The HP TouchPad Review: webOS on the Big Screen
by Anand Lal Shimpi on July 17, 2011 11:11 PM ESTPhone Calls on the TouchPad
Forgive me as I may be a bit too excited about this feature, but I really think HP gets where tablets need to go as a result of this next item. When paired with a webOS phone via Bluetooth, you can use the TouchPad to place and receive phone calls.
The pairing process is pretty straight forward although there are hiccups thanks to the current state of webOS bugginess. Once paired you can lock your phone and put it aside as your TouchPad is now your conduit to telephony.
By default calls come through the TouchPad's speakers and use the mic along the top of the tablet. If you want your conversation private, you'll need to use a mic/headset combo (either wired or Bluetooth).
Thankfully while in a phone call you can still multitask. With the calling card pushed off to the side you can still use your TouchPad like you would normally. You can conduct an IM conversation, browse the web, or respond to emails while the call is going on. I can see this being particularly useful if your TouchPad is your primary computing device and you need to be on a conference call. You can take calls without ever moving your eyes off of the TouchPad and without interrupting what you were doing prior.
There are of course problems with the calling app. The TouchPad would occasionally drop audio when initiating or leaving a call. Sometimes when I lost audio here I wouldn't hear any audio throughout the TouchPad until I reset the device. I also wasn't able to access voicemail or view any of the call history on the TouchPad itself. Since the calls are actually routed through the paired phone, in my case a Veer, the call log appears on the paired phone - not the TouchPad. While I can understand why it works this way, I think I'd prefer a copy on the TouchPad at least in addition to what's stored on the phone.
Here's to hoping HP gets this stuff worked out in the first update to the tablet, otherwise it'll be a very rough road for any early adopters.
The reason I feel like the TouchPad's phone integration proves that HP understands the future of the tablet is because it helps integrate functionality. HP has a tablet that can, at least on paper, do more than competing tablets can do. In a perfect world you'd be able to quickly switch between apps, carry a phone conversation, SMS and IM people without having to distinguish which protocol you're using, all at the same time and all on the TouchPad. Today the TouchPad's performance issues and bugs are what remain in the way of that goal, but the vision is there. Just like your Mac or PC today is capable of doing a lot, very well, I believe tablets are headed in that direction too. Multitasking is key and making it so you don't need to reach for another device to do what you need to do is an important part of making tablets a permanent resident in anyone's computing life.
Skype Integration
The TouchPad wouldn't be a modern day tablet without some sort of video calling support. Apple has FaceTime, Google has Google Video Chat and HP has Skype. The Messaging app is what you use to send text messages to Skype users, but for voice and video calls you actually use the Phone & Video Calls app.
The process is pretty seamless, to test it I had Brian Klug call me on Skype. I was busy doing something else with the TouchPad but I got a ringtone and notification.
Video calls can only happen in portrait mode. While incoming video was good quality as you can see above, that's more than I could say for the video I was sending out. This is what I looked like on Brian's screen:
Eeech. Video automatically goes away when you switch away from the Phone & Video Calls app, but audio continues. Unfortunately I did have problems getting video to come back after switching back to the calling app, chalk it up to another webOS 3 bug.
The ability to hold a conversation while doing other things however is a nice feature of the TouchPad. If you spend a lot of time on Skype, you'll definitely appreciate the TouchPad.
At the risk of sounding like a broken record however, performance is once again a problem here. Here's a look at CPU usage during my Skype call with Brian:
It appears that the calling app is single threaded and during it call the app uses all of one core. Unfortunately just scrolling around the OS can easily eat up an entire core, leaving not much headroom left for multitasking. Any performance issues I had with webOS before were exasperated during my Skype call.
The audio dropout bug I had with regular phone calls also appeared during my Skype testing.
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bigboxes - Wednesday, July 20, 2011 - link
Please. How many fart apps do you need? :pAnand, I notice that you mention Wi-Fi connectivity. Can the Touchpad access network drives and/or can it map a network drive? Part of the appeal of a tablet is not just to access the internet, but to access the intranet as well. It is disappointing that there is limitations placed on video formats and file size. Will there be 3rd-party apps (web browser, media player,etc.) that allow better functionality or is this a hardware/OS limitation?
One thing that is missing from this review is HP's support of the homebrew community. I would assume that there will be many programmers out there who will provide free apps and patches that will augment the touchpad. This will allow you to fix a lot of the devices shortcomings. Come to think about it that is one of the most important aspects of this platform: the ability to do what you want with your device. Whereas Apple locks down their device to ensure uniform performance, HP allows us techies the option to tinker wtih our hardware as we see fit. Thanks for the review Anand!
tecknurd - Tuesday, July 19, 2011 - link
I disagree and you talk like an Apple fan. To my own eyes iPads are restrictive. I can not go to any site with out getting an F grade. iPad are not productive when they can not handle Flash. Unfortunately the Internet still uses Flash.The problem with any OS is applications. Until developers adventure to other OS, applications will be limited. Linux has the same problems and still have the problems with having good applications. In Linux there are applications for office tasks such as OpenOffice, but I would not use it for a business because it is very limited.
Of course it is not the OS. It is the applications for tablets or for any computer. If I am force to buy an iPad like you say, I would just get a Mac book Air or similar.
I against the iPad and iPhone because I think there is something better from other brands. Actually this is true and Apple wants those brands kicked out. I do not support such a thing.
codedivine - Sunday, July 17, 2011 - link
The WebOS internals folks have stepped up and released a patch that reduces the amount of logging the OS does. Apparently it seriously improves performance. If the OS is indeed doing a whole bunch of disk IO that it shouldn't be doing, that will explain a lot of the lag issues.AmdInside - Sunday, July 17, 2011 - link
"The application launch time is livable however, it's something you can get used to and hope that HP will improve over time. There are two bigger issues with the TouchPad's performance that are harder to deal with."I beg to differ. This is the major reason why I sold my iPad 1 to get the ipad 2. When I tested an iPad2 after a friend bought one, I couldn't believe how much faster it launched apps. I could never get used to the launch time of the iPad 1. I am really happy with the iPad2's application launch times. I could not imagine going back to an iPad 1.
cioxx - Sunday, July 17, 2011 - link
HP isn't about building and nurturing consumer ecosystems and neither was Palm with its latest incarnation after WebOS introduction. HP's DNA is basically moving large amounts of units to corporate/conservative customers and getting on to the next model.The fact that they announced a faster Touchpad after 2 weeks of having released the first one is testament to that schizophrenic behavior.
There is absolutely no guarantees that WebOS will get better or that HP leadership will get their heads out of their ass and behave like a consumer-friendly company.
Just look at their idiotic ads to get an idea what decision-makers at the company consider to be hip or relevant.
The "It's not an iPad" crowd is pretty tiny and I've yet to see a credible tablet on the market which answers the fundamental question - "Why get this instead of an iPad?"
halihassan - Monday, July 18, 2011 - link
in the mail section you mention that there is no way to mark multiple emails for deletion. This is not true; when multiselect is enabled, the email app allows you to delete, flag, and move multiple emails.Anand Lal Shimpi - Monday, July 18, 2011 - link
Wow you're right, I definitely missed that! Fixed!Take care,
Anand
arbarath - Monday, July 18, 2011 - link
Nice Review..I personally use Eee Pad transformer, It personally satisfies all my needs. I went n bought a tablet that it should reduce the usage of my Laptop or PC atleast by 40 to 50% and its doing it although it cannot replace entirely.
There are lot of space for performance improvement on honeycomb, but i like it thus far. Regional Fonts are missing in honeycomb, like mine (Tamil) its the biggest thing i miss so far .. I stream movies from my Home Server using smb including all formats, transfer files like you do on desktop or laptop.its great.
HP tablet looks nice and it will be an intersection of iOS and Android. Card feature is really interesting and nice.
Great review. keep it up. thanks.
Omid.M - Monday, July 18, 2011 - link
Awesome review, Anand.Looks like the tablet to beat if HP can issue some updates to address the bugs you pointed out. Have you sent a list of these bugs (scenarios in which they were encountered, so they can be reproduced) to the product manager for the Touch Pad or a media relations person at HP? If not, you really should.
Google +, Google & Amazon music integration, Netflix, and better battery life (and no hiccups) would make this the ultimate tablet. I'd pick one up asap if those were addressed; I'm not sure how swiftly HP would do that, though.
Some errors I spotted in the review:
Format:
Line with [error]
[correction]
(Page title the error was spotted on)
It does get worse on the [PlayBook] unfortunately.
[TouchPad, ]
(HP app catalog)
[Seek] shelter or [be] a hermit with your new tablet are the only present day solutions.
[Seeking]
[being]
(Display)
[IT's] still a [dual-issue] in-order architecture
[It's]
[dual-issue,] --- add comma
(Performance)
With a few benign apps [open] the TouchPad multitasking experience is fine.
[open, ] --- add comma
(Performance)
@moids
Impulses - Monday, July 18, 2011 - link
Excellent review, it's a shame webOS isn't gaining traction any faster and HP isn't pushing devices out the door any faster... WP7's UI design is interesting, but webOS has features that still make many honest Android and iOS users jealous.I would've loved to see where that IM conversation about GPUs was going. ;) BTW, I don't know about iOS, but there's like half a dozen Android solutions for synchronizing or connecting your phone to a PC in order to be able to SMS from the PC, and even view the phone's notifications. I don't think there's any Honeycomb solution yet tho, short of Google Voice, which not everyone can use or integrate.