[Weaser999]

I don't think it's cynicism, it's skepticism. Why did HP buy Palm? For webOS. Who's the experts on webOS? Former Palm. If HP is so proficient at building mobile OSes, then why haven't they built their own instead of paying 1.2 billion for an inefficient one?

Besides, if the alpha-state lagginess of the OS was a factor HP is confident they will have fixed by release this summer, you would've thought they would:
1. be making everyone aware of it at their 9 Feb event instead of staring silently, awkwardly, while glowing cards sat on the screen in the demo vids.
2. not load up the nice machine nVidia built for them for an alpha-state demo - they wouldn't let anyone without an HP employee ID card even touch the devices so they had total control.

Yes, skepticism is most definitely warranted here.

I honestly can't fathom why people would judge a piece of software while it's in alpha stage, nevermind beta stage. If it were to be released in lets say 2 months then i'd say.. uh oh! But, they still have almost half a year of development left. As for earlier palm devices, I don't see too many people with Palm Pre 2's complaining about speed issues. I'd rather have my Touchpad take an extra second or two to open an app than have some crummy screen like the upcoming Atrix which uses a Pentile screen as opposed to an IPS screen. You can improve software, you can't improve hardware.

[pastorich1]

And while the Pre 3 and Veer were "handled" here and there, they were supervised the entire time and waved away from tapping certain things.

And I ask, were you there, did you witness such "waving away". I was there and handled the devices. I wasn't waved away from anything. I was there from the time the developer event started to the time it ended and was one of the last non-HP people to walk out the doors.

But even if some were waved away from certain things. I can imagine there are things they don't want known yet about the features or even some software that will ship on the devices. So no surprise there really. It just wasn't a heavily guarded/supervised environment by any stretch of the imagination.

[Reeves]

EDIT: that's a bit too adversarial. I'm just trying to better understand why you don't think Palm's excuses are valid. From it's small scale pre-merger to the inevitable upheaval and brain-drain post-acquisition, I can understand why their progress has been impeded. You point to Duarte's work on Honeycomb as evidence that excellent work can be done in a short timeframe, but you're not willing to entertain the notion that it's the very loss of Duarte that has led to some of HP's challenges?

First, no offense taken. I don't get anywhere near as worked up about what's said on these boards as some others do.

Thank you for the thoughtful addendum.

The Duarte departure is an interesting theory, but I've seen very little departure - aesthetically - in the TouchPad from what he had already set in motion prior to his departure. Just Type and Stacks were finished, shipping features as of last October. The notification area has been tweaked slightly and relocated, but nothing too radical. The mail app was "designed" and running as HTML5 last fall as well. The new keyboards are working.

He was a designer, and WebOS hasn't veered away from its design too radically since, so I don't see the vacuum he created as an obstacle. But I say that strictly based on what we've seen thus far. Maybe there are some radical new features I don't know about yet.

[Reeves]

1. Matias didn't come in and develop Gingerbread from the ground up. He added some tweaks and UI changes. They didn't even re-write every core app that ships with android OS.

No, which is why he spent a few weeks sharpening that, and immediately transitioned to Honeycomb per his Engadget interview. Honeycomb, on the other hand, is him from the ground up. New SDK, new widgets, new core apps across the board. GTalk, maps, YouTube...all significantly different than what came before.

2. Have you seen source code for webOS 3.0 to state that it hasn't changed significantly? Every single core app that will ship on the tablet is being re-written in Enyo. So any functionality you can perceive or experience is rooted in an app that has been written new completely.

Honeycomb is just as different, from all appearances. It's running on hardware that Android has never run before at a new resolutions with new apps, a new SDK, new look and feel, and an entirely different OS version......kinda like WebOS 3.

3. You don't have the facts... the TouchPad hardware is completely an HP product. Nothing for the hardware carried over from Palm.

I didn't say it did.

4. Lastly, nearly every similarly sized tablet on the market today matches the alleged render that Fox news had. It was identical to the HP slate renders as well.

I didn't say anything about FoxNews renders either, but there are significant aesthetic differences between the Slate and the TouchPad.

[Reeves]

And I ask, were you there, did you witness such "waving away". I was there and handled the devices. I wasn't waved away from anything. I was there from the time the developer event started to the time it ended and was one of the last non-HP people to walk out the doors.

But even if some were waved away from certain things. I can imagine there are things they don't want known yet about the features or even some software that will ship on the devices. So no surprise there really. It just wasn't a heavily guarded/supervised environment by any stretch of the imagination.

I have yet to see a filmed thorough hands-on of the Feb. 9 hardware not carried out in this manner. I'll be happy to accept correction when you show me one that exists on YouTube or elsewhere.

[VCI_Cell]

The Duarte departure is an interesting theory, but I've seen very little departure - aesthetically - in the TouchPad from what he had already set in motion prior to his departure. Just Type and Stacks were finished, shipping features as of last October. The notification area has been tweaked slightly and relocated, but nothing too radical. The mail app was "designed" and running as HTML5 last fall as well. The new keyboards are working.

I think that's part of my point that I failed to state well. His departure created a vacuum in creative thinking that HP is going to have to work hard to overcome.

Frankly, I'm concerned about webOS becoming as stale and boring as all the other OSes now that Duarte is gone. We haven't seen any new mind-blowing UI elements, and I'm worried that the absence of a single visionary designer has the potential to lead to webOS being designed by committee. Does anyone know who's in charge of the UX now that MD is out?

[pastorich1]

I have yet to see a filmed thorough hands-on of the Feb. 9 hardware not carried out in this manner. I'll be happy to accept correction when you show me one that exists on YouTube or elsewhere.

The absence of evidence is not the evidence of absence.

I can only relate to you my experience first hand at the event. You have only related others experiences based on the limited video evidence you have.

Between the two events and now the MWC there are thousands of people who have handled the devices. Unless there are thousands of unique videos out there that demonstrate what you describe, I hardly see it as an established pattern of manipulation.

And concerning what you said you didn't say...

Now, it's not fair because HP can't get the products ready in 6-7 months, even thought the hardware designs were done by Palm months ago, and the TouchPad almost exactly matches the render from last year as well.

You clearly said that Palm had the hardware design done months ago.

[Reeves]

You clearly said that Palm had the hardware design done months ago.

No, what I clearly did was set the Touchpad apart from that statement by comma and by my inclusion of "as well" to end the sentence. Read it again, please. Thanks.

As for the rest, I'm not going to quibble over how supervised it was or wasn't because it's barely tertiary to my main point comparing two tech giants starting tablet OS ground-up designs at the exact same time with wildly different results.

[LCGuy]

Important points:

1. I believe that any percieved "lag" by the TouchPad will not be there on launch, based on the early stage of the OS on the Feb 9 and MWC events.
2. True multitasking, on any OS, with any hardware, will proportionately tax the CPU and RAM, and decrease performance, relative the the number of and system resource demand of apps being open at the same time.
3. Relative to #2 above, more RAM and more powerful and efficient processors will increase the capacity of any device to suffer less of a performance hit.
4. The TouchPad's dual core 1.2 ghz processor, coupled with an optimized WebOS 3 should perform very well, and, given what we saw on Feb 9 and MWC in the videos, for almost all of them, the performance was incredibly good, while many cards were open at the same time, including a 3D game or two. Not bad at all for an early stage OS WebOS 3.

Perhaps this is a moot point, but, HP is setting the TouchPad up to become a simpler form of a PC than other currently competitive tablets, and given its design, and WebOS, it might just be successful at it, however, the downside is that its ability to multitask and not just provide "placeholders" for apps that have been suspended or closed, could be an inhibiting factor as the WebOS design, in and of itself, makes "real multitasking" something the average user will intuitively do without knowing the difference between it and the "hybred" multitasking OS's, and eventually "abuse" it, running 10 0r 15 apps (cards) open at a time, unecessarily, and THEN complaining about it's sluggish performance, versus the other OS's which wont feel that hit, because, well, those apps aren't really still openconcurrent with eachother.

This is something we will have to watch, and it is a bone of contention that I, personally think might come back to haunt WebOS devices - the answer to this, of course, is provide the user with a set of "preferences" to choose from, as to how much the OS truly "multitasks" - on one end of the choices would be for aboslute battery power optimization and maximum dedvice performance, and at the other end of choices would be for "real time, full running" multitasking, with the necessary explaination of the possible performance issues that could result, if using more than X amount of ABC types of apps cuncurrently.

Just sayin...

[Kupe]

1. I believe that any percieved "lag" by the TouchPad will not be there on launch, based on the early stage of the OS on the Feb 9 and MWC events.

Is this belief faith-based or is there some scientifically sound metric you can offer that supports your belief?

2. True multitasking, on any OS, with any hardware, will proportionately tax the CPU and RAM, and decrease performance, relative the the number of and system resource demand of apps being open at the same time.

Besides sounding like a fortune cookie proverb, what are you saying here? HP didn't build a powerful enough tablet to handle their inefficient OS? How does your statement fit in with the Playbook's ability to perform "true multi-tasking" (arguably better than webOS) with no hiccups or lag on a lesser processor?

3. Relative to #2 above, more RAM and more powerful and efficient processors will increase the capacity of any device to suffer less of a performance hit.

GLittering generalities aside, are you saying HP is going to add more RAM and install a better CPU before the TP release "sometime this summer?" They seemed pretty certain the hardware was the final format at the 9 Feb demo.

4. The TouchPad's dual core 1.2 ghz processor, coupled with an optimized WebOS 3 should perform very well, and, given what we saw on Feb 9 and MWC in the videos, for almost all of them, the performance was incredibly good, while many cards were open at the same time, including a 3D game or two. Not bad at all for an early stage OS WebOS 3.

For that matter, The TP's dual core processor, one of the most powerful in its class today, should have smoothly handled an alpha version of an OS, but it didn't.

Perhaps this is a moot point, but, HP is setting the TouchPad up to become a simpler form of a PC than other currently competitive tablets, and given its design, and WebOS, it might just be successful at it, however, the downside is that its ability to multitask and not just provide "placeholders" for apps that have been suspended or closed, could be an inhibiting factor as the WebOS design, in and of itself, makes "real multitasking" something the average user will intuitively do without knowing the difference between it and the "hybred" multitasking OS's, and eventually "abuse" it, running 10 0r 15 apps (cards) open at a time, unecessarily, and THEN complaining about it's sluggish performance, versus the other OS's which wont feel that hit, because, well, those apps aren't really still openconcurrent with eachother.

Like I said before - it doesn't seem to affect the Playbook like it does the TP. My netbook did pretty well with its 1.2 GHz, single-core processor running a pre-release version of a grownup OS like Windows 7 with 10-15 apps open at the same time. Why should the TP have problems when it has two cores, less overhead (running background processes), and much simpler apps running on it?

This is something we will have to watch, and it is a bone of contention that I, personally think might come back to haunt WebOS devices - the answer to this, of course, is provide the user with a set of "preferences" to choose from, as to how much the OS truly "multitasks" - on one end of the choices would be for aboslute battery power optimization and maximum dedvice performance, and at the other end of choices would be for "real time, full running" multitasking, with the necessary explaination of the possible performance issues that could result, if using more than X amount of ABC types of apps cuncurrently.

Yes, because this is how devices are sold to the consumer at large: "We can run more stuff in the background than the other guy." Do you think the average consumer might be a little more interested in "What can it do for me?" as their shopping mantra? That mantra has little, if anything, to do with multi-tasking.

[LCGuy]

Kupe:

1. I have beta tested software for many years - I have seen and witnessed, first hand, alpha builds that look to be "complete" and perform fairly well, with TONS of bloat and debuggng code still in it (because, in the "alpha" mode, its a build on the old version with the beginnings of new features being added, piecemeal, to see if adding a feature specifically causes issues with certain systems - much better than enabling multiple/all new features at once and having to debug backwards), not to mention inefficiencies galore. They perform well on some tasks, but not well at all at others, and usually the UI is the most apparent of those inefficiencies. Those videos smack of it. Just my hunch, but, Im entitled, and fairly confident Im right.
2. I don't appreciate the "fortune cookie proverb" comment. Rather insulting actually. Next.
3. Not sure I understand the "glittering personalities" inuendo, either... (maybe Im just too stupid to know when Im being insulted a second time in as many sentences, I dunno). Next.
4. Wrong conclusion. I can tell you, factually, that inefficient code can decrease the performance of even the most powerful, efficient processors. Seen it, witnessed it, and will likely see it again, many, many times, in my future testing capacities. (hint: it only takes one innocently enabled infinite loop running in the background )
5. You aren't understanding my point: true multitasking will suck up CPU time and system resources. Just look at your PC - open too many windows (which, of course, "too many" is relative to your system) and it will slow to a crawl, and THAT is real mulititasking.
6. (this is your last comment) - Im not sure I get your point - so let me say this: its ALL about what the consumer percieves and can do with the device - most are not techno-geeks like many of us here are - they just want their devices to do what they want them to do, and when they don't, it gets the broad stroke paint of "it doesnt work". The iPhone doesnt truly multitask non-native apps, but, it DOES do what iPhone users apparently need, which is why its never criticized by the general public for it, but, remember "copy and paste" on the iPhone, and the public complaints for not having it?

My point was that WebOS devices will be able to truly multitask (not with cards as stagnant placeholders, but, open applications in either supsended state or running/performing tasks) and THAT is a compliment to the design and capabilities of the system, but, with this additional power comes the possiblities of overuse/abuse by the user, who wont understand its limitations, open a gazzillion cards at once and see a degrading performance. The device will then, unfairly and incorrectly, be judged by said user as "slow", "laggy", or "defective", so, aside from the addtional CPU horespower they are providing, it would also make sense for HP to allow preferences to be set by the users to help them decide on just how much of a performance hit they are willing to take in the name of true "multitasking".

[GMoney749]

Not entirely fair or true. The version of webOS running on the tablet is NOT the same as has been running on previous Palm devices. It is built on an entirely new framework, although it looks the same and will provide a similar UX sans a dedicated gesture area. The Pre 3 and Veer were both already in the Palm pipeline and they got hands on time among the masses. But the TouchPad is entirely HP and didn't have a history to build from.

Not to mention the whole purchasing and merging of a company thing.

But that sort of thing is a piece of cake for the "experts" here...

[Kupe]

1. I have beta tested software for many years - I have seen and witnessed, first hand, alpha builds that look to be "complete" and perform fairly well, with TONS of bloat and debuggng code still in it (because, in the "alpha" mode, its a build on the old version with the beginnings of new features being added, piecemeal, to see if adding a feature specifically causes issues with certain systems - much better than enabling multiple/all new features at once and having to debug backwards), not to mention inefficiencies galore. They perform well on some tasks, but not well at all at others, and usually the UI is the most apparent of those inefficiencies. Those videos smack of it. Just my hunch, but, Im entitled, and fairly confident Im right.

How many years? 30? That's how long I've been doing it. I do agree that badly designed/coded/integrated/tested software runs like hell and is certainly not something to be demonstrated before a worldwide audience. I do not think a corporation like HP would really be so cavalier or amateurish as to do such a thing (although the old Palm might be). By the way, code with "TONS of bloat and debugging code in it" is pre-alpha software, not to be seen by anyone but the development team - at least in the professional software industry.

2. I don't appreciate the "fortune cookie proverb" comment. Rather insulting actually. Next.

Go re-read your #2 then. Perhaps non sequitur might be less insulting to you. In any case, it was about as informative as telling me that standing in the rain clothed will get my clothes wet. I apologize if you feel as insulted as my intelligence did after reading that statement.

3. Not sure I understand the "glittering personalities" inuendo, either... (maybe Im just too stupid to know when Im being insulted a second time in as many sentences, I dunno). Next.

Well glittering generalities describes a statement so void of information that it can mean pretty much anything one wants it to mean. In any case, your #3 did nothing to further your case.

4. Wrong conclusion. I can tell you, factually, that inefficient code can decrease the performance of even the most powerful, efficient processors. Seen it, witnessed it, and will likely see it again, many, many times, in my future testing capacities. (hint: it only takes one innocently enabled infinite loop running in the background )

I didn't realize that we were including poorly developed software as the baseline for your CPU-loading example. Yes it's true - even cleanly written, efficiently formed, and professionally tested infinite loops can waste CPU cycles quite well. So what did that have to do with the TP's choppy performance again? I don't believe "inefficient code" should be used in a product's debut demonstration nor do I believe "innocently enabled infinite loops" should (or did) exist in a demonstration as important as HP's 9 Feb event - not if the software development team is the least bit professional. Pre-release code may benefit from some clean up and can always be improved, but if it's still "inefficient," it's not ready for a demo outside of the producing company.

5. You aren't understanding my point: true multitasking will suck up CPU time and system resources. Just look at your PC - open too many windows (which, of course, "too many" is relative to your system) and it will slow to a crawl, and THAT is real mulititasking.

An inefficiently designed and implemented true multitasking OS running poorly formed software will certainly slow to a crawl (re: Windows before 7). Well-designed and implemented OSes are a bit smarter about how their resources are shared among the hungry, CPU-demanding processes so that they don't "slow to a crawl" unless something is broken or a program is behaving badly (although they should handle that as well). This sort of negative result just shouldn't be a factor in systems where the hardware, OS, and software are all owned and operated by the same company - as in HP and its demo of the TP.

6. (this is your last comment) - Im not sure I get your point - so let me say this: its ALL about what the consumer percieves and can do with the device - most are not techno-geeks like many of us here are - they just want their devices to do what they want them to do, and when they don't, it gets the broad stroke paint of "it doesnt work". The iPhone doesnt truly multitask non-native apps, but, it DOES do what iPhone users apparently need, which is why its never criticized by the general public for it, but, remember "copy and paste" on the iPhone, and the public complaints for not having it?

My point was that WebOS devices will be able to truly multitask (not with cards as stagnant placeholders, but, open applications in either supsended state or running/performing tasks) and THAT is a compliment to the design and capabilities of the system, but, with this additional power comes the possiblities of overuse/abuse by the user, who wont understand its limitations, open a gazzillion cards at once and see a degrading performance. The device will then, unfairly and incorrectly, be judged by said user as "slow", "laggy", or "defective", so, aside from the addtional CPU horespower they are providing, it would also make sense for HP to allow preferences to be set by the users to help them decide on just how much of a performance hit they are willing to take in the name of true "multitasking".

You're right - I better understand what you meant at the end of your previous post with your clarification here. This is a situation that a well-built OS can prevent. Android OS, since Froyo's release (2.2), does this very well. As soon as it detects a demand for resources that exceeds currently available resources, it smoothly and silently frees up resources by parking or shutting down other active processes. That's how it supposed to work so that casual users and advanced users alike enjoy the same multitasking experience.

[LCGuy]

kupe;

1. 18 years, 5 different programs, the most recent 10 years straight, almost all graphic intensive/computative - I didn't bother before Windows 95. You are wrong about calling anything "badly coded" there are attempts to code and re-attempts to do it better, especially when trying to innovate. And your "pre-alpha" comment, though your statement makes it appear like it's written in stone, is not, at all - I've had many a versions with bloat and inefficiencies on my computer - at great risk at times, but, it was necessary to help the developers, which is why I am there. Stop trying to represent as a fact, your personal opinion. Thanks.

2. I re-read it. My original post was general, and not to you, specifically. If you are so smart (and you obviously think you are), and you knew that little point I made before I posted it, and you feel you can speak for everyone else, thinking THEY all know it, fine, but you don't have to be insulting and condescending about it. I posted this specific point BECAUSE it appeared that some here didn't know it.

3. Implying that what I wrote was illogical, using sarcasm, IS insulting. Sorry, that's just how it is. A sincere apology would suffice, but that might be stretching you and your ego a bit, I think.

4. 30 years of beta testing and you say this?? Wow, that makes me wonder. "poorly written software"?? Are you implying that all software is either perfect or not? I have tested some incredibly clever and powerful software (leading edge programing, actually) that has suffered from some careless errors that caused the performance to suffer - and yes, one was, according to the developer, a nested endless loop, that was difficult to track down. Is that so difficult for you to grasp? That's jus tone example.. but most alpha and beta software is INCREDIBLY inefficient, and WILL not be even close to performing efficiently until it reaches the late stages and RC levels.

5. You are speaking as a real critic here, and Im not qualified to judge your credentials, nor do I want to; never-the-less, you are still not getting the point - the lag was likely because WebOS 3 was in alpha for this demo, and I didnt find that surprising. Criticize, categorize, do what you want, but that opinion is mine, based onwhat I saw in the video, and my experience with beta testing for many, many years. If Im wrong we'll see, and I'll gladly admit it, but, will you, if you are?

6. Wow, and I thought I made my point clearly in my first post. Thanks. At this point, I'll take any straight-forward and non-condescending reply from you I can get.

So, to recap: I saw a few lags, I think they are NOT due to hardware/software deficiencies, but, rather, due to the early build stage of WebOS, and that the device will perform even better when finally released.

[Rennat]

Why are we talking about a product that is not ready to be released, HP even said so. This is not final software nor hardware. Yes the Specs are final but the casing exc...???

[dandbj13]

Why are we talking about a product that is not ready to be released, HP even said so. This is not final software nor hardware. Yes the Specs are final but the casing exc...???

Because that's what HP gave us to talk about.

[Really mobile]

Exactly. Not sure why HP felt the need to demo an alpha or beta product. If that's how they plan to emulate or beat Apple, they are off to a bad start.

[GMoney749]

So, I see all of the same know-it-all people that were here complaining about HP/Palm not showing anything for the past several months are now complaining about HP/Palm showing product.

And despite the fact that none of the of these folks have actually laid hands or eyes on a beta OR finished product (and probably never will since they just come here to complain and don't actually buy anything) they're in here with all of their speculated issues on gear that isn't yet released.

Watching a video of someone operating the device gives you better perspective than people who were actually there? Really??

On top of which, I believe HP made it clear that the major reason for the event was to show developers the products and hopefully get them up to speed so that when the products are finally released these same folks won't be in here whining about how there aren't any apps for the tablet.

What is it about this forum that attracts the egomaniac?

[barkerja]

And despite the fact that none of the of these folks have actually laid hands or eyes on a beta OR finished product (and probably never will since they just come here to complain and don't actually buy anything) they're in here with all of their speculated issues on gear that isn't yet released.

I've laid hands and eyes on all the devices announced. There are a few others here that have as well.

[GMoney749]

I've laid hands and eyes on all the devices announced. There are a few others here that have as well.

Yes, I realize that there are people in here who have.