The smart pad market seems to be moving so incredibly fast over the past few weeks and big manufactures have announced some pretty interesting products to compete against Apple and their iPad.

Targeted more directly at the SME and Business market, Blackberry have announced their new ‘PlayBook’ which can be the answer to some businesses prayers – in terms of reliability and performance.

What makes the PlayBook different to the rest?

‘Well, each run a different OS.

  • Blackberry with Blackberry OS QNX
  • iPad with iOS
  • HP with either webOS or Windows 7

Each will have their own division of the market, for example we would expect that the PlayBook will target business users with the facility of BIS and BES, whilst the iPad is more of an entertainment device, and the HP Slate purely for developers as far as we know right now.’

What it has against competitors?

Blackberry have one over on Apple straight away as not only does it support multi-tasking but it supports multi-processing.

Spec

In terms of whats inside the slate, it packs a dual-core 1GHz processor, a luctrative 7″ LCD display with full multi-touch and gesture support and a 1024X600 resolution.

To compliment the rest of the hardware the PlayBook has, Blackberry have managed to cram:

  • 1GB of RAM
  • HDMI-Out
  • Micro-HDMI
  • Micro-USB
  • Wi-Fi which can connect to a/b/g/n
  • Bluetooth
  • dual HD camera on the device capable of a 1080p recording quality
  • a rear 5MP camera complimented by a 3Mp front facing camera – possible FaceTime facility?

No only does the smart tab have all of the hardware, the software just works! Compatibility with HTML5, Adobe Mobile Air, Java, OpenHL and Flash10.1 for probably one of the best web browsing experiences.

Summing it up

In terms of spec – it is pretty fantastic and lets hope Blackberry can deliver with this! In all honesty though, for Blackberry to compete against all of the other tablets on the market and knock off ones, they will have to produce something grossly over powered and looks pretty good at the same time – but isn’t all Blackberry devices like this?

Rumor has it that Blackberry are developing this with 3G/4G connectivity which is all well in USA, but the UK? (read more)

Well first the release of the Blackberry Torch with OS6 and now this – what do you think of the idea of a PlayBook? Do you welcome more competition for Apple or do you just think that the PlayBook could be an overpriced luxury toy?