Tablet Question
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ylexot
Super Genius
I'm guessing that you are referring to prepaid 3G/4G connections? If so, the tablet would need to have 3G/4G capability and I believe that all of them with that capability require a service contract. But, I could be wrong. Your best bet would be to talk to the service provider.
Baz
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If you buy a wi-fi only tablet, you would have to first buy a mobile wi-fi hotspot modem from one of the wireless companies. (Not the USB stick modems.) Then you could use their pre-paid cards or could add directly over the internet.
If you see yourself able to connect to wi-fi most of the time, only needing 3G/4G occasionally, I'd recommend this over getting locked into an expensive 2 year plan.
Tilted
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I'm not certain, but I think it would depend on how the provider (i.e. of the prepaid wireless internet cards) you'd be using works. They might need to provide you with a micro SIM card to switch with the one in the tablet. The GSM iPad is unlocked though, so it isn't hard-tied to a particular carrier. I would think the same is true of the other 3G-enabled tablets.
That said, for the most part, tablet service isn't like mobile phone service in that there usually isn't a contract commitment. You can turn on data service when you want it and turn it off when you don't. AT&T offers no-contract service for either $15/month (250 MB limit) or $25/month (2GB limit). You can activate it right from the iPad (and I would hope other 3G-enabled tablets). So, if you don't normally need it, you don't turn it on and don't pay for it. But, if for instance you're going on vacation and want to have it, you can turn it on before you go and then turn it off at the end of the month - you only have to pay for the one month. Verizon offers similar no-contract data plans, though the pricing is a little different (and the device required is different because Verizon uses CDMA instead of GSM).
So, even if the prepaid wireless cards don't work, you don't have to have a long term contract to get 3G data service on the tablets.
Tilted
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The majority of 3G-enabled tablets sold are sold without a contract. Some carriers are offering discounted tablets with a 2-yr data contract, similar to how cell phones and cell phone service have traditionally been bundled and sold; but you definitely don't have to buy them that way and most people do not. That's just the carriers way of trying to lock up ongoing revenue from the tablet boom - as, otherwise, tablets represent a measure of flexibility and carrier-freedom that cell phones generally do not. It's also an attempt to try to market non-iPad tablets and create some momentum for them.
As I indicated in the previous post, you don't need a contract to get data service for tablets - it's offered, and currently used for the most part, essentially on a pre-paid basis.
Tilted
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You don't need to lock into an expensive plan.
That being the case, I'd usually recommend that someone buy the 3G-enabled version of whatever tablet they're buying (if such is available), unless their budget is already being stretched in buying the tablet. For the extra hundred or so dollars, I can't imagine giving up the future flexibility and not having cellular data capability.
I have been looking at the Motorola Zoom and the New HP Touchpad but the Zoom Verizon version is $799 versus $420 for just Wi-fi. I plan on using this during my cruises for email and web. There is Wi-Fi on the ship. Just trying to stay informed before making a major purchase.
aps45819
24/7 Single Dad
Did you find that they have far less capability than a laptop for a much greater price?
... but it's a cool new toy
ylexot
Super Genius
Did you find that they have far less capability than a laptop for a much greater price?
... but it's a cool new toy
Yeah...that's one of the reasons that I'm not bothering to pull the trigger just yet. It's really funny to see the store ads with a $400 tablet on the same page as a $250 netbook with much better specs.
Baz
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Verizon, Cricket, Boost, At & T have them avaliable too, I believe. Maybe others as well.
I originally planned to tether my tablet through my phone for data when I was away from wi-fi, but have since learned most (if not all) companies now block that ability on the phones. They won't let you use the wi-fi on the tablet to connect through to your phone's data plan unless you pay extra.
Seeing as how wi-fi is practically "everywhere" now (hotels, resorts, restaurants, coffee shops, etc) I'll just pick up a prepaid modem and go that route if needed. I don't see myself needing 3G/4G for my tablet much at all. I still have my phone in case of an internet "emergency".
Tilted
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Are those otherwise comparable Xooms? I can't imagine Motorola is pricing units at $380 more for just 3G-enabling. That's about 3 times what others are charging for that functionality.
At any rate, if all you are concerned about is connectivity during cruises, and the ships have reliable Wi-Fi, then you wouldn't seem to need a 3G-enabled tablet. Either way - whether you were using prepaid wireless cards or billed service from Verizon (with contract or without) - you'd have to have a device that was 3G-enabled.
Tilted
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Did you find that they have far less capability than a laptop for a much greater price?
... but it's a cool new toy
Tablets are no doubt cool toys - e.g., for a number of reasons, they may represent the best gaming platforms available. However, they are far more than cool toys. They are capable of a great many things and facilitate many uses that were previously functionally unavailable. The uses that are being developed for them are revolutionary and the convenience, efficiency, mobility, and flexibility (not to mention the economic feasibility of specialized use development) they offer are incredible. Education applications. Enterprise applications. Gaming applications. Content delivery applications. They are truly changing the way things are done, and largely for the better. In ten years, the idea of not having tablets - and what they mean for the way so much stuff is done - will be nearly as unthinkable, and seem nearly as limiting, to us as the idea of not having internet is to many now.
It is true that much of what tablets are currently used for (though certainly not all of it), laptops are capable of. It is also true that laptops are capable of some things that tablets aren't, and are meaningfully better at other things than tablets are. However, there is a wide range of things that tablets - the good ones, at least - are far, far better at. It isn't always about capability - about what something can do or can be claimed to do - it's often about how well it does it. I use my tablet for so many things that I used to use traditional computers for (even when I'm in a room with computers), because I've found that it is much better at them - the experience is more seamless, or easier, or quicker, or fuller - and so do the people that I know that own tablets. For that matter, I often use it in place of my TVs - sometimes even when I'm in my living room with the 50" flatscreen (if I'm the only one watching). It's better - the image is bigger (as it presents to the eyes) and the video goes where I want, when I want, instantly.
I have a friend who is a construction supervisor - he uses an iPad and, he tells me, it has greatly increased his efficiency. He tells me that, since seeing how he can use his, a number of the other supervisors in his company and his boss have bought iPads of their own. It wasn't feasible for him to lug a laptop around from job site to job site, and the way they operate is just slower anyway - finding stuff and opening stuff on a laptop is time consuming and awkward at times (I realize that many laptop users don't sense that yet, but that's because they haven't experienced the new, better way of doing many things that tablets represent). His iPad doesn't just replace his laptop either, it replaces the paper notebooks he used to have to lug around to make notes and lists and draw sketches. It's a top of the line GPS. It allows quick viewing - and manipulating with your hands - of images and plans. It makes his job easier and makes him better at it - and this is in the construction industry, of all things.
People that think of tablets as just (inferior, if that be the perception) laptop replacements are missing the story and much of the point. They are not pure computer replacements, they are something much different. Something less in some regards, yes; but much, much more in others.
Tilted
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It still seems easier, less clumsy, and more flexible to me to have the 3G ability built into the device. You're going to have to pay for the service if you use it as you suggest anyway (aren't the carriers charging to allow the phones to be used as hotspots?).
I just don't see free Wi-Fi being as pervasive and available everywhere as others seem to. It isn't available on the golf course I play (people's home networks are often locked, and I wouldn't feel free to use them even if they weren't). It isn't available while in a vehicle moving down the highway. It isn't available down by the creek on the edge of my property. It isn't available on a lot of boats out on the water, or on the beach, or in many places where I don't want to lose connectivity and functionality.
Tilted
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What meaning is there in comparing specs between things that work so differently and offer such different advantages/disadvantages? It's like comparing specs between a truck and a sports car, a car and a boat, or a generator and a power washer. Sure, there are specs that are facially comparable, but they don't tell the story that matters. My iPad is, when it comes to practical use, quicker than any laptop I've ever tried and any of the desktops in my house. It works better and does what I need to do as well as I can imagine (or, at least, have experienced) it being done. I can't think of any basic performance characteristics (which are comparable to laptops or netbooks) that I find lacking - battery life, speed, stability, storage.
As for netbooks, they represent a dying product class. That's become very clear to me from listening to conference calls by the people that make and sell netbooks and the components and software for netbooks (e.g. Intel, Microsoft, Best Buy). Tablets are already significantly eroding demand for netbooks. When other tablets (i.e. other than the iPad) start to see significant sales volumes, which some of them are sure to do, the effect will be even more pronounced and likely fatal. Year-over-year declines in sales volume of 40% (which was the case for Windows-driven netbooks in the first quarter) and 41% (which was the case in this last quarter) for a whole class of products is pretty ominous, especially when we're talking about a class that's still relatively young. They should be seeing gains of those sizes, not losses. Of course they're so cheap, people don't want them anymore. We'll likely start seeing fewer, and cheaper if it's possible, offerings of them.