HP TouchPad gets permanent $100 price cut

The HP TouchPad now undercuts the Apple iPad on price.

HP has permanently dropped the price of its TouchPad tablet by a hundred bucks, good news for anyone (anyone?) currently hovering around the aisles of their local electronics store, trying to decide between a TouchPad and an iPad. From here on out, the 16 GB TouchPad will go for $399.99 and the 32 GB TouchPad will go for $499, which is also a hundred bucks cheaper than the respective iPad counterparts.

Over at ZDNet, Jason Perlow says the move was the right one for HP. "I think that if any sort of progress is going to be made with this product, they will probably have to continue to offer steep discounts on it," he writes. "Much of what we are talking about comes down to establishing a brand, and that brand becoming identified as the more 'affordable' choice than iPad." And boy does that iPad sell!

The TouchPad received lukewarm reviews when it was released earlier this summer. Some critics praised the design, and the apps, and the operating system, and others were less than completely impressed. "Tablets. There is the iPad, and there is everything else. The TouchPad is the first tablet that could be truly something more than everything else. The TouchPad gets it," wrote Gizmodo's Matt Buchanan.

And then, this kick to the stomach: "Which is why I was so excited for the TouchPad. And that's why I feel so completely crushed right now.... You're stepping on my dreams, HP. The TouchPad is so close, closer than anything else, to being good. But it's also very, very far from it. Look, give this thing six months. It could be amazing. If it's not by then, well, I guess that says everything that needs to be said." Read our HP TouchPad review roundup here.

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