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General Tablet News - AAPL, GOOG, MSFT, and AMZN


VAL9000

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Wasn't sure if I should drop this in AAPL, GOOG, MSFT, or AMZN thread since there is an impact to all.  I'm recommending that these product related news posts that have impact to multiple potential investments get placed into a "General Discussion" thread.  This will keep the investment-oriented threads a little cleaner and free of too much speculation and product discussion.

 

Some very interesting developments from Google today:

 

http://googleblog.blogspot.ca/2012/10/nexus-best-of-google-now-in-three-sizes.html

 

That's a Nexus 7 with 32GB and Mobile Data selling for $300, vs. the iPad mini equivalent selling for $560.  The 7 is going for nearly half the price of the iPad mini.

 

The Nexus 4 and Nexus 10 both look attractive, too.  They're both clearly competing directly with the iPhone 5 and the new new iPad.  Similar specs, better price point.

 

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I used a smaller nexus tablet last weekend, and I have to say, it was a pretty terrible user experience--slow, buggy, not user intuitive, etc.  I'm assuming most android tablets are better and/or maybe it was an older/cheap version.

 

The Nexus 7 or was it a different Android tablet?

 

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Leave it to Google to announce new tablets (& a phone) on a day when all the media is consumed with the hurricane. They really suck at marketing.

 

 

"Google was forced to cancel Monday’s event to unveil a new smartphone, the Nexus 4, as well as several new tablets, all aimed at the holiday shopping season."

 

From the NYTimes.

 

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/30/business/brunt-of-business-impact-yet-to-come.html?ref=business

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I used a smaller nexus tablet last weekend, and I have to say, it was a pretty terrible user experience--slow, buggy, not user intuitive, etc.  I'm assuming most android tablets are better and/or maybe it was an older/cheap version.

 

The Nexus 7 or was it a different Android tablet?

 

I need to ask my friend--I thought he said it was a Nexus, but I didn't catch the number.  I think the price point was more around $100-150, so presumably this $300 would be much better.

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Can the human eye tell the difference between the resolutions?

 

Technically yes.

http://michaelbach.de/ot/lum_hyperacuity/index.html

 

In practice, people may not notice???  There are a lot of things that we can spot but usually we don't notice.  For example, people tried doing 4K resolution in movie theatres instead of 2K and apparently nobody cares.

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Guest rimm_never_sleeps

The Nexus 10 has 300 ppi (2560 x 1600) resolution compared to the ipad retina display of 264 ppi (2048 x 1536).  That's impressive !

 

https://www.google.com/nexus/10/

 

So all the bugs with Android will be more visible and the pixelated apps designed for phones will look better?  :P

 

yeah but at least maps told Android users the Hurricane was on the East coast. :)

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Can the human eye tell the difference between the resolutions?

 

Technically yes.

http://michaelbach.de/ot/lum_hyperacuity/index.html

 

In practice, people may not notice???  There are a lot of things that we can spot but usually we don't notice.  For example, people tried doing 4K resolution in movie theatres instead of 2K and apparently nobody cares.

 

Even without going to that level, the whole "Retina" thing was predicated on a certain usage distance.  If you use it closer than that, you can easily see pixels.

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The Nexus 10 has 300 ppi (2560 x 1600) resolution compared to the ipad retina display of 264 ppi (2048 x 1536).  That's impressive !

 

https://www.google.com/nexus/10/

 

So all the bugs with Android will be more visible and the pixelated apps designed for phones will look better?  :P

 

well I suspect that's part of the point.  Google is hoping that with their version of the retina display that will incent developers to develop apps for that resolution..  It will be interesting to see if they follow suit or not..

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The Nexus 10 has 300 ppi (2560 x 1600) resolution compared to the ipad retina display of 264 ppi (2048 x 1536).  That's impressive !

 

https://www.google.com/nexus/10/

 

So all the bugs with Android will be more visible and the pixelated apps designed for phones will look better?  :P

 

well I suspect that's part of the point.  Google is hoping that with their version of the retina display that will incent developers to develop apps for that resolution..  It will be interesting to see if they follow suit or not..

 

I think that's right. 

 

I believe developers do get paid more off of development for iPads, but that's in large part because it has been an iPad market.  Now that the innovation gap is closing, the question is whether we will see market share taken by GOOG, MSFT, etc., which will result in more tablet-optimized development for their respective ecosystems.

 

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it seems like the google/android model is hardest on developers, particularly with all the different resolutions they have to deal with.  For Apple, the developers know what they support--ipad, ipad mini (which is just legacy ipad I believe) and iphone.  For the others, there's a lot of potential resolutions, so it's very hard to design a single UI/experience that will be excellent across all devices.

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Its interesting though. Google is Microsoft and Apple is Apple. I have an HTC one but the Nexus 4 looks sweet. Google has 5 massive hardware companies all creating phones for them and pushing the boundaries. They also have smart phones from $100 to $700. This is interesting to watch, I have no dog in this fight, but I have a feeling Google will continue taking share.

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Guest valueInv

Its interesting though. Google is Microsoft and Apple is Apple. I have an HTC one but the Nexus 4 looks sweet. Google has 5 massive hardware companies all creating phones for them and pushing the boundaries. They also have smart phones from $100 to $700. This is interesting to watch, I have no dog in this fight, but I have a feeling Google will continue taking share.

1, Except for one OEM, all others including Google are losing money

2, As the iPad Mini indicates, Apple is not going for marketshare

3, Google's OS business model is very different from MSFTs

4, The Nexus 4 does not support LTE

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Exactly, Apple is not about market share, they're making much more on every Apple product sold. Google on the other hand, is really about turning software into a commodity and using a large userbase to drive search. Different business models.

 

Think about it, Apple would gain market share if they slashed prices on their Mac products. They're quite expensive.....compared to my very good laptop which I got for $500.

 

I think Google has a much more serious threat in Windows Phone - they can replicate Google's business model.

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Guest valueInv

I think Google has a much more serious threat in Windows Phone - they can replicate Google's business model.

Amazon is more of an immediate threat. Amazon replicates Google's model of subsidizing the device in an attempt to make money in other ways. Both Google and Amazon are locked in a pricing battle to the bottom. Amazon should be releasing a phone also. Both companies are willing to lose money to gain marketshare and they are likely take the low end market. Amazon is also using Android, so any investments Google makes in it, Amazon gets for free and uses it to compete with Google. Amazon also directs the user to search within its own site for products it sells.

 

MSFT is smart enough to keep out of the pricing war - hence the $500 price point. However, if Surface gains share, so will Windows phone. This would boost Bing and cause problems for Google search. MSFT would be smart to get Amazon to use Bing as its default search engine in its devices.

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  • 1 month later...

Spent a good hour or so at Best Buy today playing around with the many tablets they have available.

 

-My main takeaway is that the iPad mini is incredibly impressive. This was the first time I had seen one of them in person, and you really need to see/use one to really get how nice of a device it is, especially compared with all the other 7" tablets out there. I was pleasantly surprised by the screen on it. While it's not a 'retina' screen', it is noticeably better than the iPad 1 and 2. I'm sure they'll release one with a retina screen next year. This mini is real light and compact, and I really like the shape & design of the casing. I'd love to see a future iPad with the same small bevel as the mini - so you'd still have the 9.7" screen, but a smaller device.

 

Also, I played around with probably 15+ different android tablets. While I think Android phones are pretty good, I'm really unimpressed with all the android tablets out there. I've yet to see an Android tablet that can really rival the iPad (especially taking into account the abundance of great iPad apps).

 

-The Kindle Fire HD and the Nook HD+ are good options for people looking for a tablet to use primarily as a reader. I really like the 9" screen size of the Nook HD+, and was impressed with the screen quality. The big drawback of the Nook as that there are pretty much much no customization options, and you have no access to Google Play (same thing with the Kindle Fire). There's no way to even download Amazon's Kindle app to the Nook (w/out jail breaking it).

 

Regarding the Windows 8 tablets out there...eh...some of them look really nice, but I found Windows 8 to be pretty confusing on some of them. While some of the tablets have a Home button (that functions similarly to the iPad - bringing you to the home screen), many others don't have any buttons. I found myself inside apps, and had a hard time figuring out how to get out of them and back to the home screen.

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Guest valueInv

Spent a good hour or so at Best Buy today playing around with the many tablets they have available.

 

-My main takeaway is that the iPad mini is incredibly impressive. This was the first time I had seen one of them in person, and you really need to see/use one to really get how nice of a device it is, especially compared with all the other 7" tablets out there. I was pleasantly surprised by the screen on it. While it's not a 'retina' screen', it is noticeably better than the iPad 1 and 2. I'm sure they'll release one with a retina screen next year. This mini is real light and compact, and I really like the shape & design of the casing. I'd love to see a future iPad with the same small bevel as the mini - so you'd still have the 9.7" screen, but a smaller device.

 

 

I had the same experience. Apple has nailed it again.

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