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BlackBerry's video shows PlayBook web browsing faster than iPad

RIM is turning up the heat on Apple in the big tablet showdown, releasing a video that appears to show that the BlackBerry PlayBook is faster at rendering certain web sites than the iPad.

Asavin Wattanajantra

RIM is turning up the heat on Apple in the big tablet showdown, releasing a video that appears to show that the BlackBerry PlayBook is faster at rendering certain web sites than the iPad.

RIM's film shows an employee from its web browser group testing a PlayBook and iPad side by side. The video concentrates on page rendering speed and highlights the PlayBook's support for Flash.

The employee states that he cleared the cache and cookies for both devices before beginning the demo, which were run over the same Wi-Fi network. The BlackBerry PlayBook appears to load pages much faster. When looking at CBS.com, the PlayBook renders the content before the iPad had visibly loaded anything. Check the vid out below for the full demonstration.

The video is impressive, with the QNX-built operating system doing a much better job than on normal BlackBerry smart phones, which use a different OS.  

We're not making any conclusions until we've tested a PlayBook for ourselves. But we can't deny the video makes us even more keen to see the finished product than we were before.

The real question for RIM, though, will be how the PlayBook performs against the iPad 2 when that is released next year, along with the glut of Android tablets running on version 2.3 we're expecting around the same time. That's what will ultimately determine the long-term success or failure of this product. 

Image credit: Intomobile