The $199 PlayBook Returns For A Limited Time

Back in November, there was a run on PlayBooks when the price was briefly reduced to $199. For a tablet that started out with a premium price, the deal proved enticing to many buyers. And again at the beginning of January, with a slightly odd promotion pricing all models at $299. Well, they’re at it again: until the 11th, the PlayBook is priced to move: $199 for the 16GB version, $249 for 32GB, and $299 for 64GB.

Unfortunately, the device won’t be shipping with the 2.0 version of the PlayBook software that we played with at CES. They will be rolling out the update soon, though.

Now, despite the protracted beating that this poor half-baked tablet has received, I have to say that at $200, with the new OS, this is a really good deal. For the price of a Nook or Fire, you get a device with much better specs and some big-boy productivity software. If you want games and apps, it’s obviously not a good choice. But if you use a BlackBerry and are interested in time management, email, contacts, syncing, and all that lovely stuff, the PlayBook is now a fairly practical buy. For $200, that is.

I sincerely doubt this is the last time the device will be on sale, though, and there are of course plans to obsolete it later in the year, at which time it will be going for peanuts. So there’s no pressure to buy, though if you’ve got a pair of Benjamins burning a hole in your pocket, I can think of worse ways to spend them.