WePad Demo Vids- cool is you can speak German

[blur xc]

http://www.engadget.com/2010/04/26/neofonies-wepad-tablet-shown-to-german-journalists-seems-legit/

Looks pretty darn impressive to me. Can't wait for some real reviews and spec details...far more functional than the iPad...

BM

[madjr]

http://www.engadget.com/2010/04/26/neofonies-wepad-tablet-shown-to-german-journalists-seems-legit/

Looks pretty darn impressive to me. Can't wait for some real reviews and spec details...far more functional than the iPad...

BM

the coolest thing about the wepad is that it will run native linux and android apps ?

i wonder how they will do that?

[Bölvaður]

does anyone have any news about this device?

Im not sure if I should be exited or not

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qljERjI_NFU

[agnes]

It's now officially called the WeTab (http://www.facebook.com/WeTab/posts/105523282825494)...
I'm interested too, it looks usable to me:

specs dump (http://www.pcmasters.de/hardware/review/wepad-alias-wetab-vorbestellbar.html)
Intel Atom N450 processor, 1,66GHz
1GB memory
1,3MP Webcam (yay)
accu 6 hours
1366x768 Pixel touchscreen
2 USB- and one HDMI connection*
cardreader for SD/SDHC cards
295×195×15mm size
Ambient Light Sensor
Stereo speaker
LCD screen (ok that is less nice)

The integration of Android is under construction. In the illustrated version, the smartphone apps are still (visibly) on a virtual machine. Which should disappear so that Android applications will "lie deeper and closer to the operating system" (http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/Das-WePad-gibt-es-wirklich-987307.html).
That article also says, you sure can become root ("Experten-Modus") and then, not only edit all Linux settings, but are free to install all kinds of applications (not only those from the official "Meta-Store").

Basis version has 16GB and WLAN and is for 449€ already orderable (at Amazon.de).
3G-Version (UMTS) also for 569,- euro
Probably ships on Amazon.de in August.

*Not sure if the basis 16GB version will have HDMI connection the company has said. (Source for that: older message on some Dutch blog)

[Tigerclawz]

I was looking at the iPad, then decided that it's not worth it. It's too limited. I shifted to the HP Slate and was looking into whether you could boot Ubuntu, or UNR, as I'd rather not have Win-do'hs, but in discovering the WeTab just tonight, it seems to be the best so far. It's got everything I want on it.

I'd say there'd be a way to pop Ubuntu, or UNR onto the WeTab, though the OS on there looks pretty good, it'd still be cool.

Opinions?

[blur xc]

I was looking at the iPad, then decided that it's not worth it. It's too limited. I shifted to the HP Slate and was looking into whether you could boot Ubuntu, or UNR, as I'd rather not have Win-do'hs, but in discovering the WeTab just tonight, it seems to be the best so far. It's got everything I want on it.

I'd say there'd be a way to pop Ubuntu, or UNR onto the WeTab, though the OS on there looks pretty good, it'd still be cool.

Opinions?

The latest rumors I've heard is that HP is dropping Win 7 form their Slate in favor of their recently acquired webOS which I think also runs on Linux...

BM

[Choedron]

The WeTab runs OpenOffice. Look at YouTube. I have just ordered one with 3G on Amazon.de. They are dispached on the 22nd. of September. Looks very promising.

[TheNerdAL]

The GUI is ugly.

[kat_ams]

I bought one yesterday.

It's a pretty decent piece of hardware.

+:

Big high res 1366x768 screen.
touch is very smooth
Auto-rotation in 360 degrees
Bluetooth and WiFi are seamless.
Application install is easy
The sound quality via Bluetooth is outstanding
Standard, standard, standard! Standard USB, Standard SD, Standard 3.5" minijack, Standard SIM-card slot.
Hackable from the start. Root shell (is not really a root shell you still have to use sudo).
German quality build.


-:

The onscreen keyboard is a joke, they built their own keyboard from scratch instead of using a well established technology like OnBoard. This means that there is no accented character support. So Spanish, French, Czech, Dutch, and any other slew of languages are just not supported (yet). It's clearly only designed for Germans in mind. There is a german keyboard and an english keyboard.

The LED screen's viewing angle is terrible, you have to be holding the tablet so that your are looking directly at the center in order to see the picture clearly.

The Ambient light sensor makes the screen much to dark so you have to turn it off in order to see the screen properly. (this maybe a ploy to save battery life.

It lags every once in a while. Although this is a Linux Desktop issue and not a WeTab issue. Even Ubuntu has issues with it.

Very tiny repository. Why they didn't just use the Fremantle repository from Maemo is beyond me. Most all of the N900 apps would scale perfectly to the WeTab

Differences with ubuntu:
yum with RPM instead of DEB - so self healing is not as good. If you need a good example of self healing and why NOT to use RPM just look at any inflight entertainment system running RedHat.

Language support... Ubuntu is designed for everyone... WeTab is designed for Germans.


It's still very pre-prod (software) even though they really wanted to get it out for the holidays. It does update itself every day with some improvements so we'll see how it goes in the next few months.

The potential is there to be a fantastic tablet.