At a very similar price point to the iPad, but without the manufacturing volumes of the iPad HP will have to invest margin to compete on quality – that said, the company can leverage huge buying scale from its device partners so fingers crossed that translates into a device that doesn’t just look good, but feels good to use.
From an aesthetics perspective, the HP TouchPad, or rather the design renders of the device that have been released by the company to date, meets the grade. At 9.7″ diagonal width, the tablet’s full dimensions (240mm, 9.4″ (w) x 190mm, 7.5″ (h) x 13.7mm, 0.54″ (d) are very similar to the first iPad (243 mm x 190 mm x 13 mm), released in 2010. Apple have subsequently shaved off a little extra in the iPad 2 (240 mm x 186 mm x 8.6 mm), so the TouchPad lags slightly, but not by much at all. The TouchPad is also a little heavier than the iPad 2 weighting in at 740g vs 600g.
The HP TouchPad follows a conventional design for a tablet device – a rectangular shape with rounded corners and a thick bezel surrounding the device display. The chassis itself has a curved lip running from the screen edge across the back of the device. Unlike the iPad, there’s less of a defined edge, whick should translate into the device being comfortable to hold.
A front facing 1.3MP webcam is tucked away at the top of the screen for video chat and basic photo snapping – that’s less powerful than the camera on other devices on the market including the Motorola Xoom, BlackBerry PlayBook and aforementioned iPad 2. The resolution of the 9.7″ capacitive, multi-touch screen is set at 1024 × 768, exactly the same as the iPad 2.
As you’ll see from the images above, a small button towards the bottom of the device provides the main physical control. That’s the “card view” button, which allows you to view menus and multitask applications on the device. That button is joined by another three physical buttons on the HP TouchPad – volume up/down buttons on the side, plus the power button at the top of the device completes the line-up.
From a ports perspective, you’ll find the ubiquitous 3.5mm headphone jack for hooking up your headphones to the TouchPad, or an alternative audio source. There’s also a micro-USB 2.0 port, now common in most mobile devices, which serves as the socket for the power adaptor, USB charging from a computer or (according to HP’s specs) for using a mouse. That’s going to be a lot more useful than the iPad’s proprietary dock connector.
Talking of audio, HP have recently made a lot of noise across their product range about Beats audio, and the audio system is included in the HP TouchPad too, with two individual speakers. Whilst I wouldn’t expect the TouchPad to deliver the same audio quality as larger entertainment notebook PC, certainly HP think it’s good enough to shout about in their marketing campaign. We’ll know more when we get hands on with the device.
So, that’s the HP TouchPad externals covered – join us next time when we’ll dig down under the hood.
