The BlackBerry PlayBook Review
by Anand Lal Shimpi on April 13, 2011 9:00 PM EST- Posted in
- Tablets
- Smartphones
- RIM
- BlackBerry
- PlayBook
- Mobile
The PlayBook Browser
Two years ago RIM acquired Torch Mobile, a development house that happened to be a significant contributor to the WebKit project. WebKit also happens to be the foundation for both Google Chrome and Safari (both Mac and iOS versions). Torch Mobile had its own WebKit based browser called Iris, which eventually got folded into BlackBerry OS 6.0 and launched with the BlackBerry Torch.
The PlayBook expands upon Torch Mobile's work with one of the strongest parts of the BlackBerry tablet experience. The PlayBook's browser technically supports tabs however the tab bar isn't always visible as it is with Honeycomb. The PlayBook handles browsing multiple web pages better than the iPad, but not nearly as well as the Xoom.
Scrolling is incredibly smooth, even on Flash enabled web pages. Scroll down too quickly and you'll get an empty screen that takes a moment to catch up with your scrolling. It's not uncommon to see this on iOS, it happens less with the iPad 2 and it seems to happen more with the PlayBook.
Web page compatibility is ridiculously good with the PlayBook's browser, partially due to RIM's excellent implementation of hardware accelerated Flash 10.2. Corner cases that wouldn't work on Android or iOS work perfectly on the PlayBook. While I personally prefer the UI of Honeycomb's browser and the size/screen of the iPad 2, the PlayBook probably offers the best browsing experience from a pure software standpoint of any of the tablets.
RIM's tablet browser passes the Acid3 test and scores higher on the HTML5test than both the iPad 2 and Honeycomb. The PlayBook user agent comes up as: Mozilla 5.0 (PlayBook; U; RIM Tablet OS 1.0.0; en-US) AppleWebKit/534.8 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/0.0.1 Safari/534.8+.
Nearly all websites treat the PlayBook as a desktop browser and don't force you to a mobile version of the site. This is true for video sites as well, like Hulu and YouTube.
Having full Flash functionality built in to the browser is nice. You can disable Flash entirely if you want to, but leaving it enabled doesn't really impact performance all that much - even scrolling with Flash ads in place remains pretty smooth.
Sites that depend entirely on Flash work on the PlayBook, although controlling pure Flash sites can be a problem. Case in point: Pandora. The web version of Pandora is fully functional on the PlayBook, albeit slow to load. The trouble comes in when you try to use Pandora's integrated scroll bar or actually switch stations. Pandora is optimized for a mouse driven experience, not a touch UI, resulting in a lot of frustrating tapping and really slow scrolling. It's workable, but definitely not desirable.
This is full screen Flash on the PlayBook
Flash video players also work on the the PlayBook within its browser. I was reading an article on abcnews.com the other day with an embedded video. I just tapped the video and it started playing immediately. The same for embedded Hulu videos in Facebook. The YouTube website also works, although RIM ships the PlayBook with a dedicated YouTube client for better browsing.
The problem with embedded Flash video is the same as the Pandora issue: control. You can't really hover to expose controls with a touchscreen so what you end up doing is a lot of quick tapping to try and bring up controls, change the setting you want and get back to playing the video. It's frustrating and doesn't work all of the time. None of this is RIM's fault, but now that tablets are at the point where they can start to behave like notebook/desktops web developers will have to rethink the way they build websites. The web is still the unifying platform between all OSes, it's just a few steps behind in becoming touch optimized.
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name99 - Friday, April 15, 2011 - link
"I am starting to doubt the iSupply numbers you quoted."And I am starting to doubt that your contrary opinions are of much value.
"Their memory prices are also highly suspect, clinging to $2/GB for what are still really small drives compared where higher performing SSDs already are."
(a) The price here is for STORAGE, not memory as you call it.
(b) The issue is that Apple wants flash that is low power, not high performance. This probably means that want flash that works at low voltage.
This is not trivial --- as evidenced by the fact that pretty much EVERY SSD vendor is incapable of shipping a drive that can write reliably at USB power levels.
If the market for low power flash is different from the market for high performance (and high peak power) flash, then comparing prices as you are doing makes no sense.
MonkeyPaw - Wednesday, April 13, 2011 - link
That is kinda sad. I find the tablet market a bit of a mystery still. The hardware is either loaded and expensive, or cheaply made junk. The software is still in limbo. I wanted to try a tablet without much risk, so I ended upgetting a Nook Color and a microSD card and went through the mod community. If all fails, its still a good dreaded, but its actually been a lot of fun trying all the mods. Can't wait to see a good build of HC for it, as the prerelease build isn't too bad already. A prefect tablet? No, but the specs are decent, the screen is great, and the cost was very acceptable. :)MonkeyPaw - Wednesday, April 13, 2011 - link
LoL. Dreaded = e reader. Nice spell check android! :Deliotw - Wednesday, April 13, 2011 - link
They are clearly prioritizing the corporate market that is their bread and butter. I'd never buy this for myself but the "too big to fail" bank I work for could deploy these quickly with the bridge features. That wouldn't be possible with iOS or Android. This isolation capability is impressive but I it still seems like they are releasing it with too many things missing.Spivonious - Thursday, April 14, 2011 - link
For business users yes, but I think most home users (aka non-techies) use web mail and wouldn't be too bothered.PeteH - Thursday, April 14, 2011 - link
The problem is that RIMM appears to be primarily targeting business users. Maybe their thinking is that business users will have their Blackberry on them anyway, making an application unnecessary, but it seems like a big oversight to me.galuple - Thursday, April 14, 2011 - link
It's a corporate security thing. Corporate types very serious about security. No email client means that if one of these gets lost, it doesn't have sensitive documents on it since it's all on the blackberry.Kiddo2050 - Thursday, April 14, 2011 - link
I could care less. This is aimed at Blackberry users as of now, and I am one. With Blackberry Bridge this is a none issue.Sorry, but I just can't go for Apple and it's closed app eco system (the AOL of today). I've had numerous apple products (everything except the ipad in fact) and I just got so sick of plugging everything into iTunes. Just tired of that company ripping me off left right and center. Here's the "New" Macbook Pro, yes it's already out of date in terms of specs but you don't care because it's Apple. Sure my Blackberry phone is not cutting edge but the point is no one at RIM pretends it is. The iPad2 was rolled out as the hotest new tablet and they didn't say anything about the RAM which was sub par - "just don't tell our consumers they won't know." No thanks Steve, iPad2 and Apple = FAIL start caring about your customers instead of screwing them every chance you get.
zephyros - Thursday, April 21, 2011 - link
it's true but so wat? apple came out without cut and paste before...why is everyone so surprised? it's how they fix the issue and how fast that matters. at least they know about it and came out mentioning it instead of letting customers find out themselvesEthaniel - Wednesday, April 13, 2011 - link
... great job, Anand.