The HP TouchPad has now been playing the game of ‘bring out your dead’ for twice as long as it was a living product – but this weekend might be the end of the road. HP is having a fire sale on the TouchPad starting at 6:00 p.m. (Central Time), Sunday, December 11th via its eBay store.

Here is the text of the message sent to HP employees:

To: U.S. HP Employees

HP employees will have a chance to purchase a refurbished HP TouchPad via eBay before the sale is announced to the general public. Specifically, the TouchPads will be offered through one of HP’s newest marketplaces for close-out and refurbished HP

The continuing saga of the ‘out of stock’ HP TouchPad with a seemingly endless supply returns! From a post at PreCentral we learn about the latest Tiger Direct ‘deal’:

Here’s the deal: buy a TouchPad and any HP laptop or desktop from TigerDirect, pay $299.99 upfront for the tablet, and get a mail-in rebate (sigh) for $150. Or just buy a 32GB TouchPad for $299.99. Yeah, that’s more than they were asking before for the same tablet with accessories that aren’t included here. Supply and demand, folks.

Here is how Tiger Direct shows it:

This week you are going to see 95% of the small tablet news focused on the Kindle Fire and Nook Tablet, but there is another 7″ tablet device that we just got some more pictures of that will never hit the market – the HP TouchPad Go. … Continue reading on Gear Diary ...

It is nearly three full months since HP killed off webOS and the entire former Palm line of webOS-based devices. None of this is news – the HP TouchPad was killed after only six weeks of life, and immediately placed on a fire sale which was widely reported and caused an internet-breaking amount of interest. In the ensuing three months, hardly a day has passed without some mention of HP, webOS or the TouchPad – which is a far cry from the yawn-inducing life of webOS prior to that. So, as I say from the start – these last few months since the death of webOS have been the liveliest since the very first announcements!… Continue reading on Gear Diary ...

OK, folks, this is likely one of the last ‘real’ deals we’ll see on the HP TouchPad. We know that HP and BestBuy are colluding to sell you overpriced HP PCs and warranty plans to get a $149 32GB TouchPad, so it is SOMEWHAT refreshing that Tiger Direct is selling off THEIR inventory using a cheaper bundle. It pairs the $149 32GB TouchPad with some other accessories and charges $280 … a quick look on Amazon tells me the REST of the bundle could be had for < $100 combined – but THAT is the price of getting one of the dwindling supply of TouchPads. And of course it can

We have talked about the so-called ‘Tablet Market’ as really being the ‘iPad Market’, with some marginal players scraping for scraps. Some of us have bought or spent considerable time with one or more of the various tablets that have come out over the last year – the Samsung Galaxy Tab, Motorola Xoom, BlackBerry Playbook, HP TouchPad, HTC Flyer, Acer Iconia, and on and on. Yet in all of these cases there have been some serious flaws that have derailed the tablets and ultimately resulted in the failure of the tablets to gain market penetration.

Last week the IDC released some tablet market share numbers, and although everyone is selling more units… Continue reading on Gear Diary ...

This is pure speculation on various sites and as noted by Francis, but there is a rumor that at either 2PM or 5PM EST today, more HP TouchPads will be available on QVC and/or TigerDirect.

QVC Homepage

TigerDirect Homepage

In the past few days both sites have had limited supplies that have sold out almost immediately and have appeared as bundles with accessories for ~$200.

So … we have no idea if this is real or not – but if you are like us and looking for a cheap TouchPad, this might work … certainly worth checking if you have the chance! Let us know in the comments… Continue reading on Gear Diary ...

It is hard to believe that the #2 Tablet in the world was released and cancelled within six weeks … but that is the situation with the HP TouchPad. ‘Soft launched’ in early July and formally launched a couple of weeks later, the webOS tablet was cancelled with the entire webOS product line by mid-August and existing inventory sold off quickly in a ‘fire sale’.

In early August Staples had a big sale paired with a ‘weekend coupon’ from HP for $100 off, making the TouchPad a delicious $299! Yet I didn’t buy one, and described why here. I also subsequently discussed the abysmal TouchPad sales and then derided HP as

When the Grid 10 was announced by the ever-reliable Chandra Rathakrishnan last month, it was said to run Android apps but not be an Android device. This was later clarified to mean that it is actually an Android kernel running the show, but thoroughly skinned and possibly even forked to a version of Android incompatible with future Google-backed updates. We’ll see someday, maybe.

Now TechCrunch is reporting that Amazon’s long-rumored tablet will be hitting the market in a couple months, running a completely forked Android kernel. This one is apparently pre-2.2 (how far pre is undefined) and has been so modified that it in no way resembles Android at all… Continue reading on Gear Diary ...

Image Courtesy of Demotivation

I recently remarked about how and why I didn’t buy a HP TouchPad during the recent mega-sale at Staples and elsewhere. As I mentioned then, Dan had also looked at the TouchPad when it was released and described it as “a bit too laggy for my taste”. Since then he posted about the upcoming AT&T 3G model with a faster processor, and said the main reason he didn’t get one during the big sale was his local store didn’t have any. My post also drew comments from others less than thrilled with the TouchPad.

Turns out we are far from alone – just before the Staples deal… Continue reading on Gear Diary ...

As most tech-heads are aware, this past weekend HP ran a $100 off ‘instant coupon’ special on the HP TouchPad. In addition, certain retail shops ran additional $50 off specials and Staples even had a $100 off deal, meaning it was possible to get the 16GB version of the TouchPad for $299 – $349. I know many folks who simply couldn’t resist the price and went right out to grab one. Since I am a big Palm webOS fan as I indicated in my review of the Palm Pixi Plus, I certainly printed out the Staples coupon – yet I didn’t buy one. And I will detail five reasons WHY I didn’t.

When… Continue reading on Gear Diary ...

With the upcoming HP WebOS tablet and Pre 3 smartphone featuring great-looking features such as touch-sync, it is interesting to take another back at WebOS as it exists today. Recently I came upon a nearly free deal for a no-contract 8GB Palm Pixi Plus which I was easily able to activate on Verizon to test. I used the Pixi as my sole phone for two weeks, enough to develop some things I loved about the phone and WebOS … and some things I didn’t like so much!

The Hype:
The thinnest Palm mobile phone yet, the Palm Pixi Plus for Verizon Wireless is a smartphone that’s designed to be easy to use and light… Continue reading on Gear Diary ...

OK, not totally free, as always you’ll need to be a new customer or eligible for an upgrade – and sign on to a 2-year contract. Still, the Pre 2 is a great phone with excellent features, and is supposedly going to get the Web OS update later this year allowing for the cool features HP showed in their media event a few weeks ago!

Head on over to the HP Wireless Store and get your Verizon Pre 2 Upgrade for FREE!

As companies continue to “go mobile” to take advantage of giving their employees the means to manage their work anytime or anywhere, the inevitable problems of how to manage devices and costs quickly becomes top priority.  Imagine being able to easily manage all of the service costs for each device — before those pricey overage charges hit from going over monthly minutes or data plan allotments.    Imagine being able to receive an alert to your phone before you start roaming.   Imagine being able to not only keep costs under control, but also ensure security, ease support worries and speed up mobile device deployment in your organization.… Continue reading on Gear Diary ...

There’s a big debate over whether HP bought Palm for their OS or for their patent portfolio. Technologizer took the time to pull together an amazing list of some of those patents that never came to light. Some are really weird, and some look super cool! My personal favorite is the one above, which appeared to be a phone/PDA/modem all wrapped up in a modular package. It’s the transformer of Palms!

Also cool were the various potential gaming based Palm ideas, like this one:

It’s a shame that Palm didn’t have the resources to get really creative when they were on top, but it’s a… Continue reading on Gear Diary ...