RIM unveils a tablet: the BlackBerry PlayBook

Looks like all those rumors about BlackBerry maker Research inMotion coming out with its own tablet were true — well, everything except for the name.

Instead of the "BlackPad" (ugh), RIM is calling its 7-inch, camera-packing tablet the BlackBerry PlayBook. CEO Mike Lazaridis showed off the long-rumored device during the keynote of RIM’s BlackBerry developer conference in San Francisco on Monday.

RIM says its new tablet will arrive in the U.S. in early 2011, and in overseas markets in the second quarter of next year. No pricing details yet.

Expect a 0.9-pound tablet that’s 9.7mm (or 0.4 inch) thick, complete with (as rumored) a pair of cameras: a 5-megapixel camera in the back, and a 3MP lens in front, both capable of recording HD video — nice.

The 7-inch display — the same size as that on the just-announced Samsung Galaxy Tab — will boast a resolution of 1024 by 600, and yes, it’s a capacitive multitouch display, good for such multi-finger gestures as punching and zooming.

The "no-compromises" PlayBook will run on a new tablet OS designed by QNX Software Systems, which RIM acquired back in April, and it’ll be powered by a 1GHz dual-core processor, complete with a whopping 1GB of onboard RAM (compared with just 256MB for the iPad). The PlayBook will also support multitasking and Flash (think Flash Player 10.1), by the way, as well as multimedia-friendly HTML5 Web standards.

As far as data: The PlayBook will arrive with Wi-Fi and Bluetooth support, with both 3G and 4G (yep, 4G) versions coming "in the future," according to RIM. The PlayBook will also connect to a nearby BlackBerry via Bluetooth for viewing e-mail, calendar, to-do items or contacts — meaning, presumably, that you’ll be able to tap out messages on the PlayBook and fire them off from your handheld BlackBerry.

We can also expect "nonproprietary" microUSB and micro-HDMI ports, with the PlayBook capable of outputting full-on 1080p video via HDMI, RIM says.

A slick promo video for the PlayBook shows features such as tabbed browsing, an app task bar, threaded messaging, on-the-Web YouTube video, and tablet-sized e-mail and event interfaces — all very iPad-like, with the added twist of the PlayBook acting as a BlackBerry companion (or the BlackBerry "amplified," as RIM puts it) in addition to a stand-alone slate.

All very interesting, but we’ll have to wait for more details on the BlackBerry PlayBook (not to mention its new, QNX-build OS) until some point "on or before" the tablet’s launch date — which, of course, we don’t really know yet.

So, thoughts on the PlayBook? Questions? (Keep in mind, though, that I’ve yet to lay hands on the PlayBook itself.) Predictions? Fire away below.

• Research in Motion: Press release

— Ben Patterson is a technology writer for Yahoo! News.

World of Warcraft Slang Guide: A Beginner's Guide to WoW Leetspeak

World of Warcraft is among the most popular video games of all time. As of 2009 it holds the Guinness World Record for the most popular MMORPG, with over 10 million subscribers. The game has also made its mark on pop culture, spawning popular web series "The Guild" as well as being lampooned in its own episode of "South Park." It's so big, it's even developed its own dialect!

For new players, the game's slang and abbreviated language can be confusing. Some of the lingo comprises existing "Leetspeak" or gaming slang terms, like "LOL" (Laugh Out Loud) or "pwn" (a corruption of "Own," a way to gloat over victory). Many others are specific to World of Warcraft, abbreviating game terms and features. To make your trip to Azeroth go more smoothly, here are some of the most frequently used terms:

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Char - Short for character, meaning a character avatar within World of Warcraft. Also referred to as "toon," short for cartoon.

Main - Main character. This is the character you play most often.

Alt - Alternate character. Any character you play besides your main.

Ding - Slang for increasing your character's level. A friend who knows you just reached a new level might congratulate you by saying, "Grats ("Congratulations") on ding."

Gear - Equipment. Your character's armor and weapons.

XP or Exp - Experience points. Points gained when defeating enemies or completing quests, which go toward increasing your character's level.

Loot - Treasure, usually found on the corpse of a fallen enemy.

NPC - Non-player character. Any character that can be interacted with that isn't controlled by another player. NPCs include quest givers, merchants, and city guards.

Mob - Attackable enemies, or a class of enemies such as "Those bats are level 24 mobs."

Dungeon - An area that can only be entered by a single group, with more difficult enemies and better loot. Dungeons are often referred to as "instances" in World of Warcraft. Dungeons may have their own abbreviations, e.g. "RFD" for Razorfen Downs, or "UK" for Utgarde Keep.

Raid - A group that holds up to 40 players, used primarily to fight in World of Warcraft's most difficult dungeons. A guild that does these sort of dungeons regularly is called a "raiding guild" or "raid guild."

BE, UD - Short for Blood Elf and Undead, 2 of the available player races within World of Warcraft.

Buff - Status effects that improve your character's performance for a limited time. "Debuff" indicates negative status effects, like poison or disease.

DK, Lock, Pally - Short for a few of World of Warcraft's player classes. DK is short for Death Knight, lock means Warlock, and pally is short for Paladin.

Rez - Short for "resurrection," or being brought back to life after dying within World of Warcraft. Some classes can resurrect friendly players, such as priests and paladins. If there's no one around to rez you, your spirit will appear at a graveyard. You'll need to run in "spirit form" or "ghost form" back to where you died. This is called a "corpse run" or "rez run."

Zone - An area within World of Warcraft. Usually indicates open areas rather than cities or dungeons. May be used as a verb to indicate switching areas, such as "Zone into the dungeon." Nearly every zone or dungeon in World of Warcraft is referred to as an acronym. The Stranglethorn Vale zone is known as STV, for example.

PST - "Please Send Tell." Also known as "tells" or "whispers," this means sending a direct message to another World of Warcraft player, i.e. "/tell Player Hi!"

LFG, LFM - Looking for group, or looking for more. Used to recruit players to play together, usually for a specific objective like a dungeon or quest.

Hearth - Your character's home point, to which you can teleport at any time, set by an item called a hearthstone. Used as a noun, as in: "My hearth is in Dalaran." Also used as a verb, as in: "I need to hearth to check my mailbox."

AH - Auction House. World of Warcraft's marketplace, responsible for most of the game's trade between players.

WTB, WTS, WTT - Willing (or wanting) to buy, sell or trade. Used to trade directly instead of using the AH. These terms will be yelled out in populated areas, along with the goods or services players are interested in.

Soulbound - When an item or piece of equipment is "bound" to your character and cannot be traded to other players.

BoE, BoP - Bind on equip, bind on pickup. BoE items can be traded as long as they're never worn; these are usually items you find as loot. BoE items become soulbound as soon as they're equipped, while BoP items are soulbound immediately.

Craft - Creating goods through in-game crafting professions. Many of the crafting professions have their names abbreviated, such as WS for weaponsmith.

Mats - Short for "materials," or the ingredients needed to create a crafted item.

Tank - A character designed to take most (or all) of the damage from enemies, especially in dungeons. Also used as a verb, as in "My pet can tank that mob."

PvE, PvP - PvE (Player vs. Environment) indicates when players are fighting against monsters or NPCs. PvP means fighting against other players. BG - Battleground. One of the PvP-specific areas within World of Warcraft, such as Warsong Gulch (WSG).

Board games go digital

A new release from one of the industry’s largest publishers is shooting up the video game charts, but it’s not the space marines of Halo or the jocular star-collecting Mario brothers who are sucking in gamers. Instead, it’s a title based on an old board game: one those same console fanatics probably have gathering dust at the back of the closet.

Risk: Factions is the latest in a string of these chiefly downloadable, low-priced board game spin-offs. Rather than Risk’s usual world-domination schtick -- which could make for an over-long, unwieldy experience on a game console -- Factions gives players shorter, bite-sized missions to complete, setting them loose on smaller, fictional continents. It packs a graphical facelift that introduces animated zombies, barfing cats, and tongue-in-cheek cut-scenes. Games can easily run their course in under 30 minutes. In short, it’s Risk: ADD Edition.

Flippant though its presentation might be, Factions is going down well even with Risk purists: it’s scoringhealthily at review aggregation site Metacritic.com, with much of the criticism stemming from the comparative lack of single-player content. Somehow, we doubt that’ll bother board game fans too much.

Boardgame classics hit the digital realm.

Monopoly’s next up for a similar treatment, also at the hands of EA. Releasing this October, Monopoly Streets promises to give gamers a unique view of the Monopoly board -- from ground level, by creating a living, breathing world that’ll evolve as you play. Make a good purchase, and you’ll see your headquarters swell and become more ornate; get soaked, and it’ll crumble aloing with your bank balance. It’ll also feature a no-frills mode for those looking for the classic Monopoly experience.

If that all sounds a little too...modern, more traditional takes on parlor classics are finding healthy consumer interest, too. Take Carcassonne, renowned winner of the prestigious Spiel des Jahres award in 2001: a deceptively simple game where players take turns to lay tiles that connect to form roads, cities, and fields. Just like Scrabble or Monopoly, its touchscreen-friendly tiles and turn-based gameplay make it a natural fit for the iPhone and iPad. Throw your device in your pocket, and it’ll update you whenever your opponent makes a move. Nothing more convenient than that.

Best Laptops Under $500

Save some cash with the 10 best laptops under $500, from companies including Sony, Dell and HP.

Don’t tell the hordes swarming into the Apple Store every weekend, but the days of needing to spend over $1,000 to get a quality laptop passed by while most of them were still in high school. Even before netbooks came along sending manufacturers into a frenzy while chewing their own margins down to pennies just to compete, prices on Windows laptops were in a freefall, leaving today’s prices at rock bottom. With Windows 7 now standard, you won’t have to deal with Microsoft’s last dud of an operating system this year either. Just about any notebook under $500 will serve your most basic needs, but some inevitably do it a whole lot better than others. Here are some of our favorites.

Note: All prices reflect what you can find these notebooks for on the street or online, not necessarily MSRP.

Dell Vostro V13,  $449.00 and up.

If you thought this 0.65-inch-thick, aluminum-shelled beauty shared a bloodline with Dell’s ultra-premium Adamo XPS, you would be right. If you thought it shared the price, you would be dead wrong. An ultra-low-voltage processor and a handful of other minor sacrifices (like only two USB ports) keep the 13.3-inch notebook from pulling ahead as the workhorse of this pack, but it’s hard to beat the knife-like 3.5-pound body for traveling in style.

Asus Eee PC Seashell 1201N-PU17, $483.41

Not all netbooks are built alike. Asus sets its Eee PC 1201N apart with some of the brawniest silicon to be planted in such a tiny package: a dual-core Intel Atom processor and Nvidia’s Ion graphics processor. Together, they give the 12.1-inch netbook pep above and beyond even some full-size notebooks in this price range, including the ability to run many modern games on the 1366 x 768 display. The dynamo GPU also makes the 1201N adept at 1080p video playback, which it can even pump out to a flat-screen TV via a standard HDMI port.

Gateway NV5387u, $499.99

Don't let the obtuse name deter you: This is one of the most powerful laptops in our round up. Gateway’s NV5387u offers AMD’ Turion II Ultra Dual-Core M600 processor clocked at 2.4 GHz, not to mention 4GB of RAM, a 320GB hard drive, 15.6-inch display, and ATI Radeon HD 4200 graphics. The estimated battery life under three hours won’t make it much of a travel machine, but users who need the extra power will be amazed how much grunt they get for the dollar.

Lenovo X100e, $499.00 and up.

Lenovo treads the line between notebook and netbook with the X100e, one of the few computers in the respected ThinkPad line to fall below the $500 mark. While the 11.6-inch screen and weight under 3 pounds might qualify it as a netbook, an AMD Athlon Neo MV-40 processor, rock-solid build quality and trusty ThinkPad keyboard with built-in TrackPoint joystick elevate it to a machine worthy of wearing the ThinkPad badge. Users who need a little extra power can also upgrade to the dual-core Neo X2 for another $50.

Asus Eee PC Seashell 1005PE, $377.80

The Energizer Bunny of netbooks uses a capacious six-cell battery to deliver 14 hours of run time – according to Asus, anyway. As with all notebook battery estimates, it’s a bit of a pie-in-the-sky estimate, but even after accounting for the optimism of Asus’ marketing department, you can expect honest all-day computing. And at only 2.8 pounds, you won’t throw out your back carrying it around all day, either. A 1.6GHz Intel Atom processor won’t get anything done in a hurry, but for surfing the Web, rearranging spreadsheets and writing papers, you won’t find yourself pining for anything more.

HP Pavilion dm1z Series, $449.99 and up.

HP's dm1z stacks up similar to the Lenovo X100e with an 11.6-inch screen and choice of AMD Neo processors, but you’ll get the faster Neo K125 CPU in the base price, a superior Radeon HD 4225 graphics chip that handles HD video, as well as more memory (2GB instead of 1GB) and hard drive space (320GB to 160GB). Specs don’t tell the whole story, since we find Lenovo’s build quality is hard to match, but the dm1z makes yet another excellent alternative for folks looking for a little more power than the average netbook supplies.

HP Mini 5102, $415

HP means business, quite literally, with this rare corporate-class entry in the netbook category. Although the guts look a lot like any other, HP has wrapped them in a sturdy magnesium chassis trimmed with aluminum, which looks, well, ready for the boardroom. It also gets the same drop protection as full-fledged business notebooks, an almost-full-size keyboard, and Corel Home Office preinstalled. (Yes, it's the poor man's Microsoft Office, but it will save you $150).

MSI X Slim X340-021US, $499.99

OK, it's a blatant rip-off of Apple's MacBook Air. But for a penny under $500, what's not to like? The X340 features the same rounded clamshell edges, 13.3-inch screen, and even a 0.78-inch thick profile that's only a hair away from the Air's 0.76 inches. Of course, you get a 1.4GHz Intel Core 2 Solo chip instead of a 1.86GHz Core 2 Duo, integrated Intel graphics instead of a Nvidia GeForce 9400M, and a glossy plastic body instead of an anondized alumimum unibody one. But hey, what do you expect for a third the price?

Sony Vaio W Series, $449.99

Looking for a netbook with some style? Sony’s Vaio W Series delivers with classy pink, blue and white finishes, along with a swank Billabong edition you can pick up for an extra $50. As with most devices bearing the Sony name, you’ll pay a little more for it than the generic equivalent, but a peppier 1.83GHz Intel Atom processor and large-capacity battery both come standard, negating some of the brand name price inflation.

Compaq Presario CQ62Z, $379.99

This spacious 15.6-inch machine offers the comfort of a notebook, with the price of a netbook. The AMD V Series CPU you’ll find on the base model won’t get out of its own way in a hurry, so we recommend dropping $30 to step up to a significantly faster Athlon II dual-core processor. As on the HP dm1z, ATI’s Radeon HD 4250 should make short work of HD video on the (admittedly low resolution) 1366 x 768 display, but won’t leave much headroom for gaming.

More hang-ups than hits in smartphone market

If we are buying so many smartphones these days, why is the phone industry smarting so much?

Just after the mid-point of 2010, a year marked by the re-emergence of Motorola and design savvy of HTC, we are witnessing notable hardware departures from Microsoft and, gasp, Google. Even Apple, which continues to set the smartphone pace, is licking its wounds from the enormous amount of unfavorable press surrounding the iPhone 4's faulty antenna design.

So while so much has gone right in smartphone development -- sales are expected to continue to rise rapidly -- there is much carnage in the marketplace.

Five failed signals

-- After only a few months on the market and backed by a significant marketing campaign, Microsoft pulled the largely well-reviewed Kin 1 and Kin 2 from the market.

-- Last week, Google said it will stop selling the Nexus One phone, the search giant's much-hyped foray into hardware development.

-- We almost said goodbye to the Palm product line-up until HP came in with a $1 billion lifeline to salvage that platform.

-- BlackBerry sales continue to slide as its once must-have phones are failing to keep pace with fresh approaches from Apple and Android.

-- Nokia, the world's leading mobile phone maker, is a non-factor in the smartphone race. Its much-heralded new product, the N8, is delayed.

-- Apple, of course, needed to put a band aid on the black eye that surrounds the iPhone 4.

Interestingly, there's a common denominator among these failures and hiccups. The products -- save for the missing Nokia N8 -- are innovative.

Verizon the problem for Microsoft

Microsoft's two Kin models were intended as social networking phones for teens and 20-somethings. Inspired by the success of the similar T-Mobile Sidekick, Microsoft was not wrong in its approach or execution. Indeed, the phone got raves from top reviewers like the New York Times David Pogue, who wrote that "Microsoft had three genuinely great ideas" with the Kin.

So what went wrong? Well, changing Microsoft's perception into a hip and interesting company is not easy. More significantly, Microsoft picked the wrong wireless partner, Verizon. The nation's top carrier did a lousy job of marketing the Kin phones for Microsoft, instead pushing customers toward smartphones such as the original Motorola Droid, which Verizon heavily markets. After the Kin was pulled, Microsoft employees who secretly shopped Verizon for smartphones reported that Verizon salespeople rarely mentioned the Kin as a worthy product.

If Microsoft had gone with T-Mobile, with its reputation as a hip carrier for younger people due to the Sidekick's success, the story might have been different. At least it would have lasted longer.

Google still gains from Nexus One

The Nexus One drop, on the other hand, was not surprising. The fact that Google launched its own phone in the first place was more unforeseen. Regardless, tech-savvy consumers and media pundits put heavy (and, in retrospect, unwarranted) expectations on an Android-based phone that competed against more established Android phones from Motorola, HTC and other manufacturers.

Now it's clear that Google launched the Nexus One as a loss-leader of sorts, using it as a showcase for Android at a time when few other phone makers were stretching the capabilities of the mobile operating system. But Google didn't really stretch those boundaries with the Nexus One either; rather, it hoped by slapping the Google name on a phone it would serve as a marketing tool for Android. That was the real plan, and it worked.

So when HTC and Motorola came out with great Android phones like the Evo, Incredible, and Droid X, Google quietly pulled the plug on the Nexus One.

Google vs. Apple is the real story

Of course, the reason for the troubles surrounding many phone makers and platforms is the battle between Apple and Google.

Apple has captured our imagination in what smartphones can do, something the traditional phone makers had not expressed as well prior to the iPhone's launch three years ago.

Sure, the BlackBerry sold very well and there was traction among Windows-based smartphones, but the iPhone was a unique product -- not just a portable computer and not just an email device -- that allowed for business and social activities to blend on the go. Apple's success pushed Google into the mobile market, but the Nexus One illustrated that Google is a great software company but not a hardware firm. Hence, Google will continue to make deals with phone makers who can innovate -- again, look at HTC and Motorola -- within that framework.

The future for BlackBerry, Nokia and Palm

It is widely believed that Research in Motion, the maker of the BlackBerry phones, will introduce another touchscreen phone this fall. Also, and more significantly, RIM should unveil a new operating system better suited for touch-screen products and partnerships with third-party app developers. With sales slipping, RIM is dangerously close to losing its grip on business customers -- its bread-and-butter clientele -- as the iPhone and Android products have proven to be attractive for road warriors.

Nokia's problems are more complex. In the wake of Apple's success, Nokia launched its own version of the App Store -- called Ovi -- and encouraged developers to create apps. But the approach hasn't worked well, particularly in the U.S., in large part because there are no compelling Nokia smartphones to lure customers.

As a result, Nokia faces two significant problems.

First, it needs a cool product. The phone maker once led with innovations like the N95, a fantastic media phone that was among the first to shoot high-quality video and take sharp pictures. I loved that phone. But that was launched at about the same time as the original iPhone in 2007, and was Nokia's last great phone. A promising successor, the N8, offers cool features like a 12-megapixel camera and HD-quality video recording, but the launch has been delayed from the spring and it could arrive in October. The N8's problem: Vlad Savov wrote in a June Engadget preview that "Nokia has put together a growling multimedia powerhouse, but the OS is so far from being fully baked we can still see the dough."

Thus, Nokia's second problem: leadership. According to a Tuesday Wall Street Journal story, Nokia is searching for a new CEO because its sales and stock price continue to fall. Also, it is looking at scrapping the Symbian platform for smartphones and is instead developing a new platform with Intel Corp., called MeeGo, to run its smartphones.

And then there is Palm, a story that will be developing for some time. The Palm Pre and Palm Pre Plus are well-regarded products, yet consumers are not buying. But instead of going out of business -- a very real possibility -- Palm was purchased by HP for about $1 billion. That's a pricey number, but it gives HP (HPQ) a potentially sexy product in a smartphone market it has had trouble with (who owns an iPaq?) and Palm a realistic shot at staying in the game.

Hopefully, the purchase will work out better for HP than Microsoft's and Google's recent forays into the smartphone space. Otherwise, expect more carnage in a market that, as it grows, eats its competition.