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Article: Tesco's all but given up on its Hudl tablets


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Guest Jabbitt
Posted
Tesco's all but given up on its Hudl tablets

http://flip.it/1BYLX

Thought this might interest the regulars on here...

1. I'm not surprised considering the price slash of all Hudl accessories.

2. I was surprised we got the Lollipop update though. Really surprised!

Guest Captain Cookster
Posted

Thanks for posting the link mate. 

Although the article does jump to a lot of conclusions, there does seem some logic in what the guy is saying.

Tesco may not release a new Hudl this year for various reasons. 1. Company strategy (costs) 2. There's no reason to upgrade a Tablet which is up to date (Lollipop) and the hardware is currently up to date. 3. Hudl2 has been a big seller for Tesco (and still is) so announcing or launching a new device may upset any Christmas H2 sales they were banking on.  

Who knows though really?  If I were running that outfit I would flog as many as I could beyond this Xmas as they should still fly off the shelves. 

Anyway, as others have said, the support of Lollipop has been a great addition, increased its longevity for a while I would have thought. The hardware is fine really, why change so soon! 

Guest jusumgeezer
Posted (edited)

Officially confirmed by Tesco, there will not be a Hudl 3.

Unofficial reasons for pulling out were that when it came to market the v.1 and v.2 were one of the best spec available for the price, not only have sales of tablets declined overall, the market has now been flooded with cheaper alternatives. Although not as good spec as the Hudl the consumers that Teaco targeted are only looking at price.

Also they have been running into quite a few problems lately, the purple v.2 was pulled due to a massive influx of returns and although the Lollipop update was a welcome surprise, it has also been a massive headache, due to that same target audience being first time tablet owners & the more mature customer it was far from plane sailing. There was a lot of failed updates & people having to factory reset & lose everything.

The most interesting part is that the big Hudl display ends will be shortly replaced with Microsoft Surface instead.

 

Apology for the poor formatting my phone is jumping the curser all around the text box!

 

Edited by jusumgeezer
Posted

Tesco selling Microsoft Surface?! Now there is a thought! 

Posted (edited)

Tesco selling Microsoft Surface?! Now there is a thought! 

Interesting indeed. The question is will Tesco undercut Currys? If so, I'll be at the front of the queue for a Surface Pro 4, provided they offer the Core i5 and not just the Core M3 version.

Edited by nybor
Posted

That'll be the rub though won't it? I suspect an outfit like Tesco will be going for the low end spec models in order to "stack 'em high and sell' em cheap"!

Guest Captain Cookster
Posted

Officially confirmed by Tesco, there will not be a Hudl 3.

Unofficial reasons for pulling out were that when it came to market the v.1 and v.2 were one of the best spec available for the price, not only have sales of tablets declined overall, the market has now been flooded with cheaper alternatives. Although not as good spec as the Hudl the consumers that Teaco targeted are only looking at price.

Also they have been running into quite a few problems lately, the purple v.2 was pulled due to a massive influx of returns and although the Lollipop update was a welcome surprise, it has also been a massive headache, due to that same target audience being first time tablet owners & the more mature customer it was far from plane sailing. There was a lot of failed updates & people having to factory reset & lose everything.

The most interesting part is that the big Hudl display ends will be shortly replaced with Microsoft Surface instead.

 

Apology for the poor formatting my phone is jumping the curser all around the text box!

Do you know the reason why the Perky Purples were pulled? ......what's is wrong with that particular colour? Curious

Cheers

 

Guest clive.hills
Posted

I'm interested as I have a purple Hudl 2. I would have thought that all colours had the same internals.

Posted

It's possible that a new batch/production run, that just happened to be purple, had a slight hardware update?

Guest Last_To_Know
Posted

I have a purple Hudl 2, too.

Though I love it dearly, it has its faults.

Loosing the correct time after a reboot, which can only be fixed by another reboot.

Lollipop has been a minor disaster.

Even after a factory reset, the entire system slows down, with seconds between a tap and the execution of said tap.

I have hope that Tesco will, at least, address these issues.

23
Posted

Those kind of symptoms you describe are not just "hudl 2 issues", they are generic android issues that also affected LOTS of other android devices after updating to Lollipop for the first time and have been reported elsewhere in other forums...

Guest popoyaya
Posted

Seems like he was more involved with the apps than implementing android itself...

"Joined hudl2 team a month before release of the hudl2, contributing to all pre-installed apps written for the device (the My Tesco launcher, Child Safety, Top Apps and Getting Started).

Post-release, focused on improvements to the My Tesco launcher with several public releases as part of device software updates.

Overhauled continuous integration to maximise developer feedback (for example getting builds and static analysis reports from pull request branches).

Leading significant refresh of all apps for upcoming software update."

Posted

I expect that's because they get, or rather got, Android itself, ready to run on the device, given to them as part of their contract with Pegatron.

The fact that Tesco hired a new lead engineer one month before release (and quite likely sacked the old one first) suggests they were floundering at that late stage.

Several other members of that team are also reported to have left Tesco very recently. I wonder whether there will be anyone left capable of implementing the promised USB OTG fix before the lights go out for the last time.

Posted

Paul O'Brien has just released this post .

 

I suggest we all contact Tesco and ask them to release an update that unlocks the boot loader. If enough of us do it then ... well, you never know!

 

samac

Guest vampirefo
Posted
Paul O'Brien has just released this post .

 

I suggest we all contact Tesco and ask them to release an update that unlocks the boot loader. If enough of us do it then ... well, you never know!

 

samac

Seeing they are stopping production on this device, there is no reason for a locked bootloader. They won't be supporting the device anyway.

Could be though noone that currently works for tesco knows how to unlock them.

Guest popoyaya
Posted

They could surely ask Pegatron for the necessary information.

Posted

In my ongoing "struggle" to get Tesco to do "the right thing", I have today replied to an ongoing thread I currently have with them thus:

Hi Kelly,

Ok well since my last email, it appears to have become public knowledge that Tesco is to discontinue the Hudl line? I sincerely hope that Tesco will take steps to provide instructions or an update that will allow unlocking of the bootloader so that the enthusiast community can continue to support the obsolete devices? Perhaps with the help of Pegatron the manufacturer?

Regards,

Posted (edited)

Here is my email to and the response from Tesco.

Boot loader unlocking
 
 Discussion Thread
  
 
 Customer By Web Form (Steven McIntosh)20/10/2015 10.46 PM

As it looks as if Tesco are moving out of the Hudl2 market, would it be possible to release an update that removes the lock on the boot loader.

Whilst I understand that the majority of your users do not require this functionality there are a significant number of, technically competent, users who wish to explore the full potential of this remarkable machine.

If this was released as a download from your site rather than an OTA update then only those who chose to download it would be the recipients, and I'm sure you could get an agreement from them that this invalidated their warranty.

This would also be a generous act of good faith from Tesco supporting it's loyal customers.

Please pass this on to the head of Customer Services and also the head of Technical Support, with a plea to allow this to happen. After all Tesco are dropping the Hudl2 so there is no downside and only the opportunity to reward their loyal customers.

Kindest regards

Steven McIntosh

 

 Response Via Email (Lee Jones)
Dear Steven,

Thanks for your recent email.

Currently we are unable to release the bootloader for our Hudl 2 tablet.

Apologies for any inconvenience caused.

Kind Regards

Lee Jones
Tesco Tech Support

Live online chat http://ttselectrical.custhelp.com/app/ask/

Monday - Saturday 08:00 to 20:00
Sunday - 10:00 to 18:00

Curt, I would have thought that a more thoughtful answer would have been appropriate, makes you think that it wasn't passed along as requested.

Please keep asking them to do the correct thing.

 

samac

Edited by samac
Guest Jabbitt
Posted

Random thought. Maybe Tesco is just a re-seller with support. Pegatron have more control over the device and won't release anything. Maybe Tescos legally can't release anything except software updates?

Posted

I've just been told at a Tesco store that there will be a tablet very similar specs and price to the hudl 2 launching in a few weeks after trying to purchase their display model at a discount. They said they couldn't sell off the one on the stand as they had to send them back and they cannot take the hudl2 stand down untill the new one is ready

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