The BlackBerry PlayBook was a pill far forward of its time

Abstract

Again in 2011, BlackBerry launched each its first and final iPad competitor: the PlayBook pill.
The PlayBook was forward of its time in some ways, transport with options not accessible on competing pill computer systems on the time.
In the end, the PlayBook did not compete with Apple’s iPad within the pill market, largely right down to an absence of app developer help.

With regards to the patron electronics business, nothing excites me greater than the tablet product category. The very notion of mobile-first computing is attractive: a single sheet of glass that serves as a vessel for productiveness, creativity, and content material consumption? Signal me up.

Again within the early 2010s, after the discharge of the primary Apple iPad, the pill business was in a relative state of flux. There have been plenty of competing platforms, {hardware} makers, and software program options all vying for a slice of the quickly increasing market, and it was unclear who would come out on high.

Amongst these market gamers was BlackBerry — the Canadian telephone maker that briefly dominated the pre-iPhone and Android handset scene with its line of business-oriented smartphones.

Some 13 years later, we are able to look again on the PlayBook in hindsight.

Blackberry would launch its PlayBook pill onto North American retailer cabinets in April 2011, with a lot fanfare and hype surrounding its launch. On the time, BlackBerry (then generally known as Analysis in Movement or RIM) was nonetheless a considerably dominant drive within the cell tech scene, and there have been excessive hopes that the corporate’s enlargement into the pill market would show profitable.

In fact, historical past typically performs out in onerous to foretell methods, and that is notably true of the uber-competitive and dynamic tech panorama. Some 13 years later, we are able to look again on the PlayBook in hindsight, and see the place BlackBerry went mistaken (and proper) with its ill-fated pill PC.

BlackBerry PlayBook

BlackBerry’s 2011 try at making a competitor to the Apple iPad, the PlayBook was a 7-inch pill that ran the gesture-based BlackBerry Pill OS.

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In some ways, the BlackBerry Playbook was forward of its time

Though the pill was modern, it is lack of a flourishing app market proved lethal

Bodily talking, the BlackBerry Playbook holds up nicely in 2025. The pill’s chassis is plastic somewhat than a extra premium materials like aluminum, however it oozes high quality nonetheless. Tolerances are tight, and there isn’t any creaking or flexing to talk of. General, I discover the system good-looking regardless of its outstanding show bezels, that are definitely massive by at present’s requirements.

The PlayBook is a somewhat compact pill, housing a 7-inch show panel. The product launched earlier than the so-called phablet revolution, during which smartphone display sizes and dimensions would quickly balloon in measurement. On this pre-XL smartphone panorama, 7-inch tablets just like the Google Nexus 7 would go on to search out some semblance of success.

For its time, the PlayBook’s specs have been pretty stable.

For its time, the PlayBook’s specs have been pretty stable — 1GB of RAM, a 1GHz dual-core processor, a display decision of 1024 x 600 pixels, and a alternative between 16GB, 32GB, or 64GB of storage. Some elements of the {hardware} bundle — such because the front-firing stereo audio system, or the twin HD cameras — have been in truth forward of the broader pill curb.

The crowning jewel of the PlayBook, nonetheless, has obtained to be its software program expertise. BlackBerry boldly selected to develop a gesture-based navigation system for its new pill, doing thus far before Apple popularized the interface paradigm in 2017.

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Uniquely, the PlayBook additionally included a touch-sensitive area inside its entrance bezel, enhancing the usability of the then-novel gesture system. Maybe extra impressively, the PlayBook’s QNX-based operating system allowed for PC-grade multitasking out of the field: apps run within the background with out switching right into a ‘sleeping’ state like they do on modern-day iPadOS or Android.

The crowning jewel of the PlayBook, nonetheless, has obtained to be its software program expertise.

After booting up and taking part in round with the PlayBook, its BlackBerry Pill OS 2.1 feels fluid and responsive — way more so than even some fashionable counterparts, just like the Microsoft Surface Pro and its half-baked Windows 11 pill mode.

In a twist of irony, it might be this identical software program expertise that will show to be the Playbook’s undoing. The pill’s killer app — its progressive and modern gesture-based OS, would in the end fail to draw sufficient builders and app makers to hit vital mass.

BlackBerry’s App World remained a baron wasteland post-launch, and the corporate’s baffling resolution to not ship the pill with native mail and calendar apps till the 2.0 update did not assist issues both.

In a twist of irony, it might be this identical software program expertise that will show to be the Playbook’s undoing.

Right this moment, the PlayBook stands not solely as a relic of the previous, but additionally as a reminder of what might have been. Had the App World taken off, the system and its related platform might need grown right into a full-blown competitor to the iPad and competing Android tablets. As a substitute, BlackBerry struggled to maneuver items to the purpose that it practically gave them away.

BlackBerry might not be the powerhouse it as soon as was, however its spirit lives on: I might argue that at present’s Floor Professional lineup captures the productivity-minded DNA of the PlayBook far and away higher than some other pill available on the market at present.