What businesses can learn from the TouchPad fiasco

Friday, September 9th, 2011

I wonder what Bill Hewlett and Dave Packard would have made of the TouchPad fiasco? One of the fundamental tenets of successful business is to start with a good product – the problem with HP’s defunct tablet is that this was also where it ended.

I was lucky. Using a barrage of open browser windows I managed to order one of the £89 bargains via Best Buy. I didn’t fully believe I’d succeeded until it turned up on my doorstep two days later.

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HP Pre 3 review: first look

Tuesday, February 15th, 2011

It doesn’t seem that long since we first laid eyes on the Palm Pre 2, but its successor, the HP Pre 3, is already here — or at least it will be this summer.

First impressions of the device are promising. Where the Pre 2 was a slight upgrade from the exceedingly underwhelming Pre, the Pre 3 is a “rip up the plans and start again” job.

To start, it’s a bigger device, with a 480 x 800 3.6in touchscreen, finally bringing WebOS into the world of big-screen smartphones.

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HP Veer review: first look

Monday, February 14th, 2011

Following the heady excitement of LG’s 3D extravaganza, moving on to HP’s tiny Veer might seem a bit of a comedown, but far from it. Of the three devices HP showed-off this morning, it’s the one that had the biggest “oooh” factor.

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HP TouchPad review: first look

Monday, February 14th, 2011

After its announcement last week, this is the first opportunity we’ve had for a hands-on with HP’s WebOS-equipped TouchPad. If you haven’t had the chance to check out the news story covering the announcement, the core details are pretty straightforward.

The TouchPad is a 10in tablet, with a resolution of 1,024 x 768, running a tablet-optimised version of webOS, the mobile operating system HP inherited when it acquired Palm. Under the hood is a meaty dual-core 1.2GHz Qualcomm 8060 processor, there’s a 1.3-megapixel webcam on the front for making video calls with (but no camera on the rear), and HP will be selling the device in 16GB and 32GB versions. Initially only the Wi-Fi version will be available, but 3G-enabled versions will follow soon after.

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