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Matt Mulvihill was the first to pick up a Playbook at the Staples outlet on Bank Street Tuesday. With the device available at multiple stores, it didn’t attract the lineups seen for Apple product releases |
Let’s just say it now: It has no apps!
And yet that doesn’t matter, because Research In Motion Ltd.’s BlackBerry Playbook, despite a lean selection of downloadable software, is the best tablet on the market today.
The sleek and well-designed device boasts forward- and rear-facing cameras, a gorgeous screen capable of displaying 1080p high-definition images and an innovative, touch-sensitive bezel around the screen in place of the notorious “home” button found on Apple Inc.’s iPad and other mobile devices.
And the software the device runs on —provided by Ottawa’s QNX Software Systems —is easily the best mobile operating system (OS) available. QNX has done a masterful job of creating a mobile operating system that is fluid and fresh. It presents easy-to-access icons that allow users to sort through installed applications using friendly “tabs.” For instance, the “media” tab isolates the tablet’s video, picture, music and camera software, while the “games” tab brings up all of the device’s games. It’s easy to find the applications you want, as opposed to scrolling through numerous screens of available programs.
The OS also supports gestures and multi-tasking. Swiping up from the bottom of the tablet minimizes the window so the user can access other applications that are running in the background. Returning to the home screen shows an animated row of all running apps. Videos and music continue running in the background as you flip between applications, unless you choose to pause them before you return to the home screen. Games will automatically pause.
The Playbook can handle amazingly heavy workloads. In one test, it ran a high-definition video, a copy of EA’s racing game Need For Speed Undercover, the device’s web browser had three tabs pointing at different sites, the music application was open and Microsoft Corp.’s Bing Maps application was also active. While overall performance slowed a bit under the heavy workload, it was still acceptable. It didn’t crash or show any error messages.
The device’s web browser gives the Playbook its biggest leg-up over competitors. It can run Java, HTML5 and Adobe System Inc.’s Flash., presenting the Internet in the same way a laptop or home computer would.
And despite what some say, Flash is still the dominant technology on the Internet. Chat sessions, games on Facebook, coverage of live events — all require the software, as do reading comments on many websites. Veto, YouTube, CollegeHumor, MetaCafe, Rogers on Demand and TSN.ca TV feeds all use Flash to serve up video on their websites.People who like to chat with Facebook friends can do so from the Facebook website, much like they do on their home computers. Farmville, Mafia Wars and even online radio (such as TSN Radio 1050) all work through the PlayBook’s browser.
Most important, and despite what others have reported, all of your web-based e-mail (including Hotmail, Gmail and corporate webmail systems) are served up quickly through the browser.
This is why the lack of apps doesn’t really matter. Many apps have been created because mobile browsers haven’t done an adequate job of displaying Flash.
It’s why the Facebook App, the Vevo App and the Farmville App came into being. With Flash, people need a lot fewer apps.
Still convinced that apps equal success? Keep in mind people made the same lack-of-apps argument when Google Inc.’s Android operating system was released. Android now represents 29 per cent of the global market for smart phones, while Apple is at 27 per cent, according to the latest data by Neilsen.
Also criticized in early reviews is the Bridge feature that lets BlackBerry owners sync their phones with the Playbook, making all of their e-mail, scheduled appointments and BlackBerry messenger contacts available through the tablet. The devices will stay in sync only when close to each other — lose your Playbook, or leave it in the back seat of your car while grabbing lunch, and no BlackBerry information can be retrieved from the device.
As opposed to a BlackBerry smartphone, the PlayBook’s larger size lends to it being shared among a room of colleagues, and perhaps left behind when a worker needs to run out of the office.
According to RIM, the disconnect feature was added at the request of corporate chief information officers who feared that the tablet was too appealing to thieves looking for corporate secrets. RIM has a strong reputation for producing the most secure mobile devices in the world.
Playbook can also be tethered to your cellular phone over a Bluetooth wireless connection, giving it Internet access anywhere you can get a cellular signal.
RIM deserves applause for making it easy to get content on to the device. As opposed to many competitors, Playbook doesn’t need extra software (such as iTunes) to put files onto the device. Plug Playbook into a computer and it shows up as a drive. Users can simply drag-and-drop files right on to it.
It also has support for a large range of popular file formats — including .AVI and .WMV video files. Programs similar to Word, Excel and PowerPoint let business users edit and alter documents on the go.
It has an HDMI output port, so users can plug the device right into a projector or big-screen TV and stream 1080p programming from the device.
With Playbook, RIM has done a lot of things right. But the company deserves to be kicked in the behind for not understanding the consumer. RIM has years of corporate experience, but Playbook offers its first real chance to reach out to average people. And the first experience that average person will have with the device is the need to download a 300-megabyte software update.
Within 24 hours, I was asked to download a second 270-megabyte system update.
From a corporate IT point of view, this is a positive sign. It means RIM is serious about security and making sure its products run in an optimal fashion 100 per cent of the time.
Think of how many times your work computer needs to be “updated.”
From a consumer’s standpoint, it means something is broken and needs to be fixed.
Companies like Apple and Google don’t push out software updates unless they need to address a serious security issue. Instead, once or twice a year, they play up the next version of Android, which will be called “Cupcake” or IS 4.3, and then explain all of the new features the “new OS” will bring while leaving out all of the bugs it will patch. RIM needs to learn from this.
Despite having a forward-facing camera, the Playbook comes with no video-chat software.
This is inexcusable.
Also, when dealing with consumer devices, there is no reason to leave your software developers out of the loop. RIM did not release the software kit that gives programmers the tools they need to develop for Playbook until October.
By contrast, Google made software available to developers in early 2010 for the Chrome computer operating system it will launch later this year,
Even though the device performs exceptionally well without a huge library of apps to draw from, the absence of those programs is RIM’s fault.
RIM has a real winner with the Playbook, but technology isn’t everything.
If the company wants to be successful with its tablet it must win over the hearts and minds of consumers, who are increasingly driving the decisions of corporate IT departments. In the meantime, Playbook should serve as a warning to Apple, Google and Microsoft, and force the industry giants to crank up the innovation engines on their campuses if they want to continue to compete in this space.
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