Tech2 Poll Outcome: Would You Buy the RIM PlayBook?

The launch of RIM’s BlackBerry PlayBook went seemingly unnoticed, and as Steve Jobs said – the 7-inch tablet was going to “bomb” in the market and that seems to be true, at least that's what our readers think. 

We recently posted a poll on Tech2, asking you, our dear readers, to let us know why or even if you’d consider buying the BlackBerry PlayBook and the responses was overwhelming. 75 percent of our entrants simply opted for the “Wouldn’t touch it with a 10-foot pole” choice in the list which leads us to believe, that the product has failed to make any real splash in the market.  
Even though some might think that the Indian consumer is not quite ready for their tablets or tablet technology in general, we also do have quite a sophisticated set of users who know just what they want and won’t settle for anything else. The iPad and its next-gen version the iPad2 have made great inroads in our market, and have had sold out launch weeks. We think that says it all.

Doomed?

Here’s the thing though, the PlayBook is a capable product, but lacks certain features that can easily be considered vital for today’s usage. The lack of 3G support would be at the very top of the list, of course. Next could be the lack of BBM, which is currently one of the strongest selling points for RIM devices. Another issue could be with Internet tethering i.e. using Bluetooth Connect to hook up your BlackBerry handset to the PlayBook for Internet usage outside of a Wi-Fi area. Although RIM claims that with this mode of connectivity, you won’t be utilizing too much power, we don’t quite agree. Running Bluetooth on two devices or Wi-Fi (when the BlackBerry’s with Wi-Fi hot spot capabilities are launched) is a strain on any device. These are no exceptions. So yes, connectivity would also be another issue. However, 11 percent of our readers thought that the Wi-Fi only model actually negated the need for a Second SIM card. This also means you’d still be paying just one bill, although you’d be using two separate devices.

So what really then, does the PlayBook have going for it? For one thing the BlackBerry Tablet OS is quite remarkable in terms of usability. The interface is designed for easy access to settings, menus and multitasking and the 1GHz Dual-core processor under the hood ensures speedy functionality. But is that enough? Apparently not. According to our survey a scant 8% of our total thought the device was conveniently portable, and just a measly 2% think that the compatibility with existing BB apps made a good point. Keeping the latter option in mind, we should also understand that as of right now, BlackBerry App World is still dishing out apps for the PlayBook but it’s still a long way off for being any kind of serious competition for the Apple AppStore or Android App Market. However the recent news about an app that would able to run certain applications off of Android could change the playing field a little bit for the PlayBook.

At the end of the day, the PlayBook is just a little too pricey as well. It makes no sense to price a 7-inch tablet, with quite a few limitations, in the same league as the 10-inch toting iPad Wi-Fi model.

Your feedback, dear readers, is always appreciated, so do keep a look out for the next poll we host and do let us know what you think.