HP All-In: Betting on Microsoft and Intel

We are now just a couple weeks until Apple releases its highly contentious iPad and you can rest assured that Apple fans have been preordering like crazy and there will almost certainly be lines at the Apple stores in early April for the “Mega iPhone”.

While Apple is putting its eggs in the basket of the smartphone model of a basic OS tied to an app store, HP is looking to storm the market with a tablet that can run a full version of Windows 7 with the ability to run media and normal Windows applications. Analyst, Bob O’Donnell of IDC views the HP approach as safe, “In some ways, Windows and Intel is a safe bet…You have things that are important for people like Adobe Flash, and a lot of other things that people are used to. The question is how do people use them: like a big smart phone or a totally different way. That remains to be seen.”

One thing the iPad does have going for it is a slim design and decent battery life, which Apple claims. This is achieved by using a modified version of the iPhone OS and Apple’s own battery and processor technology. The question is: Can HP imitate the battery life for a full-featured OS and keep the device at a size so that is commensurate to the iPad? It sure wouldn’t hurt to use NVidia’s Tegra processor, which is already powering Microsoft’s Zune HD platform.

Here’s what we think we know about the HP tablet so far:

Price: Between $399 and $500

Availability: This Summer (around June)

Processor: Atom-like processor

Flash Support: Yes

USB: Yes

Webcam: Yes

Memory Card Reader: Yes

Multitasking: Yes

Operating System: Windows 7

Another question is if we can even compare the two devices? On one hand we have a device that is slimmed to take advantage of the app store and multimedia and on the other hand we have a device that is geared to take advantage of a full OS. Which method will work? It will essentially come down to what the tablet user actually uses their device for. If the tablet user is nothing more than an extreme iPhone user, the iPad will be champ. If the tablet user needs more from the device by way of applications and multitasking, the Windows 7 device will win. Then again, there is not necessarily one kind of user out there, so we may see a similar-looking device, but with two very different audiences.

If I were to put all my chips onto the table, I would go for the HP Slate due to the addition of USB and Flash Support. But as we all know, Apple knows how to market a product; the question is, can HP?