Do I really need a tablet?

Tablets garnered a lot of buzz last week at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. It seemed like every electronics company out there is launching a tablet product, including Apple, HTC, Microsoft, HP, Nokia, Dell and Lenovo. Reading all the reviews and technical specs behind these devices I can't help but want one. They look pretty slick and powerful and I know I'll want to play around with one as soon as they come out.

But really, do I NEED a tablet? Does anyone really need a tablet? Some folks are calling tablets "game changers" but quite honestly I can't see the void that this product is going to fill in a consumer's life. The tablet is supposed to fit in between a smartphone and a laptop... but technically a netbook can fill that space for 1/2 the price of a tablet, and provide you with more functionality. Anything you would really do on a tablet like surfing the web, watching a video or reading an ebook can be done just as well (if not better) by other devices. Do you want to surf the web on the go? Use your smartphone. Do you want to watch video on the go? You can use a tablet, but you're not going to be walking around and watching video at the same time, you're going to be sitting down to watch your video At that point you might as well use a netbook. Do you want to read an ebook? Well, they have specialized reader devices just for that, and they seem to do the job pretty well. Overall, at an estimated cost of $600-$1000 I'm not sure if anyone can really justify the cost of buying a tablet.

Also, you have to think about all these data plans that they're touting for the tablet. Do we really need another monthly data plan? Right now I already pay around $30 a month for my iPhone data plan, so do I really need another $9.99-19.99 a month data plan on top of that? I don't know if my pocketbook can handle another subscription on top of my current data plan. I wonder if AT&T would allow me to group both my phone and tablet data plans together. Considering that AT&T is already having a hard time handling the data usage just for iPhone users I doubt they'll go along with that approach.

Back to this year's CES. The tablet that generated the most buzz despite not being scheduled to be revealed in Vegas? Apple's iSlate of course. The iSlate is scheduled for a big 'reveal' at the end of the month, and will go on sale in March. I might head over to the Apple store and play around with it a bit, but will I buy one? Probably not. I really just can't justify it right now. I know I'll want the iSlate, but I really don't need it for anything just yet. There will certainly be people out there who will buy a tablet as a "cool toy" rather than as a device that will serve a real purpose, but overall I think Apple and other manufacturers will have a hard time convincing folks to fork over so much cash for another computer/toy.