I apparently was THE guy in the whole country that bought one of these, and i've only had it about a week. I bought it during HP's recent 'sale'.
I'd like to say that i'm pretty unhappy with HP at the moment, and I have to wonder about the business logic of this move. They didn't sell enormous volumes, but they sold enough of these things that there are a couple hundred thousand people out there who are not going to be very happy right now. If they are much like me, they are currently putting this device back into its box in preparation to send it back to HP, and they are likely making plans to never purchase another HP product as long as they live.
I mean really... put these things on sale, announce the price cut is permanent because consumers showed pleasing amounts of interest, and then kill the whole product line 1 week later, and barely more than a month after introduction? Absolutely horrendous.
HP has created some ill will with this that isn't going away overnight.
Regarding the device itself, I just have to say that WebOS truly is very nice. It suffers at the hands of its software, and it is pretty clear that HP rushed it to market. But it is sad that HP is so short sighted in this. A second round of better hardware would have gone a long way toward erasing the negative commentary.
I've got an Amazon RMA and this thing is headed back to Amazon ASAP.
What a sad, short life for something so promising; the buffoons at HP ought to be slapped.
I think you are seeing the results of a top-level decision made a while ago -- when it became clear that the TouchPad wasn't going to sell in its current incarnation. What, likely, happened then, was that the people responsible for the TouchPad convinced top management to give them another chance: reduce the price of current product, extend resellers; payment terms, clear the inventory and accelerate work on a follow-on. However, the price discount/reduction didn't goose sales and events overtook them:
--The BestBuy issue made it all public
--The upcoming Stockholders meeting
--They wouldn't be able to hide the devices in the channel as devices sold
--The disruptive changes planned for other parts of the company
The biggest thing, IMO, is the politics -- The new CEO was tasked with turning HP around, The PSG is not his area of expertise, He followed the "experts" advice and it didn't work. Lastly, this problem was created by his predecessors -- he had to end it or own it -- easy choice.
...then there is that "public vote of confidence" followed shortly with a "public crucifixion" thing.
I happen to be one of the unfortunate people who have one of these devices (and an iPad), and I just have one quibble with what you've said: the OS is really quite nice, and in some ways more enjoyable to use than iOS. It has some features, like Synergy, which are really awesome, and it had a delightful notification system well before Apple bundled something similar into the as yet unreleased iOS 5.
WebOS, in my opinion, is a victim of corporate stupidity, not of its own failings. Bluntly, HP killed WebOS... by pairing it with a hardware offering that was terribly lack luster and by rushing it into the market before they had ironed out most of the bugs in version 3. They also didn't put as much effort into an ecosystem as they should have (although the HP App Catalog is much nicer than the Android store, and is almost as nice IMHO as the App Store) - I still con't quite understand who so many iOS competitors can't see how important this is. So, HP simply screwed up terrifically, and now they aren't willing to pair their mistake with an honest effort to correct - instead they are screwing over the consumers who bought these devices, their channel partners, etc. Brilliant business decision making - NOT.
I'm not sure I remember a single product released and then cancelled quite so quickly. I'll say this: it also has cancelled any future purchases of HP products from myself. I've already RMA'd this thing for its return flight to Amazon.
Very sad.
Some things about it are nice, but overall, it's not that great. The average person doesn't want to be bothered learning it, and it does have a steeper learning curve than iOS. That's true of Honeycomb as well.
It has its limits as has been pointed out by the reviewers. Unfortunately, a product has to be pretty good out of the starting gate these days. The standards have risen because of Apple. Good enough no longer wins the race, or even comes in the money.
I'll point out again that this wasn't HPs' fault. The product line was dead before they bought the company, and the Touchpad was developed by Rubenstein and his team from Palm. They were the ones who screwed it up. HP supplied support, money and marketing to get the interest up. But the products were flawed from the get go, and nothing any company could have done would have saved it.
I'm completely shocked to be honest. I thought the WebOS had legs and HP would find itself competing head on with Microsoft and Apple. This seems like a desparate measure at least on the WebOS front. I understand dropping the PC business though their system were pretty nice. Well, good luck with your new direction HP.
WebOS was supposed to be used in their printers too. What will they do with their printer division?
Good question. Some thinking is that it logically follows with the computer division. At one tine, all of HPs' profits were from ink sales.
All he has to do is offer to suspend minimum wage, occupational health and safety, and environmental laws and allow them to pay zero tax and they might consider it.
Edit: I think Foxconn just bought Cisco's set-top box plant in Juarez, so if they wanted to assemble iPads there, NAFTA would allow them to be imported into the US without tariff and worker and environmental protections are much weaker also. Maybe Jerry can try to get Foxconn execs a date with Linda Ronstadt or something.
Ha!
You know your Gov. Moonbeam!
I never thought I'd say this but The Gov is trying, he has some reasonable ideas, and seems to be getting things done ... He's not your Earl Warren or Goodie Knight, tho
We moved to CA from Tucson (then there and back again) Every third person and politician in Tucson is named Ronstadt.
I never thought I'd say this but The Gov is trying, he has some reasonable ideas, and seems to be getting things done ... He's not your Earl Warren or Goodie Knight, tho
We moved to CA from Tucson (then there and back again) Every third person and politician in Tucson is named Ronstadt.
Rip palm. Perhapsnrubenstein should come back to apple and help apple with a major design overhaul of iOS UI.
We have iOS 5 beta running on an iP4, 2 iPad 2s and an iPad 1. There have been intermittent issues, but no show-stoppers.
It really is a very nice OS -- the iP4 with iOS 5 does everything that i want a phone to do, and more.
It also does everything well on both versions of iPads -- but, I want Apple to keep pushing the envelope on the iPad, more, faster, better, smoother...
When iOS 5 and iCloud arrive this fall, I suspect that iPads will solve the computer needs for many households... no tethering needed!
I think AI should update their style guide so that the picture of Apple's new "spaceship" is appended to every article, sort of like a halo. The juxtaposition is amplified when the article in question has nothing to do with the new Apple HQ, for example, when talking about the demise of HP's webOS division.
I have provided a sample. Bathe in the magnificent light of my post! Behold the Apple Halo!
Blame the one writer here that always gets the blame.
True, but HP isn't offering competition. They suck at what they do. That's like the Pittsburgh Steelers playing a local high school football team.
True competition comes from innovation and balls. HP has neither. Nobody is willing to put what it takes into coming up with new ideas and new ways of doing things. They'd rather copy Apple and come up with cheap crap. Don't make the mistake of calling that competition.
Not really.
They do make some cheap crap, but they also do nice high-end business units, like Elitebooks, and consumer Envy line is not bad at all.
Elitebooks in particular are nice units, solid industrial design, metal chassis... they are not as slim as MacBooks but they are built to comply military standards regarding dust, shock, moisture... and they are really reliable. In addition, they are easy to maintain - most of their bottom is under one big removable cover so once it is open, you have access to HDD, RAM, WLAN, BT and broadband modules, even fan is exposed so it's easy to clean dust and dirt from it.
They also all come with default 3 year nbd on-site warranty, at least here in NZ.
We have couple of 14 and 15" units in our office, and even 14" i7 with dedicated grafics never gets too loud or two hot.
I believe this article is bogus, or out of context. I wouldn't be surprised if they spin-off some parts of their business (mobile hardware, Compaq...), but giving up on PCs in general? It's one of their core businesses, their bread and butter.
Hewlett Packard, the world's largest PC maker, has announced plans to spin off its PC business and scrap its recently acquired webOS smartphone and TouchPad tablet business to focus on software and services.
According to a report by Bloomberg, HP "has been aiming to lessen its dependence on lower-margin PCs, where growth has stalled as consumers flock to tablet-style computers like those made by Apple."
Right. So HP's strategy to capitalise on the consumers "flocking" to tablet computers is to NOT make tablet computers anymore.
WTF is wrong with large corporations? Are they so removed from consumer reality that they have no idea what's happening anymore?
We have iOS 5 beta running on an iP4, 2 iPad 2s and an iPad 1. There have been intermittent issues, but no show-stoppers.
It really is a very nice OS -- the iP4 with iOS 5 does everything that i want a phone to do, and more.
It also does everything well on both versions of iPads -- but, I want Apple to keep pushing the envelope on the iPad, more, faster, better, smoother...
When iOS 5 and iCloud arrive this fall, I suspect that iPads will solve the computer needs for many households... no tethering needed!
I am enjoying ios5 as well. But u gotta admit the UI with stripes is 4 years old and can be refreshed a bit. I'm not saying turn it into webos, I'm saying the stripes gotta go.
This is the kind of news that you should expect on April's Fools Day.
First of all, you don't give up the No. 1 position among computer builders.
Second, HP is known for its computers and printers, not the quality of its software which is, at best, mediocre.
Third, any company (like IBM, Dell, etc.) can offer its services and there is no need to divest itself of its hardware design and manufacturing component.
Fourth, to abandon computer hardware design and manufacturing goes against the tradition and almost 100 years of history at Hewlett Packard.
Fifth, computer hardware design and manufacturing is making money for Hewlett Packard. There is no need to abandon a successful business making money for a new venture.
Finally, computer hardware design and manufacturing is such an important part of Hewlett Packard that it cannot be abandonned by the Board of directors of Hewlett Packard unless they get approval by 2/3 of the shareholders of every class in value and number.
April's Fools Day comes early this year. Or it comes for a second time this year.
This is what happens when in my opinion you hire a bunch of hacks that have more expertise in corporate mergers and spin offs than in engineering and science. hp was infamous for bleeding edge electrical engineering and technological advances. When they spun off Agilent and became just a computer company , they sold off the very core of hp that made the brand famous, the stuff that creates new products and new markets. I'm sure the quarterly earnings boost resulted in juicy over bonuses for those who crafted it, those who brokered the shares, and those who received the commissions, special cash out transactions and origination fees...... Alas like any bell curve would tell you, the PC business and by extension the wireless still borns that link their existence to the PC experience, these tablets will all eventually end up on internet auction sites or crated up and donated to some charitable cause somewhere on the planet. Doubling down on that strategy by trying to buy back intellectual property and innovation [tied to a losing paradigm] is a recipe for failure. Innovation in engineering is only grown organically, takes years to develop, and takes leadership and vision. It burns tons of cash, but what everyone loses site of, the R&D pays off in new markets and products in spades. hp would have better spent the money buying back Agilent. In my opinion the prognosis for Google and Motorola Mobile is no better. Its like watching the fate of Humpty Dumpty on the operating table.
Apple has grown organically, fosters innovation, and is smiling all the way to the top. LOL
in closing hp has been in business longer than the PC has been a paradigm. They should buy back Agilent and return to their roots.
I wish Agilent, the original part of the company, could take back the Hewlett-Packard name.
That would sully the Agilent name.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Dick Applebaum
Rubbing sand in it...
HP forgot to cancel the TouchPad TV ad promotions, while cancelling the TouchPad, itself...
...it appears that HP doesn't know what it is doing... And, to whom!
Media placement for ads are usually all paid up and planned long in advance. It will hilarious, you'll definitely be seeing TouchPad ads for a few more weeks or maybe even months.
It reminds me of when they used to take portraits of dead people placed in "sleeping" positions (like in The Others).
Quote:
Originally Posted by sheff
Rip palm. Perhaps Rubenstein should come back to apple and help apple with a major design overhaul of iOS UI.
I don't know, Palm, HP, and WebOS has just been a fiasco since the best "Palm" device I owned, the HandSpring Visor line. I don't know much about Rubenstein's involvement since he left Apple but something is fishy with this guy.
Comments
Wow, now this is a real bummer.
I apparently was THE guy in the whole country that bought one of these, and i've only had it about a week. I bought it during HP's recent 'sale'.
I'd like to say that i'm pretty unhappy with HP at the moment, and I have to wonder about the business logic of this move. They didn't sell enormous volumes, but they sold enough of these things that there are a couple hundred thousand people out there who are not going to be very happy right now. If they are much like me, they are currently putting this device back into its box in preparation to send it back to HP, and they are likely making plans to never purchase another HP product as long as they live.
I mean really... put these things on sale, announce the price cut is permanent because consumers showed pleasing amounts of interest, and then kill the whole product line 1 week later, and barely more than a month after introduction? Absolutely horrendous.
HP has created some ill will with this that isn't going away overnight.
Regarding the device itself, I just have to say that WebOS truly is very nice. It suffers at the hands of its software, and it is pretty clear that HP rushed it to market. But it is sad that HP is so short sighted in this. A second round of better hardware would have gone a long way toward erasing the negative commentary.
I've got an Amazon RMA and this thing is headed back to Amazon ASAP.
What a sad, short life for something so promising; the buffoons at HP ought to be slapped.
I think you are seeing the results of a top-level decision made a while ago -- when it became clear that the TouchPad wasn't going to sell in its current incarnation. What, likely, happened then, was that the people responsible for the TouchPad convinced top management to give them another chance: reduce the price of current product, extend resellers; payment terms, clear the inventory and accelerate work on a follow-on. However, the price discount/reduction didn't goose sales and events overtook them:
--The BestBuy issue made it all public
--The upcoming Stockholders meeting
--They wouldn't be able to hide the devices in the channel as devices sold
--The disruptive changes planned for other parts of the company
The biggest thing, IMO, is the politics -- The new CEO was tasked with turning HP around, The PSG is not his area of expertise, He followed the "experts" advice and it didn't work. Lastly, this problem was created by his predecessors -- he had to end it or own it -- easy choice.
...then there is that "public vote of confidence" followed shortly with a "public crucifixion" thing.
I agree - it is dead.
I happen to be one of the unfortunate people who have one of these devices (and an iPad), and I just have one quibble with what you've said: the OS is really quite nice, and in some ways more enjoyable to use than iOS. It has some features, like Synergy, which are really awesome, and it had a delightful notification system well before Apple bundled something similar into the as yet unreleased iOS 5.
WebOS, in my opinion, is a victim of corporate stupidity, not of its own failings. Bluntly, HP killed WebOS... by pairing it with a hardware offering that was terribly lack luster and by rushing it into the market before they had ironed out most of the bugs in version 3. They also didn't put as much effort into an ecosystem as they should have (although the HP App Catalog is much nicer than the Android store, and is almost as nice IMHO as the App Store) - I still con't quite understand who so many iOS competitors can't see how important this is. So, HP simply screwed up terrifically, and now they aren't willing to pair their mistake with an honest effort to correct - instead they are screwing over the consumers who bought these devices, their channel partners, etc. Brilliant business decision making - NOT.
I'm not sure I remember a single product released and then cancelled quite so quickly. I'll say this: it also has cancelled any future purchases of HP products from myself. I've already RMA'd this thing for its return flight to Amazon.
Very sad.
Some things about it are nice, but overall, it's not that great. The average person doesn't want to be bothered learning it, and it does have a steeper learning curve than iOS. That's true of Honeycomb as well.
It has its limits as has been pointed out by the reviewers. Unfortunately, a product has to be pretty good out of the starting gate these days. The standards have risen because of Apple. Good enough no longer wins the race, or even comes in the money.
I'll point out again that this wasn't HPs' fault. The product line was dead before they bought the company, and the Touchpad was developed by Rubenstein and his team from Palm. They were the ones who screwed it up. HP supplied support, money and marketing to get the interest up. But the products were flawed from the get go, and nothing any company could have done would have saved it.
My guess is that Samsung buys it and dumps Android.
That's a joke, right?
I'm completely shocked to be honest. I thought the WebOS had legs and HP would find itself competing head on with Microsoft and Apple. This seems like a desparate measure at least on the WebOS front. I understand dropping the PC business though their system were pretty nice. Well, good luck with your new direction HP.
WebOS was supposed to be used in their printers too. What will they do with their printer division?
Good question. Some thinking is that it logically follows with the computer division. At one tine, all of HPs' profits were from ink sales.
All he has to do is offer to suspend minimum wage, occupational health and safety, and environmental laws and allow them to pay zero tax and they might consider it.
Edit: I think Foxconn just bought Cisco's set-top box plant in Juarez, so if they wanted to assemble iPads there, NAFTA would allow them to be imported into the US without tariff and worker and environmental protections are much weaker also. Maybe Jerry can try to get Foxconn execs a date with Linda Ronstadt or something.
Ha!
You know your Gov. Moonbeam!
I never thought I'd say this but The Gov is trying, he has some reasonable ideas, and seems to be getting things done ... He's not your Earl Warren or Goodie Knight, tho
We moved to CA from Tucson (then there and back again) Every third person and politician in Tucson is named Ronstadt.
Rip palm. Perhapsnrubenstein should come back to apple and help apple with a major design overhaul of iOS UI.
Yeah, just what we need. The guy responsible for the disaster at Palm comes back to Apple to engineer a disaster there.
Ha!
You know your Gov. Moonbeam!
I never thought I'd say this but The Gov is trying, he has some reasonable ideas, and seems to be getting things done ... He's not your Earl Warren or Goodie Knight, tho
We moved to CA from Tucson (then there and back again) Every third person and politician in Tucson is named Ronstadt.
As long as they don't drink tea, they're ok.
Rip palm. Perhapsnrubenstein should come back to apple and help apple with a major design overhaul of iOS UI.
We have iOS 5 beta running on an iP4, 2 iPad 2s and an iPad 1. There have been intermittent issues, but no show-stoppers.
It really is a very nice OS -- the iP4 with iOS 5 does everything that i want a phone to do, and more.
It also does everything well on both versions of iPads -- but, I want Apple to keep pushing the envelope on the iPad, more, faster, better, smoother...
When iOS 5 and iCloud arrive this fall, I suspect that iPads will solve the computer needs for many households... no tethering needed!
I am thinking out loud here.
With recent events it appears that the iPad may not get any meaningful competition for another 6-12 months (or longer).
Apple's CFO, at the last earnings call forecast lower gross margins for this quarter because of a product transition,
It doesn't look like that will be an iPad 3 with a Retina Display and/or an A6 CPU.
It doesn't appear that the iPhone 5 will be out in time to have any major downward effect on GPM.
iPods, Macs, AppleTV?
Nah!
What if Apple does this:
1) Bumps the RAM and SSD size on the iPad (especially the largest model)
2) Adds Thunderbolt and USB/FW access
3) replaces the various cell radio chips with a 3G/LTE world radio chip
4) FFF -- Furnishes a Fine Finder-like App
5) Robustifies iPad Pages, Numbers and Keynote bring them into line with iWork and Office
6) keeps the prices level the same except a new high-end model.
This would definite have a downward effect on GPM but would eliminate a lot of SKUs -- 2 WiFi only and WiFi + Cell in each Model.
It would, likely, push the date for meaningful competition to 18 months.
Nothing I've seen or read about comes close to iOS 5 on an iPad 2 (or even an iPad 1).
That could be game, set and match!
The industry is a pendulum.
I think AI should update their style guide so that the picture of Apple's new "spaceship" is appended to every article, sort of like a halo. The juxtaposition is amplified when the article in question has nothing to do with the new Apple HQ, for example, when talking about the demise of HP's webOS division.
I have provided a sample. Bathe in the magnificent light of my post! Behold the Apple Halo!
Blame the one writer here that always gets the blame.
True, but HP isn't offering competition. They suck at what they do. That's like the Pittsburgh Steelers playing a local high school football team.
True competition comes from innovation and balls. HP has neither. Nobody is willing to put what it takes into coming up with new ideas and new ways of doing things. They'd rather copy Apple and come up with cheap crap. Don't make the mistake of calling that competition.
Not really.
They do make some cheap crap, but they also do nice high-end business units, like Elitebooks, and consumer Envy line is not bad at all.
Elitebooks in particular are nice units, solid industrial design, metal chassis... they are not as slim as MacBooks but they are built to comply military standards regarding dust, shock, moisture... and they are really reliable. In addition, they are easy to maintain - most of their bottom is under one big removable cover so once it is open, you have access to HDD, RAM, WLAN, BT and broadband modules, even fan is exposed so it's easy to clean dust and dirt from it.
They also all come with default 3 year nbd on-site warranty, at least here in NZ.
We have couple of 14 and 15" units in our office, and even 14" i7 with dedicated grafics never gets too loud or two hot.
I believe this article is bogus, or out of context. I wouldn't be surprised if they spin-off some parts of their business (mobile hardware, Compaq...), but giving up on PCs in general? It's one of their core businesses, their bread and butter.
HP forgot to cancel the TouchPad TV ad promotions, while cancelling the TouchPad, itself...
...it appears that HP doesn't know what it is doing... And, to whom!
Hewlett Packard, the world's largest PC maker, has announced plans to spin off its PC business and scrap its recently acquired webOS smartphone and TouchPad tablet business to focus on software and services.
According to a report by Bloomberg, HP "has been aiming to lessen its dependence on lower-margin PCs, where growth has stalled as consumers flock to tablet-style computers like those made by Apple."
Right. So HP's strategy to capitalise on the consumers "flocking" to tablet computers is to NOT make tablet computers anymore.
WTF is wrong with large corporations? Are they so removed from consumer reality that they have no idea what's happening anymore?
We have iOS 5 beta running on an iP4, 2 iPad 2s and an iPad 1. There have been intermittent issues, but no show-stoppers.
It really is a very nice OS -- the iP4 with iOS 5 does everything that i want a phone to do, and more.
It also does everything well on both versions of iPads -- but, I want Apple to keep pushing the envelope on the iPad, more, faster, better, smoother...
When iOS 5 and iCloud arrive this fall, I suspect that iPads will solve the computer needs for many households... no tethering needed!
I am enjoying ios5 as well. But u gotta admit the UI with stripes is 4 years old and can be refreshed a bit. I'm not saying turn it into webos, I'm saying the stripes gotta go.
This is the kind of news that you should expect on April's Fools Day.
First of all, you don't give up the No. 1 position among computer builders.
Second, HP is known for its computers and printers, not the quality of its software which is, at best, mediocre.
Third, any company (like IBM, Dell, etc.) can offer its services and there is no need to divest itself of its hardware design and manufacturing component.
Fourth, to abandon computer hardware design and manufacturing goes against the tradition and almost 100 years of history at Hewlett Packard.
Fifth, computer hardware design and manufacturing is making money for Hewlett Packard. There is no need to abandon a successful business making money for a new venture.
Finally, computer hardware design and manufacturing is such an important part of Hewlett Packard that it cannot be abandonned by the Board of directors of Hewlett Packard unless they get approval by 2/3 of the shareholders of every class in value and number.
April's Fools Day comes early this year. Or it comes for a second time this year.
This is what happens when in my opinion you hire a bunch of hacks that have more expertise in corporate mergers and spin offs than in engineering and science. hp was infamous for bleeding edge electrical engineering and technological advances. When they spun off Agilent and became just a computer company , they sold off the very core of hp that made the brand famous, the stuff that creates new products and new markets. I'm sure the quarterly earnings boost resulted in juicy over bonuses for those who crafted it, those who brokered the shares, and those who received the commissions, special cash out transactions and origination fees...... Alas like any bell curve would tell you, the PC business and by extension the wireless still borns that link their existence to the PC experience, these tablets will all eventually end up on internet auction sites or crated up and donated to some charitable cause somewhere on the planet. Doubling down on that strategy by trying to buy back intellectual property and innovation [tied to a losing paradigm] is a recipe for failure. Innovation in engineering is only grown organically, takes years to develop, and takes leadership and vision. It burns tons of cash, but what everyone loses site of, the R&D pays off in new markets and products in spades. hp would have better spent the money buying back Agilent. In my opinion the prognosis for Google and Motorola Mobile is no better. Its like watching the fate of Humpty Dumpty on the operating table.
Apple has grown organically, fosters innovation, and is smiling all the way to the top. LOL
in closing hp has been in business longer than the PC has been a paradigm. They should buy back Agilent and return to their roots.
Right. So HP's strategy to capitalise on the consumers "flocking" to tablet computers is to NOT make tablet computers anymore.
WTF is wrong with large corporations? Are they so removed from consumer reality that they have no idea what's happening anymore?
LOL YES they are. Welcome to the Great Recession.
I wish Agilent, the original part of the company, could take back the Hewlett-Packard name.
That would sully the Agilent name.
Rubbing sand in it...
HP forgot to cancel the TouchPad TV ad promotions, while cancelling the TouchPad, itself...
...it appears that HP doesn't know what it is doing... And, to whom!
Media placement for ads are usually all paid up and planned long in advance. It will hilarious, you'll definitely be seeing TouchPad ads for a few more weeks or maybe even months.
It reminds me of when they used to take portraits of dead people placed in "sleeping" positions (like in The Others).
Rip palm. Perhaps Rubenstein should come back to apple and help apple with a major design overhaul of iOS UI.
I don't know, Palm, HP, and WebOS has just been a fiasco since the best "Palm" device I owned, the HandSpring Visor line. I don't know much about Rubenstein's involvement since he left Apple but something is fishy with this guy.