The Palm Topaz we have seen earlier last month makes another appearance this time. Well, strictly speaking we were only luck to its peripheral, but anyway, Topaz has shown itself and it haven’t come alone. As it turns out, HP will release two tablets this year under Palm brand with webOS onboard. We are already familiar with a 9-inch Topaz and in addition there will also be a smaller 7-inch tablet codenamed Opal. We already have some plausible release dates and bit of hardware specifications that can be found after the jump.Hand on hart, Palm might be just a little too late with the release of its tablets. They have an event booked for February 9 and I am sure many things will be disclosed there, but for now we that webOS is platform is planned to unite smartphones, tablets and, rather interestingly, desktop PCs and/or notebook (a platform-based family as you might already be aware). So Palm does miss the last two rings of the chain so far. We will put desktops and notebooks aside so far and concentrate on tablets. Now, by the end of Q1 2011 we will reportedly have BlackBerry PlayBook and Motorola Xoom around selling in massive numbers as the vendors predict huge demand. Later in spring iPad 2 must come round taking a good part of that demand all to itself. Palm Opal, the 7-incher, is expected to launch on September 11 in Wi-Fi, 3G and LTE models. If Opal and Topaz will launch separately and Topaz will be available quicker, even then Palm misses a lot of action in the market, which I am a bit worried about because I personally expect Palm tablets to be a bit better devices than many others. Partly because having a smartphone and a tablet for Palm really makes life easier – the effect that is perfectly achievable by a very common scenario where a tablet and a smartphone both run Android. But mostly because HP is now behind palm and they are a computer company rather than a smartphone company which I think favors more to the tablet form factor.
Speaking of the design, Topaz and Opal are notable for having no hard buttons, three-speaker surround sound system, just a front-facing camera without a main cam at back, microUSB port. As said above, Opal is due out on September 11. 3G models in USA will operate on AT&T network, Bell and Rogers in Canada. LTE model for both countries is given to Verizon. AT&T will also get an LTE version, but this will happen only next year on July 12.
