webOS ran twice as fast on iPad 2 as TouchPad? [Updated]
Matt Brian from The Next Web has a source that claims, before canceling all webOS devices, people inside HP tested webOS as a web app on iPad 2 using Safari and the results were twice as fast as their own TouchPad hardware.
The hardware reportedly stopped the team from innovating beyond certain points because it was slow and imposed constraints, which was highlighted when webOS was loaded on to Apple’s iPad device and found to run the platform significantly faster than the device for which it was originally developed.
Which begs the question -- why didn't HP make better hardware? Even if the TouchPad hardware was already in progress when cash-strapped Palm was acquired, why didn't HP scrap it and make something better, the way Samsung scrapped the original Galaxy Tab 10.1 after seeing iPad 2, and brought a thinner, lighter, and faster model to the table?
Or would that have conflicted with HP's intent to surrender the consumer hardware market? Here's hoping someone with some manufacturing balls picks up webOS and runs with it...
Update: PreCentral.net calls shenanigans: [PreCentral.net]
We don’t buy it. There are a few reasons why webOS seems so much slower than iOS, but the hardware isn’t one of them. webOS 3.0 still isn’t fully hardware optimized. It doesn’t take full advantage of the Adreno 220 graphics chip in the TouchPad, and despite being all HTML5 and CSS3 friendly, webOS doesn’t support things like CSS transformations. Instead it relies on more processor-intensive methods to make webOS looks slick. The problem with the performance experience of the TouchPad and webOS 3.0 is not the TouchPad’s problem – HP threw the best silicon they could at the problem, and were prepared to throw even more.
Editor-in-Chief of iMore, Executive Producer at Mobile Nations, co-host of Iterate and ZEN and TECH, cook, grappler, photon wrangler.
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I doubt that difference was the hardware even if the report is to be believed.
It sounds more like they got the WebOS apps (which are basically local web apps) to run in Safari and they ran much quicker. All that says is that Apple has optimized Safari as a web platform a lot more than what the WebOS developers managed, so it was still software holding WebOS back.
There are plenty of folks in the former webOS Homebrew community that have gotten webOS working on netbooks and other hardware. It would not be shocking of HP's folks hacked at the software and got it running on an iPad/iPad 2. I doubt that it would be stable or buttery smooth but it would boot and would work. That still doesn't prove the story but it also means that the story is plausible.
This is why I'm willing to wait for new Apple products to come to market. The original iPad was said to be on the drawing board for 10 years. As a company, you can't expect to toss something together to even compete with the iPad in under 5 years.
Agreed. Apple seems to be the only one with a cohesive, long-term strategy. Everyone else is merely following/reacting and asking themselves "Why are we in this space?"
It's because HP sucks at hardware. They always have.
True, and then try working for a company that only uses hardware and software that's at least two years old before they adopt it. Imagine trying to run a graphics department on such junk.
Yeah, it's not to hard to argue for Macs when you actually need them.
I'm guessing that you don't own a HP server then.
Owned 3 of them, utter junk. Just like their laptops and printers (1.5 minute startup time for an office printer?????)
That's one question. It's just one of many. When Leo was hired, why didn't he, after an evaluation, just scrap it altogether? The list of reasons that HP is giving out today were just as obvious then.
The true injustice was HP's actions all year along. Saying one thing and then flipflopping a week later. Saying they lied all year is harsh, but it's pretty close to the truth. You can't pin all this on Ruby (which many have done) or some other overeager VP. Half the lies came directly from the top...Leo himself.
There's no way I'd consider using HP again.
Gotta remember just after the Palm Pilot came out Apple came out with the Newton (still a great pda). So yes it can be said they had years more experience doing the form factor.
Please someone hurry up and leak that address to the web app. I would like to try that!
I've played with the TouchPad and nothing seemed slow to me. In fact it was quite pleasant and surprisingly fluid.
Remember in early 2010 there were rumors of Apple buying Palm? Looks like, at the end of the day, that would have been the best option. Apple would have immediately scrapped the hardware, taken the best bits of webOS and integrated them into iOS. As it is, they are basically doing most of that now, but would love to see Synergy in iOS. Once iOS 5 arrives, I think that will be the only thing I miss from my webOS/Pre+ days...
now if they try running it in an android tablet...................
I would love to see apple pick up palm straight out buy palm from hp yes palm .... Hp bought palm and ruined everything I'm on my original pre this is better then anything hp could develop hah
Not so fast: http://www.precentral.net/hp-tested-webos-ipad-it-ran-twice-fast-not-so-fast
Does Renee beat off to his postings cause that's what it seems like to me lol rubbin one out to his free apple stickers
I just p a i d $21.87 for an i P a d 2-64GB and my boyfriend loves his Panasonîc Lumîx GF 1 Camera that we got for $38.76 there arriving tomorrow by UPS.I will never pay such expensive retail prices in stores again. Especially when I also sold a 40 inch LED TV to my boss for $657 which only cost me $62.81 to buy. Here is the website we use to get it all from, http://bit.ly/SHoPBid
Rene, WebOS deserves to FAIL. Palm deserves to FAIL. They made the Palm pre to masquerade as an ipod and sync with itunes before they were blocked. And they had the audacity to complain to USBIF and were slapped by USBIF. What kind of business practice is this?
I completely forgot about that. I'm sure Palm did it twice, after Apple blocked it too. They announced the original Pre at CES 2009, and then waited 6 months before advertising it(terribly) and shipping it. They then repeated the process for the Pre 3 and TouchPad this year.