German WePad takes on Apple's iPad

[Berlin]

... well, that's what Neofonie from Germany is aiming at.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencet...blet-wars-German-WePad-takes-Apples-iPad.html

A new tablet PC called the WePad is hoping to rival Apple's iPad with a bigger screen, a webcam and two USB ports.

The German company Neofonie GmbH said their new PC is a worthy contender for Apple's gadget.

The WePad has an 11.6in screen compared to the 9.7in iPad. It is powered by an Intel chip and relies on a Linux software basis which is compatible with Google's Android and all Flash applications.

Neofonie's founder, Helmut von Ankershoffen, said the WePad will also boast an open source office package when it launches this July.

He added that users will not need any particular software to put music on the device.

The company is hoping to appeal to publishers by allowing them to sell their content on its platform without monopolising the customer relationship as Apple's iTunes or Amazon's Kindle do.

The WePad's basic version, which comes with Wi-Fi and 16GB storage, is set to cost £390. A larger 32GB version with a fast 3G modem will be priced at £500.

The iPad went on sale in the U.S last month for £325 ($499) for the smallest version, coming with Wi-Fi and 16GB storage.

However, Mr Ankershoffen claimed the WePad was 'a bargain compared with the iPad' due to its technological superiority and greater openness.

The WePad is to be assembled by a manufacturer in Asia that can ramp up production capacity according to demand, Mr Ankershoffen said.

Neofonie casts the WePad as helping the media industry find a way to market paid content.

Gruner + Jahr, one of Europe's largest magazine publishers, already has a partnership with Neofonie, offering the company's flagship magazine, Stern, on the platform.

'It will be the first magazine, but others will certainly follow,' Stern's deputy chief Tobias Seikel said.

Neofonie seems determined to face its big California rival - the company distributed tasty red apples boasting the WePad's logo at a press conference.

However, both companies have to prove that the touchscreen device will not only amaze the tech-savvy early users, but will also appeal to mainstream consumers.

---------------------------------

Bigger screen, has usb, web cam, card reader, flash/java compatiable ...

hope their backers have deep pockets.

 

[Berlin]

WePad

 

[djk]

It's funny how all these tablets come out of the woodwork after the iPad's launch. Can they not innovate without Apple?

 

[blackrock13]

It's funny how all these tablets come out of the woodwork after the iPad's launch. Can they not innovate without Apple?

Reverse engineering is easy that way.

 

[onthebottom]

It's funny how all these tablets come out of the woodwork after the iPad's launch. Can they not innovate without Apple?

Apple is creating a market.... how many iPod rivals did we see... what is Apple's market share....

OTB

 

[WoodPeckr]

Reverse engineering is easy that way.

Exactly!
This is what Apple DID since this particular toy was invented by others first before Apple came up with their version the iPad!.....

 

[blackrock13]

Exactly!
This is what Apple DID since this particular toy was invented by others first before Apple came up with their version the iPad!.....

I would have been really disappointed in you if you had taken that and run with it. Right on cue. Early lunch at the workshop today?

 

[WoodPeckr]

I would have been really disappointed in you if you had taken that and run with it. Right on cue. Early lunch at the workshop today?

Yepper.
Thanks for making it easy!....

 

[djk]

Apple is creating a market.... how many iPod rivals did we see... what is Apple's market share....

OTB

I think it's just they lack the ability to innovate and make a great end user experience. Just like with the iPhone. There was a market before Apple joined. Who remembers the end user experience for mobile phones and smartphones before the iPhone came out?

No app store, no multitouch, no desktop browser and email experience. It sucked.

 

[djk]

Exactly!
This is what Apple DID since this particular toy was invented by others first before Apple came up with their version the iPad!.....

Oh yeah, MS did such a great job with their tablets, we're all running around with em. *chuckle*

http://gizmodo.com/5324866/vintage-...e-the-most-popular-form-of-pc-sold-in-america

He was such a fan, in fact, that back in 2001 Gates told CNN, "The tablet takes cutting-edge PC technology and makes it available whenever you want it...It's a PC that is virtually without limits — and within five years I predict it will be the most popular form of PC sold in America."

Obviously, Gates was wrong—at least about the timeline. It's seven years later and tablets are all but dead while netbooks and touchscreen smartphones thrive

 

[alexmst]

http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/markets/japan/article7095649.ece

The electronic viscera of the iPad reveals a technological power shift: the most expensive and sophisticated components inside Apple’s new gadget are no longer Japanese but Korean.

Analysts calculating the raw cost of the items within Apple’s device believe that the bill for materials amounts to $260 per unit, or $239 less than its retail price in the United States.

Suppliers vary across the range but, in some iPad models, more than half of the component costs borne by Apple will go directly to South Korean companies, say analysts.

While most of the 700,000 new owners of the iPad were enjoying their toy last week, researchers at iFixit, iSuppli and other independent groups were conducting “teardowns” — physically stripping machines to establish the corporate and national provenance of the components.

Since companies are often at pains to conceal their manufacturing food chain from the outside world, the clues are often deliberately removed. The effect on the stocks of companies found to have high supply exposure to a bestselling gadget can be spectacular.

In the case of the iPad it is clear that South Korean companies have made a clean sweep of the most lucrative parts. The Korean company LG Display makes the LCD screen on which the device is based — a component representing about a quarter of the total bill of materials. Samsung is identified as the producer of the costly NAND flash memory, the dynamic random access memory (DRAM) and, most probably, of the central processor designed by Apple.

Teardown analysis of consumer electronics devices — from the Nintendo Wii to a Samsung camera — have usually confirmed Japan’s prowess at component making. Even cheap Chinese televisions often source components from Japan, underscoring the quality of the country’s manufacturing even as its brands are suffering. But as the digital era has progressed, the component food chain has broadened and Japan’s rivals have grown more competitive.

When the iPhone went on sale in 2007 teardown analysis revealed that more than 90 per cent of the touch panels beneath the screen were produced by Japanese manufacturers. Three years later and the same technology, representing some 10 per cent of the materials’ cost, is provided for the iPad by Wintek of Taiwan.

The Japanese media has shown increasing signs of panic over the thinning of the country’s once comfortable technology cushion over its Asian rivals. Industry bodies have fuelled the unease, warning that Japan’s once monumental share of the £106 billion global electronics component market has slipped to 40 per cent.

The success of component-makers in winning their spot inside the iPad has not been greeted with universal joy in Korea. Analysts are worried that the dominance of the iPhone in the smartphone market presents atough challenge to similar devices produced by the likes of Samsung and LG. The iPad’s status as a rival to netbooks could also deprive Korean manufacturers of sales of one of the few devices that sold well during the slump after the financial crisis.

Damian Thong, a semiconductor analyst at Macquarie Securities, said that it was almost certain that Apple will source large quantities of flash memory from Toshiba as well. He added that the iPad’s battery is produced by a company in Hong Kong, Amperex, but it is a subsidiary of Japan’s TDK

 

[Remo]

It's funny how all these tablets come out of the woodwork after the iPad's launch. Can they not innovate without Apple?

Apple didn't invent the tablet PC. Tons of companies have had them sitting in R&D for years or even sitting on shelves as near finished products. I think new OS products like Android et al. have breathed new life into the product genre. We will also see a glut of new products emerging that repair the downfalls of the iPad. Apple, IMO, has a tendency to tell consumers what they should want and what they need rather than listening to them prior to building a product.

Apple market the crap out of their stuff with some slick campaigns using undiscovered catchy music, a glut of adjectives like "magical" and "revolutionary" and then mobilize the Apple Fan Boy Army as a sort of fifth column, and set hype lose upon the world. These new pads will offer consumers everything Apple says they don't want but yet they will buy in another product if it is at least as pretty as the iPad.

The iPad isn't a tech innovation. Its a marketing innovation. The tech innovation is now years old. Its the touch interface found on the iPod Touch, iPhone and now the iPod Touch Extra Large Version a.k.a the i Pad. The marketing innovation here is convincing people they need a new gadget to surf the web with.

Apple could release a steaming turd with a white case, a glass screen and a catchy commercial and they Apple fan boys will justify its existence. Like a friend said to me, Apple is religion. Their adherents will rationalize anything and everything the company does.

So don't buy into the Apple hype that they invented this tablet stuff. They did not. But they did put in a nice package and bludgeon us with it effectively.

I personally have been waiting for an android, true multi-task capable tablet. I've been watching the WePad for a few weeks now. It seems like a good product.

 

[AnimalMagnetism]

Apple didn't invent the tablet PC. Tons of companies have had them sitting in R&D for years or even sitting on shelves as near finished products. I think new OS products like Android et al. have breathed new life into the product genre. We will also see a glut of new products emerging that repair the downfalls of the iPad. Apple, IMO, has a tendency to tell consumers what they should want and what they need rather than listening to them prior to building a product.

Apple market the crap out of their stuff with some slick campaigns using undiscovered catchy music, a glut of adjectives like "magical" and "revolutionary" and then mobilize the Apple Fan Boy Army as a sort of fifth column, and set hype lose upon the world. These new pads will offer consumers everything Apple says they don't want but yet they will buy in another product if it is at least as pretty as the iPad.

The iPad isn't a tech innovation. Its a marketing innovation. The tech innovation is now years old. Its the touch interface found on the iPod Touch, iPhone and now the iPod Touch Extra Large Version a.k.a the i Pad. The marketing innovation here is convincing people they need a new gadget to surf the web with.

Apple could release a steaming turd with a white case, a glass screen and a catchy commercial and they Apple fan boys will justify its existence. Like a friend said to me, Apple is religion. Their adherents will rationalize anything and everything the company does.

So don't buy into the Apple hype that they invented this tablet stuff. They did not. But they did put in a nice package and bludgeon us with it effectively.

I personally have been waiting for an android, true multi-task capable tablet. I've been watching the WePad for a few weeks now. It seems like a good product.

Very well said. i agree 100% and i'm sure Chiun would concur

 

[WoodPeckr]

Very well said. i agree 100% and i'm sure Chiun would concur

I'll second that.
As you can see even on this board the Apple Cult is very vocal in their defense of all things Apple....

 

[djk]

Apple didn't invent the tablet PC. Tons of companies have had them sitting in R&D for years or even sitting on shelves as near finished products.

Apple was working on a tablet computer back in 1983 or 27 years ago.

http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2010/01/apple-tablet-1983/

Not to mention the Apple Newton which development started in 1989, 7 years before Palm and other PDA's came to market.

Apple, IMO, has a tendency to tell consumers what they should want and what they need rather than listening to them prior to building a product.

In many cases, consumers don't what they want until they see it. A great example of this is a quote from Henry Ford, creator of the world's first car:

"If I’d asked my customers what they wanted, they’d have said a faster horse."

Great article on innovative and sometimes not listening to your customers - http://bentremblay.com/en/if-id-asked-my-customers-what-they-wanted-theyd-have-said-a-faster-horse

Apple could release a steaming turd with a white case, a glass screen and a catchy commercial and they Apple fan boys will justify its existence. Like a friend said to me, Apple is religion. Their adherents will rationalize anything and everything the company does.

If that's true, why do outrages like this happen within the Mac community?

http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9117339/Apple_users_rage_over_missing_FireWire
http://www.macnn.com/articles/07/09/05/iphone.price.drop.redux/

 

[WoodPeckr]

If that's true, why do outrages like this happen within the Mac community?

http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9117339/Apple_users_rage_over_missing_FireWire

When I asked an Apple saleaman why there was no usb or firewire or mini firewire ports on the iPad he said he didn't know why there was no usb port and that nobody uses firewire anymore!

Was surprised at his claim, nobody uses firewire anymore!...

 

[djk]

When I asked an Apple saleaman why there was no usb or firewire or mini firewire ports on the iPad he said he didn't know why there was no usb port and that nobody uses firewire anymore!

Was surprised at his claim, nobody uses firewire anymore!...

Apple uses a connector that is one end proprietary and the other end USB. The perk is it allows the iPad to interface with a ton of past iPhone and iPod accessories.

Speaking of innovation I want things to get to a point where you can just transfer large files wirelessly as fast as firewire making it irrelevant.

 

[Remo]

Its on the way I think. I believe Wireless USB is well under development as a replacement for Bluetooth and for wireless data transfer. Wi-tricity is another cool think to look up if you are bored.

djk raised some nice Apple history but I don't think it negates anything I said. The few cases where companies have "deliberately" ignored customers or prevailing wisdom and yet succeeded are definitely exceptional. Not only are they rare but products like Henry Ford's auto truly were revolutionary not just revolutionary because someone's thesaurus fell open on R. Ford's car was something new and non-comparable to what preceded it. Thus, consumer polling would be an irrelevant idea. Also, wasn't Ford a fascist? That sounds like fascist marketing to me Wow, there is a dream job. Working at a fascist state's marketing dept. "Buy this or we kill you!" but I digress...

Apple's products are not revolutionary on this scale. They are often improvements over existing stuff for sure, I'll give credit where it's due, but Apple's lack of inclusion of certain customer requested features just seems arrogant to me. Lack of USB, decent cameras, multi-tasking etc. These things exist, other products have them, why not put them in? They aren't costly if they are originally part of the project.

I'm sure we could find a spectrum of reasons ranging from the mundane to the conspiratorial for their lack of including such features but it really does seem that Apple believes that customers need to be shown what they want. They don't realize that tech consumers these days do know.

Perhaps turtle-neck wearing modern day beatniks looking to buy, social media inspired, mobile-tech art, toy like, devices with quasi-magical, and fantastic properties don't know because they are easily distracted by shiny objects like so any cawing crows, but why limit your market?

I for one, will be interested in what happens with the iPad. I don't know if Apple will get away with it this time. Comparable products will be on the market fast enough this time that they won't get the saturation they got with each previous generation of the iPod Touch technology.

As for the Newton, I can only respond with "Eat up Martha".

 

[Medman52]

I couldn't care less who invents what for whom..if I like it I'll buy it.

Toys make life fun. I like to play.

 

[blackrock13]

Its on the way I think. I believe Wireless USB is well under development as a replacement for Bluetooth and for wireless data transfer. Wi-tricity is another cool think to look up if you are bored.

djk raised some nice Apple history but I don't think it negates anything I said. The few cases where companies have "deliberately" ignored customers or prevailing wisdom and yet succeeded are definitely exceptional. Not only are they rare but products like Henry Ford's auto truly were revolutionary not just revolutionary because someone's thesaurus fell open on R. Ford's car was something new and non-comparable to what preceded it. Thus, consumer polling would be an irrelevant idea. Also, wasn't Ford a fascist? That sounds like fascist marketing to me Wow, there is a dream job. Working at a fascist state's marketing dept. "Buy this or we kill you!" but I digress...

Apple's products are not revolutionary on this scale. They are often improvements over existing stuff for sure, I'll give credit where it's due, but Apple's lack of inclusion of certain customer requested features just seems arrogant to me. Lack of USB, decent cameras, multi-tasking etc. These things exist, other products have them, why not put them in? They aren't costly if they are originally part of the project.

I'm sure we could find a spectrum of reasons ranging from the mundane to the conspiratorial for their lack of including such features but it really does seem that Apple believes that customers need to be shown what they want. They don't realize that tech consumers these days do know.

Perhaps turtle-neck wearing modern day beatniks looking to buy, social media inspired, mobile-tech art, toy like, devices with quasi-magical, and fantastic properties don't know because they are easily distracted by shiny objects like so any cawing crows, but why limit your market?

I for one, will be interested in what happens with the iPad. I don't know if Apple will get away with it this time. Comparable products will be on the market fast enough this time that they won't get the saturation they got with each previous generation of the iPod Touch technology.

As for the Newton, I can only respond with "Eat up Martha".

No one of my circle who use Mac most of the time, fit your description at all. They pretty well cover the spectrum, so back to the drawing board. As I said, I'm not in a hurry with this one and wait for version 2.Even then I'm not really interested as I've got stuff that does most what it does already and I only have two hands.