The HP TouchPad may have been discontinued, but it’s not quite dead yet. HP recently promised customers that it would produce one more batch of tablets (although this may have just as much to do with component suppliers left holding bags of useless parts when HP unexpectedly canceled the product as it does with efforts to make customers happier).

HP TouchPad 6-8 weeks

Now it looks like we have a rough idea of how long customers will have to wait to get those new TouchPad tablets: about 6 to 8 weeks.

HP has sent out email messages to some business customers saying that their orders will be filled, but that there’s not currently enough inventory available. It could take up to 2 months to produce and distribute the last TouchPad tablets.

The company will be honoring the price cuts, which means if you ordered a tablet with 16GB of storage you’ll get it for just $99, while a 32GB model is just $149. In other words, HP is going to continue selling the tablet far below cost, even as it manufactures more units.

Unfortunately, I get the feeling that HP isn’t going to make enough TouchPad tablets to satisfy everyone. It’s possible that the only customers that will get their hands on the new tablets are those that have already placed orders. I could be wrong, but I’d be surprised if we saw HP, Best Buy, or any other retailer start taking new orders for $99 TouchPads anytime soon.

On the other hand, HP is asking customers that don’t feel like waiting 6-8 weeks to reach out and cancel their orders, so maybe a few folks will do that and free up tablets for the rest of us.

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2 replies on “HP: More TouchPad tablets coming in 6-8 weeks”

  1. This is an interesting development. I can sort of understand why it is happening. HP breaking contracts with their suppliers might be more expensive than going ahead and selling the tablets at a low price.

    There was a time when inkjet printers for the desktop were very expensive. Canon ran a promotion for a printer plus a rebate that was $299.00. After that, their competitors responded with similar offers and pretty soon nobody would buy an inkjet that was $300 or more. I wonder if HP’s action will make it impossible to sell expensive Android tablets.

    1. I doubt it will have that kind of effect. Printer makers continued to push out cheaper and cheaper devices (and ink that was more and more expensive).

      HP is selling off dirt cheap tablets at one time, and then that’s it.

      I think the fact that the HP TouchPad units that were in stock sold out so quickly speaks more to the fact that consumers are used to seeing higher prices and considered this bargain too good to pass up. In other words, they still think tablets are worth more (whether or not they’re willing to pay more).

      If HP was going to continue producing tablets for this price, Acer, Asus, Lenovo, and others would probably be in trouble. But as it is, there were an awful lot of people who wanted TouchPads but didn’t manage to get their hands on one. 

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