tablet

At $170, you'd expect the HP Slate 7 to be stripped of a few features; however, HP takes this a bit too far. The Slate 7 includes only 8GB of storage, and it has no gyroscope, no GPS hardware, poor camera quality, a slightly (but significantly) older version of Android, and a low-resolution screen.

And even the unique features we do get have their drawbacks. MicroSD is great, but with so little storage to begin with, buying a storage card won't simply be an option but a necessity. And while Beats Audio enhancements work great on your headphones, … Read more

Apple is eyeing different shapes for batteries to find more room for them in phones, tablets, and other mobile gadgets.

Published today by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, a patent application dubbed "Curved battery cells for portable electronic devices," describes exactly that. The shape of such a battery would be changed during the manufacturing process to form a curve in its design. That trick would be achieved by heating up a set of curved plates and applying pressure to the battery cell.

The goal would be to create a battery that can make better use of … Read more

Intel has released details on the next-generation graphics chips that will appear in upcoming laptops, hybrids, and desktops.

Iris graphics will be integrated into the 4th Gen Intel Core, aka, Haswell processors, the chip giant announced Wednesday.

"Iris graphics brings [an] eye-popping visual experience -- no extra graphics card required," Intel said in a statement.

There will be a 2X (two-fold) 3D performance increase over the 3rd Gen Intel Core "Ivy Bridge" chips for both the U- and Mobile H-series processors designed for ultrabooks and higher-performance laptops, respectively, Intel said.

For desktop R series processors, there … Read more

Adobe Systems plans to release high-end photo-editing software for tablets. The new app would be a close relative to Adobe's Lightroom software for PCs and serve as a cloud-connected companion to the program.

Tom Hogarty, Adobe's group product manager for Lightroom, demonstrated an early prototype version of the app Wednesday on the Grid, an online show from Photoshop guru Scott Kelby.

Adobe has done a good job with PC-centric photography software, but the company needs to better incorporate Internet connectivity and mobile devices into photography workflow, Hogarty said.

"We need to take that story beyond the desktop. … Read more

If the current crop of Windows 8 tablets, at least the majority that run Intel's low-power Atom tablet, were put edge to edge in a police lineup, you'd have a hard time telling them apart. Nearly all are virtually identical slabs of glass over black metal and plastic bodies.

Upon closer inspection, some have more ports and connections built into their outer edges, but this stylistic similarity indicates a larger issue: they all run essentially the same components inside, namely an Intel Atom Z-series processor, 2GB of RAM, a 10- or 11-inch 1,366x768-pixel touch screen, and either … Read more

About a year ago, the Toshiba Excite 10 LE debuted to somewhat lukewarm reviews. Priced at a whopping $530 for the 16GB model, it was praised for its thin, lightweight design, but dinged for its so-so screen and proprietary charger.

With today's deal, let's see if our perspective changes at all. Today only, and while supplies last, 1SaleADay has the refurbished Toshiba Excite 10 LE Android tablet for $199.99 shipped. That's one of the lowest prices I've seen on a 10.1-inch tablet, especially one with this design.

Quick note before I proceed: 1SaleADay continues … Read more

There they go again. Seems being the CEO at a technology company invariably involves hitting the stump and doing what George H.W. Bush (father, not the son) once famously called "the vision thing." So it was that earlier today Blackberry CEO Thorstein Heins made headlines when he predicted that the clock is ticking on tablet computers.

"In five years I don't think there'll be a reason to have a tablet anymore," he told Bloomberg.

Bold words, especially given the big, bold expectations for tablets sounded by the research houses. For example, Gartner said … Read more

BlackBerry CEO Thorsten Heins is not a fan of tablets.

Heins questioned the need for the mobile devices in an interview with Bloomberg on Monday.

"In five years I don't think there'll be a reason to have a tablet anymore," he said to Bloomberg.

Those are bold words for BlackBerry, which, of course, has had a checkered history with its sole attempt at a tablet, the BlackBerry PlayBook. The PlayBook, which was a massive flop when it debuted without core BlackBerry e-mail and messaging apps, is now considered more of a bargain-bin item.

Still, there are … Read more

Verizon Wireless is getting into the cloud business in a big way.

In the coming weeks, Verizon said Tuesday, it will deliver cloud-based storage for smartphones and tablets. The company's customers will receive 500MB of storage at no charge, but can get up to 125GB of storage. Verizon is offering four storage plans to customers:

"The secure storage app gives customers a place to back up and access their information," Verizon public relations manager David Samberg said Tuesday in a … Read more