TouchPad

HP's TouchPad fire sale: The fallout

HP's TouchPad liquidation sale this weekend was telling on multiple fronts as techies drooled over a good deal, servers blew up and the tablet market pricing structure was upended. However, the fallout may go well beyond those areas.

It's a bit stunning how a liquidation sale--16GB TouchPad for $99 and 32GB for $149--can be so revealing.

Here are the main elements of fallout:

HP's TouchPad liquidation fiasco hurts its reputation with consumers and businesses. HP's Web site couldn't handle the load as the masses tried to land a TouchPad for $99. On Saturday, HP had … Read more

Michael Dell(!) mixes it up with HP

Tech industry titans are known for taking the gloves off and throwing wicked verbal jabs at their competitors. Larry Ellison, Steve Jobs, Steve Ballmer, Mark Cuban, Bill Gates, and Scott McNealy have all made headlines with their zingers.

Not on that list is Michael Dell, the relatively staid (boring?) founder and current CEO/chairman of his namesake PC maker. (Actually, one of the few times Dell did lob such a grenade he basically had it blow up in his own lap. More on that later.)

But even Mr. Dell couldn't resist the opportunity to weigh in on the wave … Read more

U.S. Best Buy to sell $100 HP TouchPad Sunday

Select Best Buy stores will sell the HP TouchPad tablet for $99.99 on Sunday.

A store manager in suburban Los Angeles said the TouchPad will go on sale when Best Buy opens its doors Sunday at 10 a.m. The sale applies to all Best Buy stores that have stock, but not all stores do, he said.

Stores typically have stock in the tens of units, not hundreds, according to the store manager. "If people start lining up, the stock will go fast," he said.

Both models will be sold: the 16GB and 32GB, for $100 and $150, respectively, he said.

This comes in the wake of fire sales by Hewlett-Packard on its TouchPad site and at Best Buy in Canada, among other U.S. resellers.

HP announced Thursday that it is shuttering the WebOS device business. … Read more

HP TouchPad tablet liquidation begins

The $99 tablet has arrived. Hewlett-Packard TouchPads are being liquidated--at least at some Canadian retailers, in the wake of HP's announcement yesterday that it is shuttering the WebOS device business.

Prices have dropped off a cliff to $99.99 for the 16GB model and $149.99 for the 32GB version, according to a post at PreCentral.net.

A quick check at Best Buy in Canada shows TouchPads at these prices.

The same can't be said for stateside Best Buy, however. As of today, Best Buy in the U.S. was showing standard pricing. And anecdotal reports in the U.S. seem to bear this out.

Of course, consumers may pause even at these prices: You're buying into a defunct HP hardware platform. That said, there was a very limited production run of the TouchPad and it may have value as a novelty item, right next to an IBM PCjr.

Update, August 20, 9 a.m. PDT: HP's U.S. site is now showing the TouchPad for $99 and $149, though it appears to be out of stock as of Saturday. Other retailers such as Target are also showing it out of stock. … Read more

WebOS goes down in quiet death

In the end, Hewlett-Packard had as much luck with WebOS as Palm did. Maybe even less.

HP said today it will discontinue operations for devices running on WebOS, including its recently launched TouchPad and smartphones. It's part of a broader shake-up including the potential sale of the company's personal systems group, which deals with PCs and other consumer devices, and the possible acquisition of software provider Autonomy.

The announcement effectively marks the death of WebOS, which won critical acclaim but little commercial success over the past few years. HP's surprise move underscores the brutally competitive nature of the smartphone operating system.

"The market and consumers proved that no one wanted it," said Maribel Lopez, an analyst at Lopez Research. "I'm not sure they could even sell it to anyone."

With a much smaller scale relative to the likes of Apple's iOS or Google's Android, it had a high initial obstacle to clear. Poorly handled by Palm and HP, WebOS may not have ever had a chance to begin with. … Read more

It's iPad or nothing, survey says

The tablet market continues to be summed up like this: the iPad and everything else. And everything else doesn't amount to much.

That's according to a recent survey conducted by Robert W. Baird. The study found that out of more than 1,100 potential tablet purchasers, an overwhelming 94.5 percent cited the iPad as a device of interest. Hewlett-Packard's TouchPad was the second most-cited device, garnering just 10.3 percent of the people surveyed, while Research in Motion's PlayBook was a laggard.

The study suggests that despite a number of new entrants jumping into the … Read more

Gizmodo not charged in iPhone 4 theft

Hewlett-Packard permanently cuts the price of the TouchPad to just $399, Google is reportedly rushing to finish the Ice Cream Sandwich update to its Android operating system, and the San Mateo, Calif., district attorney has filed charges in the theft of an iPhone 4 prototype but not against Gizmodo.

Links from Thursday's episode of Loaded:

iPhone 4 charged filed against two men but not Gizmodo HTC buys Beats by Dr. Dre HP cuts price of TouchPad to $399 Google rushing to finish Ice Cream Sandwich Verizon and AT&T block jailbroken tetherers Nintendo 3DS gets "Flame Red" … Read more

HP cuts TouchPad price to $399; price war?

HP has permanently cut the price on its low-end TouchPad price to $399 as it seeks to stand out in a crowded tablet market.

The 16GB TouchPad had been cut briefly from $499 to $399 over the weekend at various resellers. But that drop is permanent now, as HP's Web site clearly shows.… Read more

Analyst: Apple MacBook to make gains on PC

Apple's MacBook is set to make market share gains on PCs in the second half, according to a research note from a Deutsche Bank analyst.

As demand for consumer Windows PCs softens a bit, Apple will be in a position to a grab market share, according to a research note released today from Deutsche Bank analyst Chris Whitmore.

"Our recent checks with the PC supply chain suggest overall orders have softened modestly in the past several weeks due to weaker European and U.S. Consumer NB (notebook) demand and more conservative back-to-school expectations from OEMs," he wrote. … Read more