7 ms·

Motorola Xoom Looking Like Epic Flop

41 points by lotusleaf1987 15y ago

nkassis 15y ago
I haven't seen them around, I mean I can buy a Playbook at Indigo ( a bookstore in Canada) but good luck finding a Xoom. Plus for the price it's hard to justify I guess for non android nerds like me. But whatever, the Xoom is one devices, like the HTC Dream, this isn't a big deal in the Android big picture.
- cmsj 15y ago
  "the Android big picture" == "throw enough crap at the wall and some of it will stick" ;)
m0nastic 15y ago
I'm not so sure that there's any useful conclusions to draw from this article (even assuming that the numbers they cite are correct). If the Xoom turns out to be unsuccessful, there's no shortage of possible explanations as to why that was the case. At this point, I think we need to either have a successful non-iPad tablet, or a longer period without a successful non-iPad to make any kind of useful analysis. If another Android tablet launches and is successful, than that may tell us something about what Motorola did wrong here. If the Playbook becomes successful, that might also tell us something, but again, these would be things specific to Motorola's product. The only meaningful conclusion that this seems to suggest is that just launching a tablet doesn't guarantee success (which shouldn't be a surprise, as that's been the status quo for the past decade at least).
- daniel_solano 15y ago
  Slowly but surely, there are new Honeycomb tablets being shipped. In the US, this past week has seen the release of two new tablets: the Acer Iconia A500 and the Asus EEE Pad Transformer. Both of these tablets have functioning SD card slots, showing that the lack of a working slot is Motorola's fault, not Google's. In addition, these have some neat features that, as I understand it, the iPad does not support, such as USB host mode (allowing use of a USB thumb drive, external HD, keyboard or mouse). Both of these devices also sport prices lower than the Xoom. I am particularly intrigued by the Asus device, as it has a keyboard accessory that effectively turns the tablet into a netbook. For me, this type of versatility can have real value. Unfortunately, Asus has not done a very good job of supplying enough devices to meet the demand.
  - deleted 15y ago
    [deleted]
  - georgemcbay 15y ago
    I've got the ASUS Transformer, I was one of the lucky few who got an order in around midnight of the launch date (bought mine on BestBuy.com). The device is really quite fantastic, far better than the Xoom (which I've used but don't own) and cheaper. The IPS screen is just absolutely gorgeous to look at and really elevates it over the other Honeycomb tablets I've seen. Unfortunately the keyboard docking station is largely vaporware here in the USA -- reviewers got them but I don't believe a single unit has sold at retail here. It is somewhat puzzling why the docks are even more scarce than the tablets since the dock is a relatively straightforward piece of electronics compared to tablet itself.
pavlov 15y ago
Hmm. This article claims 25-125,000 Xoom units sold. Last week Motorola said that they shipped 250,000 units in the first quarter [0]. I'm aware of the difference between "shipped" and "sold", but the figures in the Forbes article should be taken with a grain of salt. [0] http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2384615,00.asp http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2384615,00.asp
- lotusleaf1987 15y ago
  They're different verbs with different implications, I think Forbes is being pretty clear. Xoom may have shipped 250,000, but only 125k were actually sold. The other half are sitting on the shelves somewhere, which means inventory is high--a bad sign, which usually leads to price-cuts to clear space.
blocke 15y ago
Google has done everything it can to hamstring this launch. The software sucks. Buggy, Crashy, Beta quality. The emulator's performance is so bad it's unusable. The tablet section of the market is empty of real tablet apps. The Android Market can't even handle reorienting itself. The Android team doesn't seem to give a shit. Ask anyone who has tried to support Android is an Enterprise how bad the Exchange, VPN and 802.1x stacks have been since day one. Business as usual. Their public issue tracker is obviously intended as a space for frustrated users [1] to shout into a bottomless pit of who gives a shit. I used to be a major Android fan but screw this. If only WebOS was open source... [1] - Edited to substitute users for customers. Real users are not Google's customers. And the experience shows.
- hinathan 15y ago
  That's not Google doing 'everything it can to hamstring' — That's Motorola shipping a product based on an OS that's obviously not ready. Motorola's fault.
  - cube13 15y ago
    I don't see how it's entirely Motorola's fault, honestly. At best, both parties are equally at fault. Google could have refused to release the source, forcing Motorola to go with Gingerbread instead of Honeycomb.
  - blocke 15y ago
    "That's not Google doing 'everything it can to hamstring' — That's Motorola shipping a product based on an OS that's obviously not ready. Motorola's fault." Google controls Android 3.0 completely. They very intentionally did not make a source release. Google entered the relationship with Motorola and it damn well had control over who was going to ship a 3.0 device. They knew what they were doing. They HAD to beat the iPad 2 release date at all costs. So now all we have is a buggy as hell 3.0 OS with no source release and we're still waiting for them to fix stuff. I hope the early release to beat the iPad furthered some other business goal because it didn't further Android as a great Tablet OS. The flaws I've seen in the device are clear OS and Software issues. So unless your point of view is that it's up to other people to fix Google's fuckups... eh...
npalli 15y ago
Bogus numbers, the report is based on an analyst who predicted between 25,000 to 120,000 sales. The company reported 250,000 shipped in their earnings. Not an iPad killer for sure but not as dire as reported either. Most importantly, the wi-fi version had been on sale starting only March 27th. The initial sales were predominantly for the overpriced wifi/3G model.
- wriq 15y ago
  Shipped ≠ Sales
  - npalli 15y ago
    Yes, but motorola doesn't own any retail stores unlike Apple. So they don't have visibility into sales until a couple of months. Unless you are looking at a very high return rate, it is a good proxy for sales.
    - shaggyfrog 15y ago
      You forgot the existence of a very high sitting-on-the-shelf rate. You can ship all the units you want, but unless people are taking them home, the number is definitely not a good proxy for sales.
      - npalli 15y ago
        Well sure, I mean there is always the possibility that there is channel stuffing. But why take the pessimistic view that all the shipped tablets are on the shelf when you don't have any information. Things to note -- 1. at amazon.com, the only site I have been tracking the tablets in actual sales, the Xoom is either #1 or #2 in tablet sales over the past two months. I mean, it is ahead of even the iPad 2 that is supposed to supply constrained. So all the guys who stood in line and brought iPad2's so they could sell for a markup -- finding it difficult to sell even for a $100 premium -- compared to the flop show that is the Xoom. http://www.amazon.com/gp/bestsellers/electronics/1232597011/ref=pd_zg_hrsr_e_1_3_last http://www.amazon.com/gp/bestsellers/electronics/1232597011/... (this keeps changing, so don't hold me to it). 2. the wifi model is flying off the shelf at some of the local retailers. did someone earlier mention out of stock situation in Canada? 3. the wifi was introducted on Mar 26th, a couple of days before their quarter ended 4. more channels and price points are yet to be introduced.
deleted 15y ago
[deleted]
tzs 15y ago
If Xoom had shipped six months earlier, it could have been a killer product. Sure, the OS would have been beta quality at best, but the hardware was killer compared to iPad 1. However, compared to iPad 2, it has no significant hardware advantage. Maybe the screen aspect ratio for some people. It has no price advantage. The OS is still beta quality. For all but the small number of people who want a tablet without the restrictions of the Apple Store and who aren't willing to jailbreak an iPad 2, there is simply no reason to buy a Xoom. Unless Motorola are idiots, they HAD to have predicted that there would be an iPad 2 and that it would be announced about a year after iPad 1. So unless the plan was for the Xoom to come out long before that and the schedule slipped, I don't understand what their plan was.
- zwily 15y ago
  So admitting that the OS is beta quality even now, you really think it would have been a killer product 6 months ago?
deleted 15y ago
[deleted]
cmsj 15y ago
(Disclaimer: I own a whole stack of Apple kit, including an iPad, and some AAPL). I've not played with a Xoom, but it keeps striking me that all of the people launching Android tablets are totally the wrong people to be doing it. Apple has (at least) the following things going for it: 1) It gets great deals on components and manufacturing 2) It maintains very consistent retail pricing 3) It does a lot of retail itself 4) It gets 30% off the top of all app purchases on the device 5) It gets ?% off the top of all music/movie purchases on the device Points 1-3 are good for initial profit margins. It means they're making decent money on every iPad sold. Points 4 and 5 are good for ARPU (average revenue per user) - it means you're continuing to make money from every device sale, long into the future. Now look at the Xoom or the Galaxy Tab or any other android tablet currently available or announced and think very hard about which of the above points apply. I think you'd struggle to apply anything other than point 1 and even that probably only applies to Samsung. Most of the vendors do small manufacturing runs, sell them wholesale to retailers and get no money from end users until it's time for new hardware. The only exception to this I can think of would be revenue sharing deals from the mobile networks on the 3G models. I don't know what kind of deals these would be, but my guess is that the networks would demand pretty cheap unit prices on the hardware. So who could do better? The obvious answer is Amazon, they could at least get points 3, 4 and 5 (and 3 strongly suggests they'd also get point 2) and what are they doing? Running an Android app store right now. If they can make a good tablet (and the Kindle hardware suggests they should be able to), they could really make a splash with it, and that would help them improve on point 1. Sony might be able to, in that they could arrange point 5 and potentially 1 and 2, but my general view on Sony's ability to execute in the 'digital lifestyle' arena is very very negative ;) Alternatively perhaps Samsung's desire to copy Apple's hardware will translate into a desire to copy their services. If they could get deals on content then they could get points 4 and 5 and differentiate themselves from the Android crowd. That's my take on part of the tablet world. I also think Android badly needs some really slick tablet apps - on a par with iMovie and GarageBand, both of which are stunningly good.
- code_duck 15y ago
  Those are the reasons why Apple is well situated in the market, and can offer low prices and still make great margins. The reasons that their products are successful beyond that are even more important, IMO. Unlike Motorola, Samsung, Google, Nokia, and so many other companies in this space, Apple has been working very hard on designing interfaces for applications and personal computer operating systems for a very long time. When you put Apple with their experience with OS X and Mac software up against Motorola, even with Google's help, it's clear who has the advantage. There's not really another company with Apple's sort of experience out there, other than Microsoft. The problem is their mobile strategy is a mess still, and they don't seem the same quality of vision that Apple does.
code_duck 15y ago
While the Xoom looks pretty neat to me, I've heard of some people having problems with their XOOMs and I'm not surprised. My Moto Droid 2 phone experience has been rather shocking, quality wise. Even when the hardware seems to be working 100%, I could fill a page with all the little-to-medium software glitches I deal with daily.
- moultano 15y ago
  I have one and love it. My only issues with it are that some apps don't manage memory for screen rotations well, so crash when trying to allocate another buffer the size of the screen when you rotate it (Aldiko in particular). Most apps work fantastically though, and the preinstalled ones are all beautiful. Google Books in particular.
  - code_duck 15y ago
    I like it, and I wanted to like it, but I've had so many problems. I went through several units that I returned to Verizon. Right now, my two main issues are instability of the hotspot (which I've seen zillions of people complain about on Droid Xs, too) and poor/inconsistent camera image quality.
  - code_duck 15y ago
    I like it, and I wanted to like it, but I've had so many problems. I went through several units that I returned to Verizon. Currently, now that I have what seems to be a fully functional unit, my two main issues are instability of the hotspot (which I've seen zillions of people complain about on Droid Xs, too) and poor/inconsistent camera image quality.
razzmataz 15y ago
There's probably good reason. It was way too expensive, for one thing. I haven't seen any of these tablets hit the sweet spot of pricing that a few surveys revealed a while back.
foobarbazetc 15y ago
I recently bought a Xoom (since the Android Honeycomb emulator is unusable), and it's a laughably poor product from the unboxing experience all the way to the horrible UI that is Honeycomb (even worse than standard phone Android, and that's laughable UI -- where's the HIG, Google?). Honeycomb is like taking the worst Linux WM you can find and sticking it onto a tablet with no thought for how a tablet should work. This is going to appeal to some Android fans, but that's about it. Everything on this device is horrible. The device feels chunky and heavy, the screen looks dithered (you can see individual pixels) and unevenly lit, and you can see UI element flicker into place. And there are about 2 or 3 tablet specific apps that are actually tablet apps in the Market (Angry Birds, and some other poor quality Android games). ClockOS even lives on, with a dedicated clock on the home screen, and the bottom right corner, and there's even a 'Clock' app. Fantastic. Oh, it also doesn't charge via USB. WTF? Anyway, it has one thing going for it: it has Angry Birds and it works more or less like the iPad version of Angry Birds. That's about it.
- abrown28 15y ago
  I like my Xoom and those of us without super human vision think the display looks just fine. Not charging via the usb is annoying but not a deal killer for me. The apps will come eventually plus I can write my own apps if I want without having to shell out another $800. I have no love for apple.
- guelo 15y ago
  I own a Xoom, and while I agree it is nowhere near the iPad experience, the device is not THAT bad, your comment is way too harsh. There are 64 tablet specific apps. And you are lying about seeing individual pixels, it has a higher pixel density than the iPad, on par with an iPhone 3G.
  - foobarbazetc 15y ago
    I'm not lying. I can see the dithering and have terrible eyesight. The pixel density may be higher than the iPad, but the screen quality is nowhere near it. And the device is that bad. What's with the system tray? And the Windows Vista style app switcher? It's like we've gone back in time to when Windows 95 was cool (and Honeycomb has a UI that is less consistent than Windows 95), except with tappable UI widgets. Maybe 4.0 will fix it all (ala how 2.0 brought Android into the 'usable' category), but this is not a tablet for anyone but nerds. '64 tablet specific apps' is being generous. Maybe the people developing these apps upped targetSdk and stuck in a poorly-recreated-fragment-API-using-thing-aka-UISplitViewController widget, but that's pretty much it. The rest are games that are available on iPad.

41 points by lotusleaf1987 15y ago

I haven't seen them around, I mean I can buy a Playbook at Indigo ( a bookstore in Canada) but good luck finding a Xoom. Plus for the price it's hard to justify I guess for non android nerds like me. But whatever, the Xoom is one devices, like the HTC Dream, this isn't a big deal in the Android big picture.

cmsj 15y ago
"the Android big picture" == "throw enough crap at the wall and some of it will stick" ;)

m0nastic 15y ago

I'm not so sure that there's any useful conclusions to draw from this article (even assuming that the numbers they cite are correct). If the Xoom turns out to be unsuccessful, there's no shortage of possible explanations as to why that was the case. At this point, I think we need to either have a successful non-iPad tablet, or a longer period without a successful non-iPad to make any kind of useful analysis. If another Android tablet launches and is successful, than that may tell us something about what Motorola did wrong here. If the Playbook becomes successful, that might also tell us something, but again, these would be things specific to Motorola's product. The only meaningful conclusion that this seems to suggest is that just launching a tablet doesn't guarantee success (which shouldn't be a surprise, as that's been the status quo for the past decade at least).

daniel_solano 15y ago
Slowly but surely, there are new Honeycomb tablets being shipped. In the US, this past week has seen the release of two new tablets: the Acer Iconia A500 and the Asus EEE Pad Transformer. Both of these tablets have functioning SD card slots, showing that the lack of a working slot is Motorola's fault, not Google's. In addition, these have some neat features that, as I understand it, the iPad does not support, such as USB host mode (allowing use of a USB thumb drive, external HD, keyboard or mouse). Both of these devices also sport prices lower than the Xoom. I am particularly intrigued by the Asus device, as it has a keyboard accessory that effectively turns the tablet into a netbook. For me, this type of versatility can have real value. Unfortunately, Asus has not done a very good job of supplying enough devices to meet the demand.
- deleted 15y ago
  [deleted]
- georgemcbay 15y ago
  I've got the ASUS Transformer, I was one of the lucky few who got an order in around midnight of the launch date (bought mine on BestBuy.com). The device is really quite fantastic, far better than the Xoom (which I've used but don't own) and cheaper. The IPS screen is just absolutely gorgeous to look at and really elevates it over the other Honeycomb tablets I've seen. Unfortunately the keyboard docking station is largely vaporware here in the USA -- reviewers got them but I don't believe a single unit has sold at retail here. It is somewhat puzzling why the docks are even more scarce than the tablets since the dock is a relatively straightforward piece of electronics compared to tablet itself.

pavlov 15y ago

Hmm. This article claims 25-125,000 Xoom units sold. Last week Motorola said that they shipped 250,000 units in the first quarter [0]. I'm aware of the difference between "shipped" and "sold", but the figures in the Forbes article should be taken with a grain of salt. [0] http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2384615,00.asp http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2384615,00.asp

lotusleaf1987 15y ago
They're different verbs with different implications, I think Forbes is being pretty clear. Xoom may have shipped 250,000, but only 125k were actually sold. The other half are sitting on the shelves somewhere, which means inventory is high--a bad sign, which usually leads to price-cuts to clear space.

blocke 15y ago

Google has done everything it can to hamstring this launch. The software sucks. Buggy, Crashy, Beta quality. The emulator's performance is so bad it's unusable. The tablet section of the market is empty of real tablet apps. The Android Market can't even handle reorienting itself. The Android team doesn't seem to give a shit. Ask anyone who has tried to support Android is an Enterprise how bad the Exchange, VPN and 802.1x stacks have been since day one. Business as usual. Their public issue tracker is obviously intended as a space for frustrated users [1] to shout into a bottomless pit of who gives a shit. I used to be a major Android fan but screw this. If only WebOS was open source... [1] - Edited to substitute users for customers. Real users are not Google's customers. And the experience shows.

hinathan 15y ago
That's not Google doing 'everything it can to hamstring' — That's Motorola shipping a product based on an OS that's obviously not ready. Motorola's fault.
- cube13 15y ago
  I don't see how it's entirely Motorola's fault, honestly. At best, both parties are equally at fault. Google could have refused to release the source, forcing Motorola to go with Gingerbread instead of Honeycomb.
- blocke 15y ago
  "That's not Google doing 'everything it can to hamstring' — That's Motorola shipping a product based on an OS that's obviously not ready. Motorola's fault." Google controls Android 3.0 completely. They very intentionally did not make a source release. Google entered the relationship with Motorola and it damn well had control over who was going to ship a 3.0 device. They knew what they were doing. They HAD to beat the iPad 2 release date at all costs. So now all we have is a buggy as hell 3.0 OS with no source release and we're still waiting for them to fix stuff. I hope the early release to beat the iPad furthered some other business goal because it didn't further Android as a great Tablet OS. The flaws I've seen in the device are clear OS and Software issues. So unless your point of view is that it's up to other people to fix Google's fuckups... eh...

npalli 15y ago

Bogus numbers, the report is based on an analyst who predicted between 25,000 to 120,000 sales. The company reported 250,000 shipped in their earnings. Not an iPad killer for sure but not as dire as reported either. Most importantly, the wi-fi version had been on sale starting only March 27th. The initial sales were predominantly for the overpriced wifi/3G model.

wriq 15y ago
Shipped ≠ Sales
- npalli 15y ago
  Yes, but motorola doesn't own any retail stores unlike Apple. So they don't have visibility into sales until a couple of months. Unless you are looking at a very high return rate, it is a good proxy for sales.
  - shaggyfrog 15y ago
    You forgot the existence of a very high sitting-on-the-shelf rate. You can ship all the units you want, but unless people are taking them home, the number is definitely not a good proxy for sales.
    - npalli 15y ago
      Well sure, I mean there is always the possibility that there is channel stuffing. But why take the pessimistic view that all the shipped tablets are on the shelf when you don't have any information. Things to note -- 1. at amazon.com, the only site I have been tracking the tablets in actual sales, the Xoom is either #1 or #2 in tablet sales over the past two months. I mean, it is ahead of even the iPad 2 that is supposed to supply constrained. So all the guys who stood in line and brought iPad2's so they could sell for a markup -- finding it difficult to sell even for a $100 premium -- compared to the flop show that is the Xoom. http://www.amazon.com/gp/bestsellers/electronics/1232597011/ref=pd_zg_hrsr_e_1_3_last http://www.amazon.com/gp/bestsellers/electronics/1232597011/... (this keeps changing, so don't hold me to it). 2. the wifi model is flying off the shelf at some of the local retailers. did someone earlier mention out of stock situation in Canada? 3. the wifi was introducted on Mar 26th, a couple of days before their quarter ended 4. more channels and price points are yet to be introduced.

deleted 15y ago

[deleted]

tzs 15y ago

If Xoom had shipped six months earlier, it could have been a killer product. Sure, the OS would have been beta quality at best, but the hardware was killer compared to iPad 1. However, compared to iPad 2, it has no significant hardware advantage. Maybe the screen aspect ratio for some people. It has no price advantage. The OS is still beta quality. For all but the small number of people who want a tablet without the restrictions of the Apple Store and who aren't willing to jailbreak an iPad 2, there is simply no reason to buy a Xoom. Unless Motorola are idiots, they HAD to have predicted that there would be an iPad 2 and that it would be announced about a year after iPad 1. So unless the plan was for the Xoom to come out long before that and the schedule slipped, I don't understand what their plan was.

zwily 15y ago
So admitting that the OS is beta quality even now, you really think it would have been a killer product 6 months ago?

deleted 15y ago

[deleted]

cmsj 15y ago

(Disclaimer: I own a whole stack of Apple kit, including an iPad, and some AAPL). I've not played with a Xoom, but it keeps striking me that all of the people launching Android tablets are totally the wrong people to be doing it. Apple has (at least) the following things going for it: 1) It gets great deals on components and manufacturing 2) It maintains very consistent retail pricing 3) It does a lot of retail itself 4) It gets 30% off the top of all app purchases on the device 5) It gets ?% off the top of all music/movie purchases on the device Points 1-3 are good for initial profit margins. It means they're making decent money on every iPad sold. Points 4 and 5 are good for ARPU (average revenue per user) - it means you're continuing to make money from every device sale, long into the future. Now look at the Xoom or the Galaxy Tab or any other android tablet currently available or announced and think very hard about which of the above points apply. I think you'd struggle to apply anything other than point 1 and even that probably only applies to Samsung. Most of the vendors do small manufacturing runs, sell them wholesale to retailers and get no money from end users until it's time for new hardware. The only exception to this I can think of would be revenue sharing deals from the mobile networks on the 3G models. I don't know what kind of deals these would be, but my guess is that the networks would demand pretty cheap unit prices on the hardware. So who could do better? The obvious answer is Amazon, they could at least get points 3, 4 and 5 (and 3 strongly suggests they'd also get point 2) and what are they doing? Running an Android app store right now. If they can make a good tablet (and the Kindle hardware suggests they should be able to), they could really make a splash with it, and that would help them improve on point 1. Sony might be able to, in that they could arrange point 5 and potentially 1 and 2, but my general view on Sony's ability to execute in the 'digital lifestyle' arena is very very negative ;) Alternatively perhaps Samsung's desire to copy Apple's hardware will translate into a desire to copy their services. If they could get deals on content then they could get points 4 and 5 and differentiate themselves from the Android crowd. That's my take on part of the tablet world. I also think Android badly needs some really slick tablet apps - on a par with iMovie and GarageBand, both of which are stunningly good.

code_duck 15y ago
Those are the reasons why Apple is well situated in the market, and can offer low prices and still make great margins. The reasons that their products are successful beyond that are even more important, IMO. Unlike Motorola, Samsung, Google, Nokia, and so many other companies in this space, Apple has been working very hard on designing interfaces for applications and personal computer operating systems for a very long time. When you put Apple with their experience with OS X and Mac software up against Motorola, even with Google's help, it's clear who has the advantage. There's not really another company with Apple's sort of experience out there, other than Microsoft. The problem is their mobile strategy is a mess still, and they don't seem the same quality of vision that Apple does.

code_duck 15y ago

While the Xoom looks pretty neat to me, I've heard of some people having problems with their XOOMs and I'm not surprised. My Moto Droid 2 phone experience has been rather shocking, quality wise. Even when the hardware seems to be working 100%, I could fill a page with all the little-to-medium software glitches I deal with daily.

moultano 15y ago
I have one and love it. My only issues with it are that some apps don't manage memory for screen rotations well, so crash when trying to allocate another buffer the size of the screen when you rotate it (Aldiko in particular). Most apps work fantastically though, and the preinstalled ones are all beautiful. Google Books in particular.
- code_duck 15y ago
  I like it, and I wanted to like it, but I've had so many problems. I went through several units that I returned to Verizon. Right now, my two main issues are instability of the hotspot (which I've seen zillions of people complain about on Droid Xs, too) and poor/inconsistent camera image quality.
- code_duck 15y ago
  I like it, and I wanted to like it, but I've had so many problems. I went through several units that I returned to Verizon. Currently, now that I have what seems to be a fully functional unit, my two main issues are instability of the hotspot (which I've seen zillions of people complain about on Droid Xs, too) and poor/inconsistent camera image quality.

razzmataz 15y ago

There's probably good reason. It was way too expensive, for one thing. I haven't seen any of these tablets hit the sweet spot of pricing that a few surveys revealed a while back.

foobarbazetc 15y ago

I recently bought a Xoom (since the Android Honeycomb emulator is unusable), and it's a laughably poor product from the unboxing experience all the way to the horrible UI that is Honeycomb (even worse than standard phone Android, and that's laughable UI -- where's the HIG, Google?). Honeycomb is like taking the worst Linux WM you can find and sticking it onto a tablet with no thought for how a tablet should work. This is going to appeal to some Android fans, but that's about it. Everything on this device is horrible. The device feels chunky and heavy, the screen looks dithered (you can see individual pixels) and unevenly lit, and you can see UI element flicker into place. And there are about 2 or 3 tablet specific apps that are actually tablet apps in the Market (Angry Birds, and some other poor quality Android games). ClockOS even lives on, with a dedicated clock on the home screen, and the bottom right corner, and there's even a 'Clock' app. Fantastic. Oh, it also doesn't charge via USB. WTF? Anyway, it has one thing going for it: it has Angry Birds and it works more or less like the iPad version of Angry Birds. That's about it.

abrown28 15y ago
I like my Xoom and those of us without super human vision think the display looks just fine. Not charging via the usb is annoying but not a deal killer for me. The apps will come eventually plus I can write my own apps if I want without having to shell out another $800. I have no love for apple.
guelo 15y ago
I own a Xoom, and while I agree it is nowhere near the iPad experience, the device is not THAT bad, your comment is way too harsh. There are 64 tablet specific apps. And you are lying about seeing individual pixels, it has a higher pixel density than the iPad, on par with an iPhone 3G.
- foobarbazetc 15y ago
  I'm not lying. I can see the dithering and have terrible eyesight. The pixel density may be higher than the iPad, but the screen quality is nowhere near it. And the device is that bad. What's with the system tray? And the Windows Vista style app switcher? It's like we've gone back in time to when Windows 95 was cool (and Honeycomb has a UI that is less consistent than Windows 95), except with tappable UI widgets. Maybe 4.0 will fix it all (ala how 2.0 brought Android into the 'usable' category), but this is not a tablet for anyone but nerds. '64 tablet specific apps' is being generous. Maybe the people developing these apps upped targetSdk and stuck in a poorly-recreated-fragment-API-using-thing-aka-UISplitViewController widget, but that's pretty much it. The rest are games that are available on iPad.