HP TouchPad review

HP's TouchPad is finally here to tackle the tablet market with its webOS operating system. Anyone who has seen the iPad 2 will admit that the TouchPad follows similar stylistic lines. For a start, the HP tablet has a startlingly similar look to the iPad, with a large bezel around the screen, a single home button and a front facing camera.

The back is a different story, though, with its glossy black plastic cover that makes the TouchPad feel lower quality. It's a magnet for fingerprints, too, which do spoil the look of the device. Although fingerprints are undesirable, it is worth remembering that it's quite easy to scratch the back of the iPad, which we think is worse.

We like the way the Touchpad feels in your hand, though. Its smooth case gives it a sturdy, quality feel that should be applauded. Oddly, there's no rear camera on HPs device, something most other tablets have. However, we don't see it as a problem, as no one really uses their tablet as a camera, do they?

Side by side the Touchpad is thicker and heavier than the iPad 2. It's 13.7mm and 740g compared to the slender 8.8mm and lightweight 600g of Apple's tablet. At that weight, we doubt you'll want to hold the TouchPad for too long, especially one-handed.

The TouchPad has a lot to offer in terms of hardware. Powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 1.2GHz processor, it's better equipped than the iPad 2, with it's 1GHz chip.

That should mean it's much faster, at lease on paper, but in real life we didn't always find that to be true. For example, we noticed some lag when rotating the device between portrait and landscape orientations. Sometimes we had to wait a few seconds for the screen to turn around. On the plus side, menus are pleasant and speedy.

There are two storage options - 16GB and 32GB - priced at £399 and £479 respectively. These are exactly the same prices as the equivalent iPad 2. If capacity is important to you, it's worth remembering that Apple offers a 64GB model. At the moment there is no 3G TouchPad, and HP is keeping quiet on plans to introduce one.

Like the iPad 2, the TouchPad has a 9.7in screen with a resolution of 1,024x768. The screen looks decent, and brightness is good if you set it to maximum. Somehow, though, the iPad 2 screen just looks better.