I probably won’t have my full review of the CTL 2goPad ready for another few days, but apparently plenty of people weren’t waiting for my review to pull the trigger and purchase this $499 slate PC with a 10 inch capacitive display. CTL says the company sold out of the 2goPad the day after it started taking orders last week.
CTL expects to get a new shipment at the end of November, but expects to sell through those units quickly as well. That’s not surprising, because while CTL offers some interesting products, it’s not exactly an enormous company on the scale of a Dell, HP, or Asus. Update: CTL says the problem isn’t company size or purchasing ability, but the short supply of 10″ multitouch capacitive displays.
If you want a bit of a preview of my 2goPad review, it goes something like this: It’s probably one of the best budget Windows slates on the market today… but that’s not saying a lot.
First of all, at $499, the 2goPad isn’t exactly cheap when you consider the fact that it’s basically a keyboardless-netbook with a touchscreen, accelerometer, and lower capacity battery. Second, the price will soon go up to $549 when the launch promotion ends on Wednesday.
Third, while I’ve found the 2goPad much easier to use than the Netbook Navigator Nav9 due to some hardware and software optimizations, I still find there are some Windows 7 quirks that make the operating system awkward to use on a touch-only device, particularly one with a relatively slow processor.
I’ll have more details to share soon. In the meantime, if you’re looking to get a 2goPad before the end of the year it looks like you’d best reserve one soon before the backorder date gets pushed further back.
You can also check out my unboxing and hands-on video after the break.
Lenovo, ASUS, HP, and others need to start working together on a software solution if they want to sell tablets. Work with something like Meego for tablets, something, anything. I’m not convinced Windows 7 is ever going to cut it in the tablet market. Microsoft is struggling for identity right now and they’re just a step behind everyone else lately.
Apple is killing here and will probably end up with the same sort of market dominance they enjoy with the iPod line. Personally I’m happy with my iPad and have Apple stock 🙂 but I think competition is good for all consumers, and of course different users have different needs. (I have an iPad and a Macbook which is essential for my work but I’d still like to have a new netbook for playing with Linux.)
I wish they’d just release a tablet with full capabilities of the current gen of netbooks can’t they just put an wacom pen/touch digitizer on an Asus Eee 1215N with an N550 charge $50 more dump the keyboard and touchpad and call it a night.
The current crop of slates running Win 7 is like running Vista on a Pentium M laptop (remember those?). It wasn’t until Intel came out
with the Core 2 Duo that Vista became less of a hassle, although still
a big time hassle.
On the hardware side, things are likely not going to improve unless
someone packs an affordable dual core Atom with switchable Nvidia optimus graphics and active digitizer.
On the software side, I would look for someone else
besides Microsoft to come up with a touch friendly UI, namely
Asus, HP, or Lenovo, the way that HTC’s Touch Diamond smartphone
UI put lipstick on the Windows Mobile pig. I don’t think Microsoft will
come out with a good slate UI until Windows 8.
If you believe what CTL are saying you will believe anything. They have some problem they are obviously not willing to share because a lack of supply of touchscreens just don’t cut it. And if it is all true – it is a poor business model – you just can’t sell slates if you can’t get the parts.
The exopc is the only viable win 7 slate to come this year – hopefully the reviews will come in the next week or so. Fingers crossed it does a good job – this company isn’t churning out a netbook sans keyboard -they have worked to optimize it – good UI, additional keyboard, hd decoder, fast ssd, good viewing angles etc.
If you can settle for an ipad with its limitations – I would wait for a 10″ android – these are cheaper and solve many of the issues that the ipad has like usb ports, sd slots, file access, flash, 1080p, hdmi out etc etc.
There are shortages of certain display sizes and types. Other companies have also reported delays because of these shortages.
Archos for example was originally suppose to release their 7″ and 10″ Android Internet Tablets this month but the shortages forced them to delay and they are likely not to come out until November. Though you can still get their 2.8″ to 4.3″ models now, but they’re resistive and not capacitive like the 7″ and 10″ models.
While some other companies have simply switched screen types to get around these shortages but that’s not an option all can follow, especially if they have to go through the time and cost of a last minute redesign.
Unfortunately, these things do happen and can’t always be predicted and accounted for…
Btw, not all Android tablets will be supporting 1080p quite yet, though many will support 720p. For example, both the Archos 70 and 101 use ARM Cortex A8 at 1 GHz with DSP with Graphic accelerator: 3D OpenGL ES 2.0 but only support up to 720p.
There are tablets that will support 1080p, but check the specs first before assuming it does. Also those that do may not have the best CPU performance. So you will have to consider how you will use the tablet to see which fall into your plan usage the best unless you go all out on one of the more expensive tablets that give you more of everything.
1080P support should be more prevalent next year though, for those willing to wait.
Sure but ctl must have know about this issue pre-launch. It is not as if they are building millions of these things. They should have made sure they secured a reliable supply before launching it. As it stands it will be out of date before it even ships.
Many of these products are getting World wide distribution and that does mean up to millions of units get made and unless they make the screens themselves then there is no insurance of what they knew and when.
Also often the only way for them to get a good price is to manufacture millions of units to get the price per component down…
Manufacturing delays happen and they can’t always be foreseen! The fact this is also effecting other companies shows it’s not isolated and CTL can hardly be faulted for something other companies are also experiencing. Rather it’s the fault of the screen makers and whatever reason for the delay in manufacturing.For example, the delay can be unavoidable if they for example discovered a manufacturing defect that caused a recall of the screens at the last minute. It would definitely be too late to do anything by then if that scenario happened and there are others I can think of that would put companies in a no win scenario as well.It’s always good to remember Murphy’s Law, as anything that can go wrong often does! Even the big companies can have problems that cause unexpected delays.
sure but there are plenty that will support 1080p and even if they don’t they support easier file transfer and video player/file type options for 720p.
I would disagree with your assertion of “plenty”, but my point remains valid that you shouldn’t assume it’ll just support 1080p if it has HDMI. There are even some that will find 720p difficult, especially if considering one of the cheaper sub $200 tablets.
So carefully review the specs of any tablet you may consider, they are improving but they aren’t all capable of doing everything we may want them to do just yet.
Many of the cheaper tablets for example just take last gen chips and over clock them to make a barely usable product. And even some of the more expensive tablets still only support up to 720p and not necessarily all video encoded formats.
You also have to consider some use specific hardware that may only work with apps made to work with that hardware, which can effect what video player you can install and what codecs are supported. Though chances are better if the tablet is being made by a company with MP3 and PMP experience.
I’ve been waiting for a new Windows 7 tablet for a long time. Now, the wait is getting ridiculous. Maybe it’s because the manufacturers are trying to get the same battery life squeezed out those slates as compared to an iPad. Due to the needs of the OS, performance would then take a hit. It can’t be done…yet.
CTL did start shipping their tablet, but soon ran out. The next round of shipments is not until December. Another wait. If fact, now the company is going to charge your credit card at the time of order, instead of holding off until the ship date. They claim “…to decrease fraud and to help ensure that backorder queues on popular products are equitable…”. Which may mean they need the extra funding to manufacture the units, and your upfront payment will help.
I hate to say it, but I’m not waiting any longer. I purchased an iPad yesterday. It will keep me mobile until the Win 7 machines eventually show up. If they do.