, not just for the global elite.

The mass market in question goes well beyond the budget-conscious living in developed markets, and focuses specifically on getting more smartphones and into hands in emerging markets. This was the topic of a panel discussion at MWC today.

Research numbers support the adoption trends of both developed and developing markets. Demand in the U.… Read more

Get a Toshiba Thrive 10-inch Android tablet for $259.99

Is now the right time to take a leap (because it's Leap Day, get it?) and buy a tablet? Surely the more curious crowd will wait to see what Apple unveils on March 7.

On the other hand, a deal's a deal, and lately the tablet deals have been coming fast and furious. Like this one: today only, and while supplies last, 1SaleADay has the refurbished Toshiba Thrive 10.1-inch Android tablet for $259.99, plus $4.99 for shipping. Any way you slice it, that's a mighty attractive deal on a 10-inch tablet.

The Thrive is … Read more

Rumor Has It, Ep. 22: Is Google jealous of Siri? (podcast)

Apple's invite doesn't explicitly say "iPad 3," which leaves us surmising whether the tablet about to be unveiled mere feet from the CNET office will be--drum-roll not necessary--the iPad 2S!

Noooooooooooooooo!

But since the mere acknowledgment of an iPad announcement on March 7 makes me the loser of the game show this month (sad face), we come up with an ingenious plan to find out the true identity of the iPad as soon as it's announced!

No, not by live-blogging or finagling another invite to the event from Apple (pshaw), but rather by filming me … Read more

Samsung Galaxy Tab 2 hands-on (video, photos)

BARCELONA, Spain--Samsung's tablet spotlight is on the flashy Galaxy Note 10.1 this Mobile World Congress, but after putting down the stylus, I picked up both new versions of the Samsung Galaxy Tab 2.

If you've ever seen the original Galaxy Tab 10.1 and Galaxy Tab 7 Plus, you'll find similar-looking devices, with Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich preinstalled. Instead of making these tablets top of the line, Samsung says it'll introduce them at lower price points than the original, in an effort to compete with dedicated e-readers.

Both devices were on display at … Read more

Why the Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1's stylus works (hands on, video)

BARCELONA, Spain--Forget about a smartphone you have to force to be a tablet. The Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1 is a tablet in its own right, and in my opinion, the appropriate size for a device that makes use of a stylus for additional creative composition.

Let's back it up for a moment with a look at the Galaxy Note family tree. The first Note, which CNET first spotted back in September and has since intensely reviewed, comes with a 5.3-inch screen and a skinny, 4-inch tall pressure-sensitive stylus you can use to doodle or take notes.

The … Read more

Samsung: 'We're not doing very well in the tablet market'

BARCELONA, Spain--Samsung Electronics admitted that its attempt to breach the tablet market has largely been a flop, with one executive offering a sobering summary of its performance.

"Honestly, we're not doing very well in the tablet market," Hankil Yoon, a product strategy executive for Samsung, said today during a media roundtable here.

That's about as frank a statement as it gets from any executive at the Mobile World Congress trade show this week.

That Samsung hasn't met expectations in its tablet business isn't a huge surprise; the company lags well behind Apple's iPad … Read more

Huawei claims first-ever quad-core 10-inch tablet

Chinese electronics company Huawei just made bold claims at MWC when its chairman, Richard Yu, said the Ascend D Quad is the world's fastest phone. Naming another milestone, Huawei has announced plans for the first 10-inch tablet powered by a quad-core processor.

Called the MediaPad10 FHD, the slate uses a similar 1.5GHz K3 CPU Huawei expects to place in the Ascend D Quad. Another alluring attribute you'll find in the MediaPad FHD is a 10-inch IPS LCD screen with a supersharp resolution of 1,920x1,200 pixels. Dolby Surround Sound audio processing will be onboard as well, along with an 8-megapixel main camera and 1.3-megapixel front-facing shooter.

Of course I thought the first 10-inch quad-core tablet was the Asus Transformer Prime. Truth be told, that's a 10.1-inch quad-core tablet, so perhaps Huawei is really splitting hairs here. … Read more

Get a refurbished Kindle Fire for $169 shipped

Amazon just took the gloves off.

Less than a week after Barnes & Noble introduced an 8GB Nook Tablet for $199, priced to compete head-on with the Kindle Fire, Amazon has started selling refurbished Kindle Fires for $169 shipped.

I should note that this deal first went live on Saturday, and I've been checking all weekend to make sure they're still in stock. As of this morning, they are.

Also worth noting: it wasn't very long ago that scoring an e-ink-screened Kindle e-reader for $169 was major news. Now, for the same price, you can get a … Read more

Get more from your mobile with the Asus Padfone

BARCELONA, Spain--Asus struck a high note when it introduced the one-of-a-kind Transformer Prime last year, but that device was only the beginning.

Today at Mobile World Congress, Asus finally released its long-awaited Padfone. Though the device first made an appearance last May in a promotional video, sightings of the actual device have been rare. And after skipping an official unveiling at CES last month, speculation mounted that Asus would use Barcelona as the stage instead.

At its most basic level, the Padfone is a candy bar Android smartphone with high-end, though hardly revolutionary, specs. You'll find a 4.3-inch … Read more