The HP Slate was first unveiled at the Consumer Electronics Show in January, where it failed to gain momentum at par with the Apple iPad. Later, HP re-jigged their product and launched the HP Slate 500 on October 22, 2010, projecting it as an enterprise market product. The 8.9” Slate compete with other similar consumer products from Apple, Dell or Samsung. Nevertheless, it can be a good productivity tool for on-the-road professionals.

Overview

The Hp Slate 500 may seem expensive at first, but its specifications and productivity make up for that. It can be an ideal tablet PC for professionals who are on a constant move and cannot be tied to a workstation or desktop. The Slate comes out as a sturdy, light-weight device with slick industrial design, which weighs just about 1.5 lbs (0.68 kg).

The tablet runs Windows 7 OS which can provide the professional with seamless productivity. With a Windows OS, the user has multitude of apps and software at their disposal, hence they can truly work away from their desk.

What is being seen as a weakness of the Slate is the lack of any specialized software for the touch-panel. The tablet doesn’t come with any other custom software and depends on the built-in features of Windows 7 OS for the touch-interface like the on-screen keyboard.  The HP Slate Digital Pen (included) can be used for taking notes which sets the tablet apart from other Windows 7 based ones.

Specifications

The 9.21 x 0.58 x 5.91 inch (23.40 x 1.47 x 15.00 cm) tablet runs on an Intel Atom Z450 processor (1.86 GHz), 2 GB RAM and 64 GB Solid State Drive (SSD). The Slate sports an 8.9” – 1024X600 pixels WSVGA capacitive multi-touch display panel, which boasts HD video playback facilitated by the Broadcom Crystal HD chip and Intel Graphics Media Accelerator 500.

On the connectivity front, the tablet has integrated 802.11b/g/n, Bluetooth ® 3.0 and HS combo. It also has a USB port, a SD card slot, integrated microphone, a combo-stereo headphone/microphone jack, a front VGA and a rear 3 megapixels camera and a docking connector. The dock (included) further enhances connectivity with two more USB ports, HDMI output and extra headphone and microphone jack.

The Slate comes with per-loaded Windows 7 Professional that helps in enhancing productivity along with providing a portable net-book-like experience. Also, the touch-screen interface is mostly lag-free, unlike other Windows based tablets sparing the professional the operational irritation. The Slate also takes input from an included stylus that the company calls as HP Slate Digital Pen. The official HP site boasts of the Slate having ’up to 5+ hours’ of battery life as well.

The only extra software the Slate comes with are HP Slate Camera, EVERNOTE, HP Support Assistant, Adobe Reader, and Adobe PDF.

The HP Slate 500 comes bundled with a docking stand, a carrying case and the pen with a price tag of $799.

Comparison with Apple’s iPad

The Slate initially failed to shine through the glow of Apple’s iPad, but when it comes to connectivity, the Slate wins hands down. It has various other hardware advantages over the iPad as well. Where iPad runs on the iPhone OS 3.2, the Slate runs on a full Windows 7 Professional OS; hence one does not have to depend on proprietary apps and can choose from the already available wide variety of software and applications. One also gets the functionality of multi-tasking which is unavailable with the iPad. And where iPad has no camera, the HP Slate comes with two.

The parameter where Slate lacks is the touch-interface and 3G connectivity.

The Bottom-line

The HP Slate 500 is a good tablet which is suitable for an enterprise professional on constant move. It provides true on-the-road productivity, good connectivity and sturdy operating system. But the lack of a customized touch-interface may be a hindrance and also the higher price tag can limit it to enterprise users only. If it can be an iPad Killer, is up to the user.

Novatech, a leading technology retailer from UK, entered the foray of tablet PCs recently with the launch of its first product, the nTablet. The tablet’s launch in late October has received much positive feedback from consumers and it seems to be gaining popularity steadily. It is even dubbed as ‘Uk’s first Windows touch screen tablet’, but whether it can turn out to be an iPad Killer, only time can tell.

Overview

In looks, the Novatech nTablet is very similar to the ViewSonic ViewPad. One might even find it hard to differentiate the tablets, if they are placed together with their brand tags removed. Both the tablets run dual operating systems, Android 1.6 and Windows 7. There is a lower priced version with just Android or no OS available as well. Having Windows 7 really boosts the productivity, since the tablet can run multitude of applications. But the touch sensitivity of the screen can be a problem with the OS’s on-screen keyboard.

Running a full OS Windows 7 on a tablet does have its limitations, since it is necessarily made for desktop application. Multi-tasking can tend to get sluggish. Also, the Android OS is an older 1.6 version which will limit functionality, as there is no Flash support and also the apps for new 2.1 version won’t work. The firm does plan to include Android 2.1 in the upgraded variant next year.

The look and feel of the tablet is quite positive but media playback can be an issue. The Intel GMA 3150 GPU is fine for playing 720p video, but trying to view 1080p videos can be sluggish and frustrating. Novatech plans to resolve this issue by upgrading the hardware with Intel’s Oak Trail family of processors in the coming year. The new processors are also said to be better at power saving and can hence increase battery life. Less power consumption will mean less heating. But heating doesn’t seem to be a problem with the nTablet as the fan is hardly audible.

Specifications

The tablet comes with a 10.1” screen which is surrounded by a glossy black bezel/border with the Novatech brand name clearly visible at the bottom. The right-side bezel has three buttons; power, home and enter. On the top, situated in the middle, is a 1.3 megapixels camera and there are LEDs showing power, connectivity and battery status on the right hand side. The rear side is brushed aluminum.

The 275 x 170 x 14mm tablet weighs just 725g and is designed in such a way that majority of the connectors and ports are situated on one edge of the system (left side). There are two USB ports, a mini D-SUB to DVI-I, micro-SD card reader, audio-out, microphone and a power port. On the other side, there is a SIM card slot for 3G connectivity and a reset button. There are also two cooling vents placed on both the edges for better heat management.

On the inside, the tablet gets its processing power from an Intel Atom N455 1.6 GHz CPU, which features Hyper-Threading technology to boost the single core processor’s power. Novatech nTablet comes with 1 GB 1333 MHz DDR3 memory and a 32GB Solid State Drive (SSD). It has a 10.1″ 1024 x 600 pixels capacitive multi-touch screen backed by the Intel GMA 3150 GPU, which can easily handle full screen video, Windows Aero and Flash content.  For wireless connectivity, it has integrated 801.2 b/g/n, 3G n and Bluetooth v2.1+EDR which facilitate connectivity almost everywhere.

It also has gravity censor (like the iPad’s) which detects and automatically adjusts the screen’s orientation. The nTablet has a 4200mAH battery which promises up to 5 hours of power.

The tablet is powered by Windows 7 operating system which also comes pre-installed with the Microsoft Office 2010 Starter Edition. And the BIOS of the tablet can be accessed using an external keyboard; albeit it has limited functionality.

The Bottom-line

The company Novatech, is well known for its great products and superb customer support. The tablet is also cheaper and bigger (screen size) than other tablets, especially the ones running Windows 7. Although Windows 7 can face performance lag on the Atom processor, the tablet may be a lot lucrative with the proposed new processor and newer versions of Android. All in all, a solid built, value-for-money tablet.