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Google quits selling tablets

techcrunch.com

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Re: Google quits selling tablets

#41

Post by Benjamin_Dobell »

This is somewhat strange. I thought tablets killed the PC market. My wife is a primary school teacher and it's very difficult to teach children to use a mouse because they all have tablets at home.

I know Android tablets haven't been selling well, but that's because people like me have been desperately waiting for a decent device to be released. iPads are absolutely everywhere.

What's the proposed alternative for media consumption? In particular reading, but even watching videos and playing "board" games etc.

Re: Google quits selling tablets

#42

Post by m-p-3 »

zdw wrote: post #11

The mid level tablet market died in a race to the bottom. Looking on aliexpress or taobao, you'll find dozens upon dozens of cheap tablets with CPU's from allwinner or rockchip, a few gigs of ram/flash and a not that great 8-10" screen for Completing against these are a few Samsung models that have their highly customized variant of Android, and Apple holding the premium ground with iOS/HW quality/price/performance,…

To be fair, I bought a cheap shitty tablet to act as a display for my wifi camera to monitor the baby. Works well for a single purpose, and I don't use it for anything else.

I sold my Nexus 7 some time ago because it was gathering dust.

Re: Google quits selling tablets

#44

Post by kbd »

sliken wrote: post #4

I loved my nexus-7, and the 2nd gen nexus-7 even more. Inexpensive, pure android, decent hardware spec, and a usefully larger display than a phone. Anyone know of a current table that avoids the adware, crapware, and 3d contact managers where each card flies around in 3D? I just want android with the current security updates and 7-9" display.

I still use my Nexus 7 (2nd gen) as my main tablet. That thing is a trooper. It's my book reader, Chromecast runner, Sonos controller, etc. It's big enough to comfortably watch Twitch on. It fits in my back jeans pocket so I can easily bring it with me, which lots of tablets including the ipad mini don't. I'd love to find a modern replacement for it, ideally just a little bit bigger.

Re: Google quits selling tablets

#45

Post by crazygringo »

kelnos wrote: post #9

> ... few people see any reason to upgrade a device that was originally sold for its simplicity and ease of use, not its specs. I, for one, have been using the third-gen (1st Retina) iPad since its release approximately 500 years ago and have never felt any compulsion whatsoever to get a new one. This seems a little weird to me. Don't tablets age in a similar way that smartphones age? As in, the battery gets weaker o…

You'd think they would... but in my experience they don't seem to.

My phone's battery is used 16 hrs/day, my tablet on average maybe 1-2 hr/day? And the battery is huge to begin with besides.

And on my phone I'm constantly switching apps (churning memory and CPU), whereas on my tablet it's mainly staying in one app for a long time -- whether Docs or a video or a game, and even games seem to be designed to accomodate older tablets since so many people have them.

Re: Google quits selling tablets

#46

Post by m-p-3 »

jxdxbx wrote: post #22

In think 8” tablets are a good form factor for content consumption (ebooks, movies, some games) but Android tablets always fall short even then. You need a good screen, especially for text. The 2015 iPad Mini 4 is still much better than any similarly-sized Android tablet.

To be honest most of the time I used my tablet was for reading stuff online. I sold it and bought a Kobo eReader instead. I push articles I want to read later to Pocket and read them there instead.

My only wish would be to see a decent eReader with an email/calendar client to read my work emails on it and see my schedule. I looked at the reMarkable but despite its impressive annotation capabilities, it doesn't have anything else I would find useful at work.

Re: Google quits selling tablets

#47

Post by Shank »

Benjamin_Dobell wrote: post #41

This is somewhat strange. I thought tablets killed the PC market. My wife is a primary school teacher and it's very difficult to teach children to use a mouse because they all have tablets at home. I know Android tablets haven't been selling well, but that's because people like me have been desperately waiting for a decent device to be released. iPads are absolutely everywhere. What's the proposed alternative for med…

> I know Android tablets haven't been selling well, but that's because people like me have been desperately waiting for a decent device to be released.

Amazon sells Fire tablets pretty easily. The problem is that there's Amazon, selling tablets for next to nothing, and Apple and Microsoft, selling premium tablets. The middle market has to be either exceptionally good to exist, or it just disappears. That's what happened.

Re: Google quits selling tablets

#48

Post by komali2 »

shasheene wrote: post #20
sliken wrote: post #4

I loved my nexus-7, and the 2nd gen nexus-7 even more. Inexpensive, pure android, decent hardware spec, and a usefully larger display than a phone. Anyone know of a current table that avoids the adware, crapware, and 3d contact managers where each card flies around in 3D? I just want android with the current security updates and 7-9" display.

Samsung Chromebook Plus satisfies my needs for a tablet: mainly media consumption (web browsing, YouTube, reading long articles, and watching movies). 1. Incredibly nice screen 2. Gets security updates (ChromeOS devices are great for this compared to the dumpster fire that is Android security) 3. Haven't had any issues with Android support (I use mainly apps like RBDigital, Instapaper, Wikipedia) 4. Works well for mo…

>It also has a stylus which works well, but I've returned to paper exercise books for note taking.

So, I'm very curious about this. Were you taking written notes on electronic devices? What apps and devices have you tried?

I ask because a couple years ago I tried using a surface for taking notes when I got into a coding bootcamp and it was a mind blowing experience for me - finally, infinite paper space. Swapping between whatever color pen/highlighter I needed. Throwing pics into notes. I thought time and time again, "if I had this thing in college I'd have had a 4.0" (I had, like, a 3.2 lol)

For me it made taking notes so easy that I learned better. Now it's two generations old and I'm looking to upgrade, but I can't justify 2k on the new model or the surface book, so I'm wondering if you explored other options, or what your experience was with the Chromebook plus.

I've also considered switching to pen and paper but that means carrying around a fuckload of pens and highlighters, which would annoy me.

Re: Google quits selling tablets

#50

Post by derefr »

> Cheap Kindle tablets from Amazon have proliferated somewhat, presumably as distractions for kids who would otherwise get fingerprints all over mom’s new phone, or for ultra-compact time-wasting on airplanes.

Why does everybody think of only consumer-electronics uses for a $40 tablet? I think it would be quite obvious what the real use for these is: IoT control surfaces (the “smart fridge” upgrade), POS systems, inventory kiosks, etc. Embedded systems, in other words.

And, heck, for $40 apiece, you can embed them into every desk in your office as a personalizeable dashboard. Or hand them out with preloaded maps on them to every participant in a missing-persons search.

In fact, for $40, you could just set the display to a single colour and call it a cheaper alternative to a smart lightbulb. :P

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