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Move Over Apple, My Tablet Cost $200
- cma 16y agoIt is the best tablet deal around. Running Honeycomb on it still lacks support for the hardware decoder, but it will come in time--older android versions support it fine.
- barake 16y agoIs general performance okay on the Nook? If Honeycomb works fine minus HD video I'll go pick one up today.
- grayrest 16y agoIt's slow. Animations and web page scrolling are ~15fps and controls in many apps take ~200ms to respond. Also, there's a problem with the 3g network component that prevents the nook from sleeping unless it's in airplane mode. A lot of this is due to how the nook honeycomb image was done (it's a mashup of gingerbread+developer preview image components) and should be better once Google pushes out the Honeycomb AOSP code drop. This could also just be related to my install since other people on various threads aren't seeing some of the issues I am. The more polished Froyo and CM7 (Gingerbread) images run decently well but aren't as smooth as my Droid Incredible running its stock image. That said, I'm happy with it as a ebook reader and web browser and it fits in my coat pocket, which is good for the subway. I like the OS changes in Honeycomb well enough to put up with the screwiness in the image.
- bilban 16y agoWell speed isn't everything. I choose to run a bare bones web browser - without plugins - precisely because it is easier for me to read. I'd take a kindle over the iPad if it was easier on my eyes. I know that wouldn't suit everyone - but I'm sure there is a market there.
- ajju 16y ago>Also, there's a problem with the 3g network component that prevents the nook from sleeping unless it's in airplane mode. You are running Android on the Nook 3G with the black and white (eink) screen?
- cma 16y agoIt's fast; I'm running the 1.1ghz overclock, but it was decent even without it. The processor was probably underclocked for battery life, not because it was 'binned' as flaky at the normal clock. To get the $200 deal, you don't "go" pick one up. At least when I bought mine, it was only available in their ebay store using a coupon. Shipping was free.
- kordless 16y agoWhat would be interesting if for Barnes and Nobel to allow the continued use of the Nook for this type of stuff, and then later do a detailed report on how big an impact it had on their bottom line. The speculation (by hackers) has always been if you are selling product as a loss leader and people are hacking it, it's a better strategy than if you try to shut them out. Someone should test it!
- metageek 16y agoI believe they have announced that they will allow it, in the sense that they won't impose any measures to prevent rooting. Given that, I would expect them to check in a year or so to see whether they need to change their mind.
- Johngibb 16y agoWhile it's a great deal for the end user, Barnes and Noble may be selling them at a loss (or at least a very small profit) with the expectation of making up the difference with book sales. They probably don't stand to benefit from having the cheapest android tablet, with users who weren't specifically looking for an e-reader.
- thematt 16y agoIf they're selling the hardware at a loss, they're in even bigger trouble (as a company) than I thought. With rumors of the Kindle trending towards a price of "free", how can B&N possibly compete long-term? That's not a battle they can win, not against Amazon's scale and distribution network. They're hedging their entire company on a product which their main competitor is going to start giving away. They'll need to make a lot from the sale of the books to make up for that.
- Kylekramer 16y agoAmazon's going on the same model though. I agree that B&N is crashing fast, but "sell at a loss, make up on books" is essentially the entire idea behind ebook readers. It is why the main competitors are coming from book stores, not traditional hardware makers.
- thematt 16y agoIt will probably turn out well for Amazon, but it's failed strategy for B&N to pursue. In those loss leader situations it's usually the biggest guy that survives, which doesn't bode well for B&N. Amazon is plenty diversified to outlast B&N and then capitalize on the empty competitive landscape once they've knocked the other booksellers out.
- SoftwareMaven 16y agoAnd yet Sony, Microsoft, and Nintendo all manage to do it regularly with games. I agree Amazon is set to dominate this market, but if B&N can figure out a way to leverage its brick and mortar stores in this fight, they could still be a solid competitor. For example, if they really embraced this and allowed people to browse around the store for a book, take it to the counter and buy the ebook and have the clerk put it on your Nook, they could continue to capture the crowd that wants to browse as well as expand the market to people who are more technology-phobic.
- jonny_eh 16y agoI think, the comma is misplaced in the title.
- pohl 16y agoThe comma makes more sense if you retain the exclamation point of the original. An addressed person's name (here "Apple") is always grammatically parenthetical, and hence preceded by the comma. The erroneous part is the missing terminal punctuation after the introductory command.
- st3fan 16y ago"It's not for power users." -- Yeah I don't think iPads are for power users.
- deleted 16y ago[deleted]
- tmcw 16y agoMove Over Apple, My Dell Cost only $400 and I don't understand the fact that you're aiming for an upmarket quality play like usual! Computers are computers, tablets are tablets, right? Just like cars, right?
- runjake 16y agoEdit: Whoops. My sarcasm detector is broken. Coffee++
- redial 16y agoyour irony detector must be broken.
- christo16 16y agoI think you mean sarcasm detector
- ZeroGravitas 16y agoSarcasm and irony overlap. This was both.
- Kylekramer 16y agoI thought everyone was saying the iPad is remarkable cause Apple wasn't aiming for an upmarket play?
- pohl 16y agoIn other news, the CueCat was a remarkably inexpensive barcode scanner.
- dexen 16y agoNook could, possibly, become a business model on its own. It has merit as a stand-alone product and general audience will be willing to shell out $250 for a tablet. If trend catches on, economy of scale will kick in and B&N may start making decent profit on it. On the other hand, you can't exactly market a barcode scanner to the general audience...
- runjake 16y agoFor you: http://i.imgur.com/8Qr0Y.jpg http://i.imgur.com/8Qr0Y.jpg
- pohl 16y agoThank you, I saved that as a keepsake. Would you happen to have a photo of how Digital Convergence Corporation is doing today?
- moblivu 16y ago"Why should I have to invalidate the warranty in order to make their product more attractive?" Exactly, why don't the companies hear us. Why do Samsung and Moto keep putting their Android skin if we hate it. Why don't Apple listen to us when we ask for a better web browser with tabs and Flash and a good notification system. Why do a bunch of hackers can hack t and make it better and the giant corp can't.......... ridiculous !
- npalli 16y agoI rooted the Nook Color and it is terrific. Great use as a ebook reader and general tablet. It seems to strike a very good balance between a pure ebook reader like the kindle and the iPad. We have kindle, nook color and the iPad at home. The iPad is useless for holding and reading more than 20 mins. My wife can't pick it up for more than 5 mins. The Nook Color is lighter than the iPad but more functional (browser, apps, zoom in/out) than the kindle. Downsides are -- rooted it is still android 2.1. Moving to 2.2 or 2.3 is not easy (I believe moving to 2.2 required turning off the heat sensor!!). Honeycomb kinda runs in a debug mode (ie., very slow). If the community can create a painless way to move this to android 2.3 it will be a great win. As to the economics, B&N owns the retail distribution of this product. So a big win over other android tablets is that it doesn't need to tack in another 30-40% markup for retail stores. Apple makes at least 30% on the iPad and the iPad is bigger with much higher BOM costs. So at $250 it is very likely that Nook color is making a decent profit for B&N. B&N has a winner on this one, they own the distribution and don't have to pay for the software development (at least the majority of it).
- 2mur 16y agoSame here. I love my Nook Color. I bought it specifically to root it. I own a Kindle which I would much rather read long-form fiction on. The Kindle is terrible for reading academic pdfs and programming books. That is at least 50% of my use for the Nook, the other 50% being general android apps and web browsing. I haven't even opened a book on it yet.
- mikebike 16y agoHow smooth is the Nook Color for navigating around an academic PDF? When I've played with one inside the store, it seemed a little jerky when zooming on the Nook Color manual PDF.
- 2mur 16y agoI think that the stock Nook Color app is not that great for reading pdfs. I use the Adobe one and I've tried one other pdf viewer (that I can't recall the name of now), and they were markedly better.
- tsmith 16y agoI've had an iPad1, now have a rooted Nook Color, and on Friday (or Saturday) will be getting an iPad2. The Nook Color is great in all ways except one: video. No Netflix client available or forthcoming, no streaming from NAS a la Air Video Server, and no VNC. No good hardware-assisted video players either, especially not for free. Otherwise it's a great deal for $250 and works very well as a Kindle reader, web browser, e-mail client, etc., and as a good way to dip your toes into the Android tablet market.
- metageek 16y ago>The Nook Color is great in all ways except one: video. That, and the WiFi on mine was flaky; a couple of times per day, it would drop out, and not reliably come back until I rebooted. That was the main reason I returned it.
- 27182818284 16y agoSeems silly to write, "Move Over Apple, My Tablet Cost $200" and then spend a couple of paragraphs writing about what it is lacking compared to an iPad, Xoom, etc. Doesn't seem "Move Over Apple"-worthy.
- deleted 16y ago[deleted]
- rb2k_ 16y agoJust to save people some time, here are the nook color specs: Power Installed battery (8 hours with Wi-fi off) CPU 800 Mhz ARM Cortex-A8-based TI OMAP3621[1] PowerVR SGX 530 (unconfirmed) Storage capacity 8GB internal storage, 32GB expandable Memory 512MB Display 7-inch 1024 x 600 px WSVGA IPS LCD at 170 ppi Input Capacitive multitouch screen with side Volume, Nook Home, and Power buttons. Connectivity Wi-Fi USB Dimensions 8.1 in (210 mm) (h), 5.0 in (130 mm) (w), 0.48 in (12 mm) (d), Weight 15.8 oz (450 g)
- Kilimanjaro 16y agoMove over Mercedes, ford got a new pinto for much less. Damn I'm good at savings.
- Groxx 16y ago>Be aware that you perform this software hack entirely at your own risk. Barnes & Noble says it invalidates your warranty. The process ran smoothly for me, but when I read the Internet chat rooms, I found at least a few people had had problems. If it goes wrong, you're on your own. Move over Apple, the geeks have done something only geeks will do, and B&N might sell another couple percent because of it. And let me know when it can play 3D games at the framerates the iPad (much less the iPad2) achieves.
- DavidBishop 16y agoMove Over BMW, My Kia Cost $12,000. I had a Kia that did the job for 230,000 miles. If all you want is transportation, it does the job. If you want all the nice things that come with a BMW, however, well, you get what you pay for. From the article: "Of course, it's hardly the same as an iPad or a Xoom or a Galaxy. It doesn't have any cameras. It has a slower processor. It's not for power users. The video support is pretty limited. A few Android programs still won't run on it. And dedicated gamers will doubtless find it frustrating." It's an attention grabbing headline which is the purpose of a headline. But the author is not truly comparing Apples and Oranges. He simply wanted to highjack eyeballs.
- DavidBishop 16y agoMove Over BMW, My Kia Cost $12,000. I had a Kia that did the job for 230,000 miles. If all you want is transportation, it does the job. If you want all the nice things that come with a BMW, however, well, you get what you pay for. From the article: "Of course, it's hardly the same as an iPad or a Xoom or a Galaxy. It doesn't have any cameras. It has a slower processor. It's not for power users. The video support is pretty limited. A few Android programs still won't run on it. And dedicated gamers will doubtless find it frustrating." It's an attention grabbing headline which is the purpose of a headline. But the author is not truly comparing Apples and Oranges. He simply wanted to highjack eyeballs.
- cheez 16y agoWow, 230K miles! I thought Kia would be one of those brands that broke hopelessly after 50-100K miles. Did you do anything special beyond regular maintenance? Any big surgeries?
- stellar678 16y agoKia has a 10-year, 100k mile powertrain warranty. How could they do that if their cars were mostly trash after 50-100k miles?
- deleted 16y ago[deleted]
- VladRussian 16y agothe 10 years warranty is only for the 1st owner.
- georgieporgie 16y agoThe paint could blister and peel, the door seals could rot, the dashboard could crack from UV exposure, the shock absorbers could leak, the wipers could seize, the steering could become loose and noisy, etc. I haven't owned a Kia, nor do I have anything against them, I'm just being pedantic and pointing out that you could fulfill a 100k powertrain warranty and still end up with a car that's mostly trash. :-)
- drudru11 16y ago8 hours of battery life
- terhechte 16y agoMove over Apple, my tablet cost $10 I just bought a Moleskine, sure it can't do fancy videos, and it can't really surf the web, but neither can the hacked Nook for $200. And with a small hack I can even read books from Amazon on this device! I just print them out and glue them between the Moleskine's pages. Of course, there's always cheaper hardware with less functions - but why make this a wsj article?
- jokermatt999 16y agoWhile the article is being (rightfully) ridiculed for the over the top headline, there is some truth in there. The iPad and it's competitors are still fairly expensive for an "impulse buy", and I don't think it's clear to a lot of people how tablets are useful. They seem cool, but it's hard to justify spending that much for something you aren't even sure if you're going to use, at least with what I make. It's much easier to consider buying a $200 tablet. I can't see that a tablet would be useful enough to me to spend the few extra hundred dollars to get a more powerful one.
- jluxenberg 16y agoperfectly legal software fix from the Internet that turned it into a fully functioning tablet running on Google's Android platform Don't think this is legal, as the exception to the DMCA's anti-circumvention clause only applies to "wireless telephone handsets" [1] [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_Millennium_Copyright_Act#Anti-circumvention_exemptions http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_Millennium_Copyright_Ac...
- patrickaljord 16y agohttp://abcnews.go.com/Technology/us-government-jailbreaking-iphone-legal/story?id=11254253 http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/us-government-jailbreaking-...
- orangecat 16y agoConsidering the "circumvention" is inserting an SD card and turning it on, I doubt that would trigger the DMCA. The only question is whether the image that you burn to the card contains copyrighted B&N software, which I don't believe it does; it just installs additional software that grants root access. Installing the Android Market, Gmail, and other non-opensource Google apps is probably not legal, but Google has shown a deliberate lack of interest in preventing that.
- zavulon 16y agoI'm fairly sure a month from now, original iPad will cost ~ $200 and it's still ages beyond the Nook
- poppysan 16y agoDell streak 7....the dual core beast for $199 with a new phone contract. Check it out...there is a middle-ground!
- AndyZ 16y agommm, move over mister Brett Arends, if you found a 200$ for your soul please shut up and and enjoy your tablet, the 15 million iPad users really dont give a #*%& about your article ;) Btw. I dont have an iPad, neither do I need one :D
- DeAngeloLampkin 16y agoBetween requiring developers to pay to write apps (have to enter their personal or enterprise program) and now charging for the IDE, Apple is almost taking a hostile stance against developers, whereas Google is embracing them. I wonder what the reasoning behind this move is.