My view of the future of tablets
First we need better definitions to differentiate smart-phones, tablets at 5in 7in 10in.
this would then reflect the price range they should fall into.
Look at my "sig-pic" the little guy is a 5" streak smart phone the other is a 10" Hannspad.
They both cost me £150 S/H as I wanted to get my hands on them to test out their potential.
Needless to say both devices got hacked somewhat and what I considered to be useful apps installed
including "decent" as opposed to "noddy" satnav, kindle reader, email, browsers firefox - opera, music and video players etc.F.O.C
I let the kids (40yr olds!)borrow the streak to guage their reactions
Note they both have iphone4s blackberries of some sort and ipads, laptops but are not in IT.
First reaction thats not a phone its a house brick; I cannot possibly use it.
2 days later "I like the larger screen it is better to watch vids - I can can type on the screen easier etc"
Question by me "would you swap your iphone for this"
"NO it is not trendy but if it became mainstream I would"
Coke says tablets are only useful as toys - "pardon?"
MY 10in tablet probably copes with approx 80% of my activity.
I can't run - Excel, Intense GFX editing programs, web development or play intense cpu/gfx games aka skyrim.
The above gives a small indication of some of my experimentation so far.
So off the top of my head here is my breakdown
The younger generation (sub 40yrs) mobility is the key. They have a panic attack if they mislay their phones.
Tablets will kill off the low powered notebooks (not high class laptops).
Phones will grow to have bigger better screens as visual content is more important now
General users 85%
I will divide that into 2 classes -
- professionals with a reasonable income, or company issued devices 15%; will readily spend £500
- mass market (facebook crowd) 70%; £100 to £300 maxing out their credit cards or on contract because it is a must have.
Enthusiasts 10% This is far more difficult as one must consider disposable income; £200 to £600
Remaining 5% Thats us folks! who look at the capabilities, lifetime cost of ownership, £200 to £1000 depending on specific needs.
And from a commercial point of view "and the Winners are" :-
1st; a sub £400 5in smart-phone/tablet for complete mobility as a single device.
2nd place; a 10" - 12" tablet that replaces notebooks with greater cpu/ memory capability etc
3rd place: a 7" tablet mainly because it will end up falling between two stools and it does not fit in your pocket.
Note I have quite deliberately ignored the Apple/MS/Android battles they will all get a share.
my guess is Android purely and simply because Apple is a total -lockout at the smart phone level, Ms are greedy and set their licency fee to high.
The "cloud"/app purchase does not really effect mass market purchaser they do not weigh in the cost of drip feeding £s
they already do that on Itunes and google market place.
10" tablet; MS simply because of the installed base and the fact that the majority by far are windows users.
7" cant really pick a winner here it will depend on price Apple will be fighting off Android, MS will be too high.
Do my all means, disagree, I was reading the thread and replied off the top of my head
