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Topic: Hewlett-Packard

Best Buy and Staples offering big discounts on the BlackBerry PlayBook

Summary: If you have been thinking of a BB PlayBook, then you may want to swing by Best Buy this weekend or hope the rumors of a Staples 50% sale come about next week.

Matthew Miller

By for The Mobile Gadgeteer |

It's not quite the crazy fire sale that HP offered, but this weekend it looks like you can find deals on the RIM BlackBerry PlayBook at Best Buy and Staples. HP dropped webOS hardware, but there are no indications that RIM is dropping the PlayBook. The new OS 7 devices seem to be doing pretty and with a significant PlayBook update coming soon, these deals on the PlayBook are pretty compelling. I bought a PlayBook on launch day and am no using it even more with my new Bold 9930.

Best Buy has a sale on now through Monday where you can get the 16GB model for $449 ($50 off) and the 32GB ($50 off) or 64 GB ($150 off) models for $549. There is also talk that Stapes will be offering 50% off the PlayBook on 7 and 8 September so you could get the 16GB for $249, 32GB for $299, and 64GB for $349. Keep in mind these Staples deals are just rumors still, but the Best Buy sale is going on now. I have a 32GB model that I paid $599.99 for so these are great deals.

I also noticed this past week that the Rapid Charger Dock was on sale for $34.99 (regularly $69.99) and picked one up for myself since I prefer charging my PlayBook up in this stand. The soft shell case is on sale too.

While these sales are great, they are not close-out fire sales and I think they are just holding these to move inventory and do not personally believe there is a new PlayBook coming anytime soon. The 7 inch form factor is great for the PlayBook and I hope RIM is just dedicating resources to the next update and not future larger form factor models.

Topic: Hewlett-Packard

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  • RE: Best Buy and Staples offering big discounts on the BlackBerry PlayBook

    249 still not a good buy, i rather buy a refurb ipad 1 for 299
    mainard1@...
    Reply Vote

    • RE: Best Buy and Staples offering big discounts on the BlackBerry PlayBook

      @mainard1@... Yeah right, this thing would smoke an paid 1 and likely the 2 as well. It is the fastest Tablet on the Market thanks to QNX!
      slickjim
      Reply Vote

      • RE: Best Buy and Staples offering big discounts on the BlackBerry PlayBook

        @Peter Perry
        Some of the cheaper Android tablets are better than this because of apps, and seperate email client. Integrating it tightly with Black Berry Phone has its own disadvantages too. RIMM forgot about the standalone consumers who have a different type phone (may not be a cool smartphone, but feature phone owners). They should have made it configurable. I see trouble there.
        Ram U
        Reply Vote

      • RE: Best Buy and Staples offering big discounts on the BlackBerry PlayBook

        @Peter Perry How? Lack of apps and no real email client alone kill it... unless you have a blackberry to bridge to it IMHO it's useless. Getting a Nook Color and rooting it is still the better deal.
        athynz
        Reply Vote

      • RE: Best Buy and Staples offering big discounts on the BlackBerry PlayBook

        @RAMA.net. not sure if you have been paying attention but this thing runs Android Apps!
        slickjim
        Reply Vote

      • RE: Best Buy and Staples offering big discounts on the BlackBerry PlayBook

        @Athynz again, Playbook can run Android Apps and it is incredibly fast!
        slickjim
        Reply Vote

      • RE: Best Buy and Staples offering big discounts on the BlackBerry PlayBook

        @Peter Perry
        Unless I have excessive "disposable" income to spend on toys and I cannot live without "touch", Playbook is simply a too_expensive toy. I can buy a real computer with 11.6" (1366x768) with AMD C50 and 6xxx-class graphics notebook PC (6hr battery minimum) at Costco at $340 max!
        PWsY
        Reply Vote

      • RE: Best Buy and Staples offering big discounts on the BlackBerry PlayBook

        @Peter Perry Faster does not necessarily make better.
        non-biased
        Reply Vote

    • RE: Best Buy and Staples offering big discounts on the BlackBerry PlayBook

      @mainard1@... you can't tether for free or access flash webs & apps on an ipad...
      no hdmi
      no LTE support
      no camera...
      SinfoCOMAR
      Reply Vote

      • RE: Best Buy and Staples offering big discounts on the BlackBerry PlayBook

        @SinfoCOMAR -
        FYI - the iPad WILL do HDMI, albeit with an adapter (already have one for my iPad 2 and almost never have the urge to hook it up).

        MOST OF US don't have LTE support no matter what tablet we get because it's still very limites as far as coverage. I'm happy for you if you can get it where you are and where you go, but the majority of people aren't dying to have it. But again, can always be added through a 4G hotspot (through any carrier) if you decide to go that route.

        If you have a phone, you have a camera, and probably better than the PlayBook's camera.
        V1R4L
        Reply Vote

      • RE: Best Buy and Staples offering big discounts on the BlackBerry PlayBook

        Doesn't matter if the ipad is slow, no flash, no whatever. The fact of the matter is the ipad is the only thing that apps are being developed for. I realized this when I got myself a droid phone not wanting to be married to Apple. Well now I'm living with a device with only a small percentage of apps when compared to an iphone. So I'm certainly not going to make that same mistake on a tablet which is where I would want my apps. So it really doesn't matter if this is a far superior product and they give it away for free. If you can't run anything from it, it's not of much use.
        P. Dickason, CNE, MCSE, CCA
        Reply Vote

      • RE: Best Buy and Staples offering big discounts on the BlackBerry PlayBook

        @SinfoCOMAR

        <i>"you can't tether for free or access flash webs & apps on an ipad..."</i>

        I could play the same silly game.

        No Airplay, DLNA
        No dedicated mail app (need to be married to a Black Berry)
        No great choice of apps, no cool choice of games
        No dedicated calender
        No dedicated contact
        No 3G option without a Black Berry
        no videochat
        No Skype
        No Notes app
        No GPS app..........
        dave95.
        Reply Vote

      • RE: Best Buy and Staples offering big discounts on the BlackBerry PlayBook

        @SinfoCOMAR
        How many would use camera (back) on a tablet seriously on a daily usage? For that most of the phones including feature phones have it and there is no need of second one). LTE, it is debatable. How many carriers really have LTE support? Even Verizon doesn't cover 100% USA. And like @V1R4L mentioned, if you carry multiple devices having a mobile hotspot with 4G does the best. Sprint Overdrive, AT&T MiFi and Verizon LTE Hotspot comes to mind. iPad 2 and a good number of Android Tablets have this, and I don't see a good number of these device owners use that on a daily basis at least on a weekly basis. A lot of common users still use TV, and Bluray player or DVD player still, if it is not in the Air or Cable.
        Ram U
        Reply Vote

      • RE: Best Buy and Staples offering big discounts on the BlackBerry PlayBook

        @V1R4L
        Doesn't matter if you find a way via adapter that has an hdmi output on it for the ipad 1 because the ipad specs themselves says that it cannot output in high res. Soooo basically the ipad 1 output is almost as good as dvd. awesome. That was the only deal breaker I needed for ipad 1. There are far more of course.
        rengek
        Reply Vote

      • ???

        @P. Dickason So what "got to have" iPad only apps are there that aren't available on Android?

        The Apple app store #s sound impressive until you start looking at what's offered - do a thousand different fart apps or flashlights or calculators count?
        archangel9999
        Reply Vote

      • RE: Best Buy and Staples offering big discounts on the BlackBerry PlayBook

        @archangel9999 The good old fart app claim used whenever there isn't an actual valid argument to back up your position.
        non-biased
        Reply Vote

    • RE: Best Buy and Staples offering big discounts on the BlackBerry PlayBook

      @mainard1@...
      If people are paying $250 for a Nook Color and that is an ereader, I think people will pay $250 for a dedicated tablet with a tablet OS. Who cares about a native email app anyway? Not most consumers that is for sure.

      Sent from a HP Touchpad.
      mstrsfty
      Reply Vote

      • RE: Best Buy and Staples offering big discounts on the BlackBerry PlayBook

        @mstrsfty I guarantee you there are email apps for services like gmail which would also likely have a calendar app.
        slickjim
        Reply Vote

      • RE: Best Buy and Staples offering big discounts on the BlackBerry PlayBook

        @mstrsfty I agree. I think the Ipad is a bit overblown for a single app tablet. If it could multitask it might, mind you, I said Might be a good tablet. But for business it cannot compete with a Blackberry tablet.
        Most businesses already use the Blackberry phone.
        RobertMoore12@...
        Reply Vote

      • RE: Best Buy and Staples offering big discounts on the BlackBerry PlayBook

        @mstrsfty Why not just use the Web browser to access Webmail in the mean time? The release of QNX 2 with native email client is imminent, which is probably why these devices in the channel with QNX 1 are being cleared out: they want to load the channel up with PlayBooks that have QNX 2 installed, with new packaging that says "Native Email Client" right on them.

        Basically, RIM is 'relaunching' the PlayBook with QNX 2, I figure.
        lorax1284@...
        Reply Vote
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