Well yes, but they'd be like all the tablets before the iPad, and not like the ones now, which are basically copying Apple's concept of what a tablet should be (as opposed to Microsoft's - like Bill Gates saying back in 2002 (I think) that the majority of PCs sold in five years' time would be tablet PCs!).

No.

Pointless waste of money. I have a computer. I have a laptop. I have a cell phone.

Pointless.

I'll pass on all tablets until they drop in price.

Ite missa est...
All has been said about tablets: they are cumbersome, limited, expensive and a fashion object.

(Other tablets)... are basically copying Apple's concept of what a tablet should be (as opposed to Microsoft's - like Bill Gates saying back in 2002 (I think) that the majority of PCs sold in five years' time would be tablet PCs!

Whether the concept of Apple is the only one could be the right question. Actually, if I look at Apple tablet, I just see a small Microsoft "Surface" with limited capabilities which was developped in 2006... Microsoft is very innovative. FYI, this is the list of the US patents leaders in 2010, Apple is not amongst:
1. IBM: 5,896
2. Samsung: 4,551
3. Microsoft: 3,094
4. Canon: 2,552
5. Panasonic: 2,482
6. Toshiba: 2,246
7. Sony: 2,150
8. Intel: 1,653
9. LG Electronics: 1,490
10. HP: 1,480
IBM patents exceeded the combined issuances Microsoft, Hewlett-Packard, Oracle, EMC and Google

It needs to be pointed out that US patents does not equal inventiveness. Patent trolling can be a very profitable business, and overly general patents are a known problem (that is, patenting the concept, without putting any work into any way of actually implementing it).

It also needs to be pointed out that I don't intend the above to be targeted at any particular business or individual; its meant as a general cautionary for interpreting this type of data.

What I just want to point out is that Microsoft is much more R&D oriented than Apple. Apple is a marketing monster. I doubt IBM or Microsoft are suspect of patent trolling.
Apple, instead of trying to mask or increase its R&D budget, has an extraordinary semantics: we are dwarf in R&D budget but it's because we are smart... Apple spend around 7 times less than Microsoft in R&D (4.6 billions $ in 4 years vs 31 billions $). That's a fact. But their marketing budget is higher than Microsoft.

That's another fact.

I need some tablet's for my headache.

This.
You forgot to mention that a netbook is much more versatile.


Well thats personal taste. I think the iPad is absolutely NOT what tablet pcs should be.
The main argument for those entertainment-tablet-pcs are a easy, portable connection to the internet, isn't it? So...no flash support when the majority of homepages uses flash (unfortunately)?
The second thing would be to play media files on the tablet. What, no USB?
I think you can see why I personally dislike the iPad and think its definately not worth the money.
But everyone his/her own taste .

I've already got a desktop, a laptop and a smartphone, and I'm planning to get a netbook for on the road/conferences/... So, while I will almost certainly end up getting a tablet, I will pay less than 400 EUR for it.

That said, Honeycomb looks awesome.

I dunno. If she is going to do any amount of typing on it, it'll be as annoying as hell, not to mention the web browser on tablets is still marked as "mobile", which might cause problems with certain websites used by her instructors.

So I'm guessing there is no stylus support like you were talking about earlier? I haven't done much research on them she just mentioned wanting one, I might just have to steer her away from them and buy her a new laptop especially since I can get a pretty good one at the same price as an ipad. I'll admit some of the appeal is they're just cool.

I saw in the store they displayed mobile sites, so no way to toggle that to normal sites like a phone can?

There is support for a capacitive stylus, they are more expensive than a regular stylus, but the thing it lacks is character recognition. That means that you can only use a stylus for note taking in something like a doodle pad app, and there would be no way to export it to a text document.

Also, if thinking iPad, that means no flash, which I know my instructors use quite often (one this semester even has a java applet)

You can toggle, but there are some javascript that just plain don't work on mobile safari or the Android browser. Windows Live, for example, I know doesn't work on mobile safarai.

Without character recognition (which is a must for proper stylus support), I just don't see a tablet being useful in the school environment. Yeah, they are cool, but far from functional as a tool for students.

You see, I don't think of the touchscreen slates coming out as "tablet PCs" so much as just tablets. They're to very different things, IMO. Tablets are just big, cool, glorified smartphones that are fun to play with and convenient for certain things.

A real PC, with laptop power, a 13-17" stylus/ finger-capable touchscreen, proper battery-life, and a solid slide-out keyboard is something yet to be seen in the recent inflow of competing products. That's what I'd like to see: a big touch-slab that I can do everything on. The closest thing I've seen to it is the Asus Eee tablet, and it doesn't really come close.

Eh, you've not been looking very hard then. Windows tablets have been around for ages. They generally aren't cheap, but that's because it is basically a laptop with a touch screen

Yeah, but how far along are they in terms of functionality? And why haven't they jumped into the spotlight like the light tablets have recently? It seems like something that cool would attract attention.

They are as functional as a latop, as I said, they are a laptop with a touch screen basically. Hell, one of the optometries I work for has been using WinXP tablets for like 4 or so years now.

Likewise, as I said, they aren't in the spotlight because of their price. It's a full-featured laptop with a touch-screen, it isn't cheap in any sense. People see tablets as neat toys, not as tools. These tablets are the exact opposite: they are intended to be tools, which isn't where the market is right now, and, unfortunately, may never be there.

Android might do it. Technically there is the underlying support already in Android for character recognition, and it is used to a limited degree, but full-featured handwriting recognition has yet to come to it, and until Android tablets start coming with a stylus by default, I doubt it will become fully fleshed out.

Edit: here's an example of well-done handwriting recognition http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nm1eFRfBojY. When Android gets something on that level baked into it, it'll be an excellent tool as well as being a great toy.

The tipping point was the iPad, it effectively killed the stylus-input method for tablet PCs, and created the "tablet". Yeah, Apple's experienced great success because of it, but IMO, overall the tablet PC market took a huge hit functionality-wise, which is a real shame.

I've seen those before, my Chemistry teacher had one actually, he would do worksheets and diagrams on the projector with it. It was more the size of a pc than an actual tablet though, something like an HP touch I believe.

Like you say, character recognition is a must. Without the ability to write something you can turn in to an editable document on a pc, you lose alot of versatility.

Maybe sometime in the future we'll get a mainstream tablet that supports websites in the same way a PC does.

Sorry, I wasn't trying to invalidate your point. In this instance, it is unlikely that the difference (thousands of patents) is due to dodgy behaviour.

Microsoft does spend a lot more resources on research (though, as has just occurred to me, they are also a much bigger company). Apple does spend a lot more on marketing.

The thing Apple does right -and has based its monopolies on- is not so much make something new, but taking stuff and refining it. I'm not going to be buying any of their products any time soon (don't care about looks, I take the better hardware and chuck linux on it ), and style alone definitely doesn't make a product good, but what they do is produce slimmer, slicker, more accessible* versions, and that has its place. One positive is that they help to drive forward the adoption of technologies... the downside of that being that they also monopolise things in the process (Ipod, Iphone).

*One thing they do put research and effort into is their interfaces.

EDIT: To avoid misrepresenting myself as a Apple-lover : I don't like the 'evil' stuff they do; DRM lock-in and hardware lock-in (how do you fix a Mac? You send it to Apple or buy a new one), for example.

THIS! and no mobility.

I think a tablet would be a great tool to use for note-taking in college even if it didn't have character recognition. If it was fully stylus supported (not made for finger-use) then I feel it would be enough to write my notes with a stylus and simply have it saved as an image file (just as if I had scanned a page out of my notebook). Of course, character recognition would be a plus but seems like it may be down the road a bit.

I really, really laughed hard at you saying you like the new Xoom, but you think iPads are a joke. LOL.
There is literally no difference whatsoever. Apple bandwagon hating at its finest.

You are VERY mistaken there. While I don't care for either, there are major differences between them that can be objectively (as well as others that are a bit more subjectively) defined:

1. The Xoom has a dual-core processor. the iPad does not

2. The Xoom runs Android. the iPad runs iOS4

3. The Xoom runs Android 3.0, which has a UI that was specifically crafted for tablets. the iPad has the same UI as the iPhone, just stretched and ever so slightly modified

4. The Xoom does not need to sync with iTunes or anything else or be physically connected to your computer. The app store is on the web and instantly syncs to your android devices

5. the Xoom supports adobe flash. the iPad does not

6. The Xoom has full support for multitasking. the iPad does not (though because of this, the iPad would probably have a little bit better life. Note that the iPad also does indeed have some multitasking, just not on the same level as Android)

7. The Xoom supports acting as a wifi hotspot and 4G. the iPad supports neither

8. the Xoom has HDMI out. the iPad does not

9. The Xoom has two cameras a front-facing camera for video chat and a back-facing one for pictures/video. the iPad does not have any camera

10. The Xoom supports removable storage up to 32 GBs. the iPad does not (though the iPad can have more internal memory, it's memory at best is only equal to that of the Xoom with full removable memory)

11. The Xoom has a gyroscope, barometer, proximity sensor, and turn-by navigation. the iPad has none of these.

So, you are quite mistaken in saying the Xoom is the same as the iPad. There are many objectively measurable differences between the two.

I think Toshiba's coming tablet looks great. I just need to know the price so I can see if it is worth it.

Only thing that svcks about it is no 3G support, I hate having to rely on unregulated public networks.

I would never get an iPad, I much prefer the concept of Android. Especially the line: "It's your tablet, have your way with it"