OT - Black Friday & Cyber Monday and the Tablet Market | The Boneyard

OT - Black Friday & Cyber Monday and the Tablet Market

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I replied in another thread that it seemed the online tech sites peddled a lot of junk at low prices for Cyber Monday and Black Friday to some degree. I thought I heard that retailers did poorly on those two days and the weekend between compared to the prior year. In addition to the slumping economy, I think a big part of this is due to the retailers thinking they could get away with holding back what a lot of people wanted and peddling crap that hadn't been selling for low prices. Maybe I'm wrong, but that's what it looked like.

I did get a good laptop (amazon) and all-in-one printer (Staples) online on Black Friday. But didn't find much out there for one item I was interested in, an Android tablet.

One area that I think the retailers all erred on was in the tablet market. I'm not referring to the iPad, which has stringent price controls (if you're waiting for a deal for one of those forget about it!), but more the Android tablet market which does not have as much price control. None of the sites discounted any tablets significantly or not at all. Probably the best deal out there was the new Kindle Fire which was offered for just $200, but from what I understand is the going price for the foreseeable future no matter where you buy it. A few retailers had some good tablets for cheap but were in-store only deals which you had to be one of the first 5 to 10 people there to even get your hands on one. Maybe the retailers calculated correctly and those who intend to buy a tablet will eventually do so between now and Christmas and pay close to top dollar. IMO, unless someone has their heart set on an iPad or any tablet to that matter, it might be worth waiting till after the holidays. I think they're going to have a crap load of overstock, but maybe I'm wrong.

As for me, I don't want to shell out 4 to 500 dollars for an iPad or any pad to that matter. There's an Asus Transfer pad that is highly rated, but too costly for what I'm willing to pay. Oh, and I don't want a pad that I need to pay for monthly 3 or 4G connectivity. I just want a wifi connected pad.

The new Kindle Fire is a very good deal for just $200, but has some limitations that I'm willing to wait and see get met with Kindle's next device rumored to be called Kindle Ice. Although the Kindle has the "cloud" that allows you to store just about as much content you might desire, the on-board storage is small (8 GB) and not expandable. As long as you're wifi connected you're good. If you want to use it, say, while flying, well whatever you copy to that 8GB space is all you got. Although you can load and play android apps, there's no camera or microphone. Unless you can read lips and send smoke signals, apps like Skype are out of realm of possibility. It does combine the best of the book-reader world, WEB-Browsing and Android App playing worlds at a really cheap price. Oh, and no HDMI to hook the tablet to my HD TV if I'd like to watch a movie or surf the web on a large screen like I can my Droid Bionic.

I'm torn between getting K-Fire now and upgrading to K-Ice which I bet adds most, if not all those lacking features for what will probably be only a small increase. My guess is since Amazon is willing to sell its tablets for less than or close to less than it costs because it's going to get a ton of your money from what you'll purchase to load and run on their tablets, they're going to sell whatever comes next for $250 to $300 dollars, which will be 100s of dollars cheaper than any other tablet that offers close to its features. Rumors are Ice will be out anywhere from 1st quarter 2012 to end of 2012. If I were to guess, Ice comes out just before the summer, no sooner, unless Amazon planned for a significant reduction in Fire production, enough to hold the market till Ice comes out and takes over as their primary tablet. If I were to guess, their plan was to saturate the pre-Christmas sales with Fire, but then re-kindle...sorry I couldn't resist...the tablet market with ICE sometime around June when users will be itching for something more.

So what should I do? (And, no! I'm not going to shell out 4 to 500 on an iPad no matter what you tell me.)

1. Should I buy, or better put encourage my wife to get me the Kindle Fire for Christmas and my Birthday, unfortunately the same day. Then buy whatever predecessor comes out whenever it comes out?

2. Should wait till the after-Christmas sales when the retailers are stunned at how much tablet over stock they have and want to significantly reduce their inventory and buy a good Android tablet cheap like the Asus Transformer if they drop it below $275.

3. Or should I wait till Kindle Ice comes out which will likely be bigger 10" compared to 7", more memory, more processor, camera & mic, plus HDMI...I hope.

My initial choice is #3, but I might cave and go with 1 for now and worry about 3 later. Really! How often will I need to use the tablet w/out wifi. For $200, 8GM might be good enough to store whatever I need if I know I'll be out of wifi for a spell. How often will I really need to Skype someone. I don't even do it now on my laptop or my smart phone, which doesn't work very well in the first place. If I want to skype, I can just use my laptop. And do I really need to connect my tablet to the TV? I can already connect my laptop and Droid if needed.

I'm ready to be swayed or assured. Fire away!
 
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Motorola Xoom @ Verizon w/ data plan for $199.99 this weekend was a sweet deal, and its $299.99 regular price w/ data plan.

I have one and love it. I connect it to my TV to steam Netflix etc. Don't waste time with the Kindle its not to the caliber of the Motorola or Samsung Galaxy.
 

RS9999X

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The reason the Kindles are popular --- they fill the niche for streaming music, video, web browsing, and eBooks. I went with the HP 32GB as a stop gap. It will serve my purposes and I wanted the memory for offline use.

The Kindle Tablet "form factor" won't replace a good 13 or 15 inch QWERTY Ultrabook for serious stuff or the convenience of a smart Phone for video, MP3, calls, and messaging.

Tablets are great for the couch and Ebooks. Great for browsing (once your favorites folder is imported). Video and Music and Camera and Games are nice to have so you don't need to grab another device when on the couch. They are over priced Netbooks! Even the iPad.
 

Fishy

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I wouldn't overthink this. A Kindle Fire is $200. I'm not saying $200 is nothing because I have no idea what anyone's circumstances, but it's low enough that it's not a big investment.

For that price, you can buy it, use it and then throw it out the window whenever you decide to upgrade. Or you can sell it on Ebay for $100.

As the owner of the most gadget-filled house and office on earth, we do have one, but I haven't used it. My wife was watching something on Amazon Prime the other night and it looked pretty good in passing.
 
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There were alot of 75-99 dollar deals on cheap tablets if all you wanted to do was surf and read. Poloroid and Panatech mostly. cheaply made but i was going to get one for the kids. As far as if you are buying now? Wait. The Asus Prime coming out now is top of the line at 499. The makers of the new Tegra chip that power it have said that the prices on the top tablets are going to drop like a rock sooner rather than later (they predicted in less than 6 months). That means that the $400 ones now will be around 200 in about 6 months. If I was buying today I wait a week or two and grab the Asus Prime with a dock, The first Quad Core Tablet. but then again that will set you back alot.
 
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I wouldn't overthink this. A Kindle Fire is $200. I'm not saying $200 is nothing because I have no idea what anyone's circumstances, but it's low enough that it's not a big investment.

For that price, you can buy it, use it and then throw it out the window whenever you decide to upgrade. Or you can sell it on Ebay for $100.

As the owner of the most gadget-filled house and office on earth, we do have one, but I haven't used it. My wife was watching something on Amazon Prime the other night and it looked pretty good in passing.
You make a good argument, Fishy. I could simply pass it on to my wife or one of my kids when the next gen kindle comes out.
 
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Motorola Xoom @ Verizon w/ data plan for $199.99 this weekend was a sweet deal, and its $299.99 regular price w/ data plan.

I have one and love it. I connect it to my TV to steam Netflix etc. Don't waste time with the Kindle its not to the caliber of the Motorola or Samsung Galaxy.
Did you mean 299.99 w/out data plan? The 30 or more bucks a month for the data plan, really adds up. I'd rather be restricted to wifi only and not play hundreds of more dollars a year. If in fact it could have been had for 300 w/out the plan, than that's not bad for the Xoom. I must have missed that, but for whatever reason, I sort of set my limit to 250 on down. I already spend way too much on gadgets. It's madness, I tell you! Madness!
 
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The reason the Kindles are popular --- they fill the niche for streaming music, video, web browsing, and eBooks. I went with the HP 32GB as a stop gap. It will serve my purposes and I wanted the memory for offline use.

The Kindle Tablet "form factor" won't replace a good 13 or 15 inch QWERTY Ultrabook for serious stuff or the convenience of a smart Phone for video, MP3, calls, and messaging.

Tablets are great for the couch and Ebooks. Great for browsing (once your favorites folder is imported). Video and Music and Camera and Games are nice to have so you don't need to grab another device when on the couch. They are over priced Netbooks! Even the iPad.
That's pretty much all that I want it for. I just would like a few more bells and whistles, that's all. But for $200. It's not a huge investment. I can use it, give it to someone in my family once the next gen comes out. I think I'm going to go down that road. The one huge plus about the kindle fire is the use of the cloud which allows you to access all your content from any type of device, not just the fire at no extra cost. That is a huge marketing tactic from Amazon, though I don't know how much all that storage space will cost them. Also, I hope there' isn't a change they could pull it out from under the consumer and tell them they have to pay for it one day or lose it. That would s*ck, wouldn't it?
 
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There were alot of 75-99 dollar deals on cheap tablets if all you wanted to do was surf and read. Poloroid and Panatech mostly. cheaply made but i was going to get one for the kids. As far as if you are buying now? Wait. The Asus Prime coming out now is top of the line at 499. The makers of the new Tegra chip that power it have said that the prices on the top tablets are going to drop like a rock sooner rather than later (they predicted in less than 6 months). That means that the $400 ones now will be around 200 in about 6 months. If I was buying today I wait a week or two and grab the Asus Prime with a dock, The first Quad Core Tablet. but then again that will set you back alot.
I noticed some real cheap ones out there that I hadn't heard of. Based on reading reviews how the best Android tablets have their cons, I didn't think it was worth buying an under-powered and under-featured cheap tablet. I want a good bang for my buck. I have a threshold dollar amount on one end and a threshold feature/quality level on the other. The two have to match up. I think the $200 Kindle Fire might be the happy compromise.
 

Fishy

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I wouldn't buy a tablet on contract - that's idiotic.

I didn't realize that you wrote the initial post, Stu - I have gotten so used to not recognizing the names in this s*** heap that I don't even pay attention to who writes what.

The Fire would be fine. The most important thing about these beasts is the ecosystem. Amazon has that down pat.

And look into Amazon Prime - $79 a year, free shipping from Amazon and a very healthy dose of free HD vids.
 

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Just curious .. but you said you wouldn't spend $4-500 on an iPad but you'll buy a Kindle Fire now for $199 and then upgrade to the Kindle Ice (?) for $199 when that comes out?

Not trying to convince you one way or another but in terms of connectivity and ecosystems/clouds ... why not at least consider the iPad if you're going to upgrade so soon? Solves some of your wants (bigger screen, camera, faster, great ecosystem, airplay (HDMI) mirroring)

Otherwise, probably just wait until that new Kindle comes out ... those are a decent deal.
 
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Did you mean 299.99 w/out data plan? The 30 or more bucks a month for the data plan, really adds up. I'd rather be restricted to wifi only and not play hundreds of more dollars a year. If in fact it could have been had for 300 w/out the plan, than that's not bad for the Xoom. I must have missed that, but for whatever reason, I sort of set my limit to 250 on down. I already spend way too much on gadgets. It's madness, I tell you! Madness!

Nah its w/ data plan. I use it all over, its like tied to my hip, so having the 4GLTE connect is pretty much a no brainer for me. Maybe not for everyone, but the Xoom is great. My Fiancee uses hers for school(with Bluetooth keyboard) in leiu of a laptop and we have them connected to bluetooth printer/speakers in our house. So pretty much its fully integrated into our lifestyle.

Good times, man.
 
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I have HP Touchpad for $220 off ebay brand new. It's perfect for kindle reading, web, email, facebook, angry birds, etc. I'd get that over Fire any time.

Sent from my SCH-I500 using Tapatalk
 

RS9999X

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Next Christmas it will be the Win 8 eco-system versus Amazon versus Apple versus Google.

The rumored Xbox 2012 as the Win 8 Home Media Center server offering Win Apps as well as subscription services, web browsing, gaming, cloud, cable cards for DVR usage, etc could be huge. Win 8 tablets and phones as control surfaces for the XBox Media Center, Kinect, Voice, Skype etc. XBox serving Word and Excel both on the cloud and in Win App form, etc. Seamless. stuff

Bet they blow it and hold back on some features.
 
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I wouldn't buy a tablet on contract - that's idiotic.

I didn't realize that you wrote the initial post, Stu - I have gotten so used to not recognizing the names in this s*** heap that I don't even pay attention to who writes what.

The Fire would be fine. The most important thing about these beasts is the ecosystem. Amazon has that down pat.

And look into Amazon Prime - $79 a year, free shipping from Amazon and a very healthy dose of free HD vids.
Thanks for added info, Fishy. I remember hearing about Prime but didn't understand what it was. For most of the things I want to get out of the tablet fire should be fine. With my daughter going to school in FL it would be nice to be able to Skype from my tablet, but it's not a deal breaker.
 
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Just curious .. but you said you wouldn't spend $4-500 on an iPad but you'll buy a Kindle Fire now for $199 and then upgrade to the Kindle Ice (?) for $199 when that comes out?

Not trying to convince you one way or another but in terms of connectivity and ecosystems/clouds ... why not at least consider the iPad if you're going to upgrade so soon? Solves some of your wants (bigger screen, camera, faster, great ecosystem, airplay (HDMI) mirroring)

Otherwise, probably just wait until that new Kindle comes out ... those are a decent deal.
There's a flaw in your logic. If I buy the Fire for 200, then buy Ice for 250, 300 or whatever it sells for, I then have two tablets for the price of one iPad. I can give one to someone in my family and get the new one for me.
 
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Nah its w/ data plan. I use it all over, its like tied to my hip, so having the 4GLTE connect is pretty much a no brainer for me. Maybe not for everyone, but the Xoom is great. My Fiancee uses hers for school(with Bluetooth keyboard) in leiu of a laptop and we have them connected to bluetooth printer/speakers in our house. So pretty much its fully integrated into our lifestyle.

Good times, man.
I can understand the value of having a data plan and its mobility for you and your fiancee. For me I don't really need that. I'll use it primarily at home.
 
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Next Christmas it will be the Win 8 eco-system versus Amazon versus Apple versus Google.

The rumored Xbox 2012 as the Win 8 Home Media Center server offering Win Apps as well as subscription services, web browsing, gaming, cloud, cable cards for DVR usage, etc could be huge. Win 8 tablets and phones as control surfaces for the XBox Media Center, Kinect, Voice, Skype etc. XBox serving Word and Excel both on the cloud and in Win App form, etc. Seamless. stuff

Bet they blow it and hold back on some features.
Oh, great! Another choice to muddy the waters. I like technology, but I don't love it. Someone has to write a book called gadgets for dummies to help people like me that don't want to bother reading about the latest and upcoming technology we're going to miss out on.
 

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If you buy the Fire, give us an update on your experience with it.
 
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Next Christmas it will be the Win 8 eco-system versus Amazon versus Apple versus Google.

The rumored Xbox 2012 as the Win 8 Home Media Center server offering Win Apps as well as subscription services, web browsing, gaming, cloud, cable cards for DVR usage, etc could be huge. Win 8 tablets and phones as control surfaces for the XBox Media Center, Kinect, Voice, Skype etc. XBox serving Word and Excel both on the cloud and in Win App form, etc. Seamless. stuff

Bet they blow it and hold back on some features.

Microsoft and Sony wont be releasing their new systems till late 2013/early 2014 (At the EARLIEST).
 

RS9999X

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Microsoft and Sony wont be releasing their new systems till late 2013/early 2014 (At the EARLIEST).

The product I'm referring to is an XBox refresh which will be based on Win 8 and the present XBox technology. It's a roll up of all their existing technology into a Windows eco system and will include better hardware than the 360. Same games. Same graphics engine. They want to get another couple years of life out of the existing XBox technology. They've done 6 refreshes since 2005.

The next generation graphics engine is another couple years away. Likely Holiday 2014.
 

Fishy

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I'm not holding my breath on that Windows 8 refresh - I think it is further off than you think.

On a semi-related note, I've been using a Windows Phone for the past three weeks. It's surprisingly nice.
 

RS9999X

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I'm not holding my breath on that Windows 8 refresh - I think it is further off than you think.

On a semi-related note, I've been using a Windows Phone for the past three weeks. It's surprisingly nice.

Strangely enough, the notification tiles are liked by businesses. Uncluttered alerts unlike Androids rather cluttered spread of consumer goodies.
 

Fishy

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The live tiles are nice - it is hands down the prettiest way of going about it and you can glance at your home screen and basically know everything you need to know. The office integration is handy as well.

There are some niggling and not so niggling issues - Dropbox would be nice - but the work-arounds are not awful.
 

tykurez

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The live tiles are nice - it is hands down the prettiest way of going about it and you can glance at your home screen and basically know everything you need to know. The office integration is handy as well.

There are some niggling and not so niggling issues - Dropbox would be nice - but the work-arounds are not awful.

No dropbox for the new windows phones yet? I have to admit they're really slick looking and I'm sure developers are starting to catch up.

There's rumors of MS developing Office for the iPad ... which would be a big deal.
 
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