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tablets

Analyst: Competitors can't catch up to iPad

A slew of upcoming iPad competitors won't be able to match Apple's tablet anytime soon, Deutsche Bank analyst Chris Whitmore said in a recent note to investors.

"We believe Apple's lead in the tablet market will prove difficult to close by the onslaught of competing products coming over the next several quarters," Whitmore said Monday in a research note obtained by Fortune. "Ultimately, we expect the slew of upcoming competition to fall flat from a user-experience standpoint while struggling to materially undercut the iPad on price."

Apple's lead is quite substantial, Whitmore … Read more

Symantec makes push to secure mobile devices

As people increasingly use their smartphones both for work and for pleasure, Symantec is now offering a range of tools designed to better protect mobile devices, no matter where or how they're used.

The security company today unveiled several updates to its mobile strategy to help companies, consumers, and carriers all better secure and manage smartphones, tablets, and other portable gadgets.

On the business front, companies face strong challenges in securing the mobile phones on their networks, especially as more employees try to use their own personal gadgets on the job. Many can't support the increasing array of … Read more

Sharp's Galapagos, other tablets tease at Ceatec

CHIBA, Japan--A handful of tablets are on display at Ceatec 2010, though most of them are still firmly in the idea stage.

Of the major consumer electronics manufacturers here showing touch-screen tablet devices, only Sharp's Galapagos seems close to being a real product. Fujitsu's was kept under glass and clearly labeled "prototype," and Toshiba's had few details beyond its use of Android as the OS.

Samsung's Galaxy Tab is here, though it is part of wireless carrier NTT DoCoMo's booth because Samsung does not display at Ceatec. Even without the manufacturer's presence, … Read more

Reports: LG delays Android tablet

LG has decided to ditch its plans for a tablet until Google delivers a better version of its Android operating system, news services are reporting.

Citing an unnamed LG official, Reuters reported Monday that LG will hold off on releasing its tablet until the "most reliable Android version" is made available for the tablet. The person said that Android 2.2, code-named "Froyo," is not "the most suitable version for our tablet."

Bloomberg--also citing an unnamed LG official--said that the company's hardware is complete and that it's now just waiting on software … Read more

2010 CTIA Fall Show is all business

SAN FRANCISCO--New 4G networks and cool wireless gadgets like the iPad aren't just for playing games and watching movies, companies large and small are looking for ways to leverage this technology to make it work for their businesses.

While many technology trends have traditionally flowed from the corporate environment into the consumer market (think e-mail and voicemail as just two examples), many of the latest trends in mobility over the past few years have originated for consumers.

The Apple iPhone and Google Android phones, and the mobile app craze that has followed, have predominately been focused on meeting the … Read more

Week in review: PlayBook enters tablet playing field

BlackBerry maker Research In Motion is attempting its own rewrite of the playbook for the nascent but increasingly competitive tablet market.

Showing the rest of the world that it's not just a boring, yet eminently reliable smartphone maker anymore, RIM on Monday unveiled its PlayBook, a tablet device due to hit the U.S. market sometime early next year.

As was widely rumored, RIM announced the PlayBook at the opening keynote event at its DevCon developer conference in San Francisco. The device has a 7-inch touch screen, is just under 10 millimeters thick, has a front- and back-facing camera … Read more

iPad fingered in mini-notebook decline

Netbooks and mini-notebooks are still selling, just not very well.

Market research firm DisplaySearch crunched some numbers in its Quarterly Advanced Notebook PC Shipment and Forecast Report released today and came up with a good news/bad new scenario for the between-a-smartphone-and-a-notebook category.

The good news is that when combined, second-quarter shipments of tablets, Netbooks, and mini-notebooks were up 29 percent in the last year. The bad news? If you take out the 3.3 million iPads that Apple shipped during that same quarter, the tablet-mini-notebook-Netbook shipment numbers sink to 13 percent fewer shipments than the year before.

DisplaySearch is … Read more

Windows tablets delayed until 2011? Remember, they're already here

[Note: Updated below with a new gallery of currently available Windows tablets and slates.]

There's much online chatter at the moment about a financial analyst's prediction that there won't be any tablet computers that run Microsoft Windows until mid-2011. According to Jefferies & Co. analyst Katherine Egbert, says businessinsider.com, it's simply an impossible task right now:

Windows 7 is currently not supported on Qualcomm's popular SnapDragon processor, and Intel's low power Oak Trail processor (part of the Atom family) for tablets is not due out until March 2011. Microsoft could introduce Windows-based tablets … Read more

Report: Dell's 7-inch tablet due in 'next few weeks'

Dell will unveil its second Android tablet in the next few weeks, this one sporting a 7-inch screen. And a 10-inch model could arrive sometime in 2011.

The new tablet's debut was confirmed by Dell Greater China President Amit Midha in a Wall Street Journal interview published today. The news follows CEO Michael Dell's appearance last week at Oracle World in which he teased the audience with a brief glimpse of a 7-inch tablet but was mum on any details.

"It was showed off at Oracle World by Michael last week and we'll be launching very, … Read more