The HP Slate has been one of the most heavily touted iPad rivals but it may be joining the Microsoft Courier in the tablet death pool if new rumours are right. Is HP gearing up to get rid of the HP Slate Windows 7 tablet in favour of hardware running its latest toy, the Palm webOS?
HP Slate specs leaked only a few back and HP even released an HP Slate video promoting its Flash support. But now Techcrunch is reporting that HP sources say it’s planning to drop the HP Slate altogether.
We first saw the HP Slate in the hands of Microsoft boss, Steve Ballmer, at CES but it seems HP may have gone off Windows 7 in the meantime. After buying Palm, it’s now being suggested that we might see webOS tablets coming from HP instead.
Palm boss, Jon Rubenstein, recently predicted webOS tablets were on the way so it could be that Palm already has some tantilising tech in its labs that HP has now got its hands on. Perhaps the HP Slate just couldn’t compete.
If the HP Slate is canned, it’ll be another tablet scratched off the list of iPad rivals. But we’ve still got the Asus Eee Pad waiting in the wings and can expect a raft of other touchscreen foes for Apple to fend off if ARM’s prediction of 50 tablets this year is even remotely right.
Do you think HP would be right to write off the HP Slate? Or are you gagging for a Flash-friendly tablet?
Due TBC | £TBC | HP (via Techcrunch)
