There were a lot of proper wireless products making their debut at CES 2011, including an even closer look at the BlackBerry PlayBook. Along with it, RIM took the occasion to show off a tonne of official accessories for their first tablet. Available in a variety of colours were soft shells, hard shells, slip cases, leather sleeves, neoprene sleeves, sleeves with zippers, proppable cases, book-style binders, leather envelopes, and rubber skins. Like I said, a tonne.
If that wasn’t enough, RIM was also showing off some third-party cases as a part of the new Built for BlackBerry program; obviously the OtterBox for the PlayBook caught our eye. We got to see the the PlayBook’s charger too, which included a foldable plug for easy storage. There was a curious big brick built into the charger, which I hope is detatcheable and holds a charge as a backup battery, and not just a big, awkward Xbox-style converter. The PlayBook’s charging pod was also there, which claims to charge a double the normal rate.
I’m still of mixed opinion about official RIM accessories; their “deluxe” multimedia headphones are uncomfortable, a pair of the new stock headphones busted on me just when I was unplugging it from a jack (though they’re pretty comfortable and have decent sound), plus the holster for my Bold 9000 started cracking after about 6-8 months of intermittent use. However, the sheer variety of accessories RIM is showing off plus the importance of the PlayBook and a positive user experience with it gives me hope for the quality of these ones. It would be nice to see an HDMI dock, or maybe even a case with a built-in extended battery, but maybe that’s hoping for too much at this point.
To get the full sampling, check out our gallery of BlackBerry PlayBook accessories below.
