HP announces three new webOS devices

by Volker Weber

ZZ60A15247

Palm is gone, but it ain't dead. A few hours ago HP announced three new webOS devices, and you probably want all (or none) of them. The big Touchpad is similar to an iPad, the tiny Veer is for those moments when you don't want to carry a full size smartphone, and then there is a regular sized Pre3.

There are hardly any surprises in the specs. Pre3 gets the same screen as all the Windows Phones and Androids, the Veer is just tiny and has the screen resolution of old days, and the Touchpad has the same dimensions and screen resolution as the current iPad. Add cameras for video calls, some nice features like the one that lets you transfer a web page from the pad to the Pre, but when you get down to it, the magic is in webOS.

I love webOS, but so far it has not held up to its promise. None of the apps that I need are on webOS, and neither are many that I want. I think HP got the sizes right, but not the dates. None of the devices is available now. The tiny Veer will be out in spring, the Pre3 and Touchpad Wi-Fi in the summer. And the TouchPad 3G even after that. No prices announced yet. By the time HP goes to market, Apple will have an iPhone 5 and an iPad 2.

The elephant in the room is that carriers have all but given up on the platform. The Pre 2 was never released in Germany, and Pre/Pre+ owners are still waiting for 2.x to be pushed to their devices. With the tablet and the new slider still half a year out, that's going to give the competition quite some time.

Comments

At least they had some product announcements though ;-)

Julian Woodward, 2011-02-10

HP is breaking promises.

It seems like webOS 2.x won't make it to the Pre/Pre+

http://www.precentral.net/no-major-webos-ota-updates-pre-pre-plus-pixi-pixi-plus

Ingo Kueper, 2011-02-10

Ouch. Well, that seals it for me then.

Volker Weber, 2011-02-10

it's sad to hear that my device will never receive an update to webOS 2.0. I purchased my Pre in June 2010 and now i should scrap it...

Christian Tennigkeit, 2011-02-10

Wew, dodged that bullet. Was quite enthousiastic about Palm but as availabilty lagged was drawn in by Android. The whole Palm shebang seems to go belly-up now..

Quite happy with my Android!

Lars Berntrop-Bos, 2011-02-10

Well, it looks like they will compete with iPad 3 ... tough competition for HP, in the midst of detaching from M$....
http://www.macrumors.com/2011/02/09/ipad-3-to-arrive-this-september/

Luca Re Garbagnati, 2011-02-10

There may be updates, but they probably won't be deployed over-the-air. Though palm.com/webos-info says "Nope!" for my Pre.

Olav Brinkmann, 2011-02-11

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