WePad: Intel Atom Based Android Tablet

Neofonie, a German manufacturer, has introduced a new Android OS tablet named WePad with netbook features like 11.6-inches touchscreen display (1366 x 768 resolution). The tablet is powered with 1.66 GHz Intel Atom N450 and GMA 3150 Graphics chip, other features includes card reader, webcam, 2 USB ports, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, UMTS modem and around 6 hours of battery life.

Flash supported WePad will be among the first few tablet devices to sport Android Marketplace. They also have plans for their very own WePad App Store too.

Pricing and release date are still not available.

Sources:

1. Techlivez

Marvell Unveils $99 'Moby' Multimedia Tablet

Marvell has just unveiled their Moby tablet prototype. It’s a kind of internet or multimedia tablet which offers to change the way students learn by delivering an always-on, high performance multimedia device featuring live, real-time content, 1,080p Full HD and 3D media, and full Flash Internet (in other words, what the iPad can't do).

Powered by high-performance, highly scalable, and low-power Marvell ARMADA 600 series of application processors; the Moby tablet features gigahertz-class processor speed, 1,080p Full HD encode and decode, intelligent power management, power-efficient Wi-Fi/Bluetooth/FM/GPS connectivity, high performance 3D graphics capability and support for multiple software standards, including full Adobe Flash, Android and Windows Mobile. The ultra low power Moby tablet is designed for long-battery life, although specific details on this issue have not been provided yet.

"Education is the most pressing social and economic issue facing our country and our times. I believe the Marvell Moby tablet can ignite a life-long passion for learning in all students everywhere. Marvell's goal is to fundamentally improve the way students learn by giving them more efficient, relevant - even fun tools to use. Marvell's Moby tablet recognizes that every student learns differently and so it delivers an array of media choices for different learning styles," said Weili Dai, Marvell's Co-founder and Vice President and General Manager of Marvell Semiconductor's Consumer and Computing Business Unit.

The Moby tablet is priced around 99 US dollars. Marvell will soon announce a pilot program in partnership with the District of Columbia Public School system (DCPS) where the Company will donate a Moby tablet to every child in an at-risk school as part of a multi-year program in new media and learning.

Read also: New Concept of OLPC

Sources:

1. Softpedia Gadget

iPad Pre-Order Start at 8:30 EST Friday Morning

Good news for Apple lover! iPad pre-order will be started tomorrow (Friday) morning at 8:30am EST, or 5:30am Pacific.

Tomorrow's crack-o-dawn getup will save you a spot for either a Wi-Fi or Wi-Fi+3G-equipped model, on their respective release dates of April 3rd and "Late April." If you pre-order through your local store over the phone, you can reasonably expect to get your iPad day of launch; of you pre-order through Apple's website, which may be the only option for West Coasters, they will ship it on launch day, but no earlier.

Read also: Apple Unveils iPad Tablet

 

 

Sources:

1. Gizmodo

2. Engadget

More Tablets Than Just the iPad

The world of tablets is not just the iPad. There are several Tablet PCs which could become the Apple iPad alternatives.

1. HP Slate PC 

Hewlett Packards’s touchscreen slate, expected to go on sale later his year for “under $500”, was demonstrated running a PC Kindle app to a 3,500-strong crowd by Microsoft chief Steve Ballmer. The excitable CEO started: “It’s a beautiful little product… as portable as a phone and as powerful as a PC running Windows 7.”

Next to no specs have been revealed, but on first glance we’re not sure if it’ll be a real contender to Apple’s tablet anyway. Microsoft’s Courier concept, with dual screens that open like a book, looked far more interesting when it was previewed late last year. Having said that, the prospect of Windows 7 on such a small device is mouth-watering and demonstrates where technology is headed in 2010.

$499 (£300), www.HP.com/uk, Out early 2010

2. Sony Dash Viewer

Sony's quirky sidecar to the tablet bandwagon was this seven-inch touchscreen Wi-Fi “Personal Internet Viewer”, which runs the Linux-based Chumby OS. Users will be able to access the 1,000+ free Chumby apps for news, weather, photos etc, and it also can be propped up like a photo frame. One for home users, in short.

$199 (£120), www.Sony.co.uk, Out April

3. T-Mobile Vega 

 Available in the UK later this year, the Vega from T-Mobile and Innovative Converged Devices (ICD) is one of the first tablets to run on Android. With a 15-inch touchscreen and powered by an Nvidia Tegra 250 mobile web processor, it’s designed for family use within the home. T-Mobile calls it a “family communication network”, as it can be accessed remotely by multiple users. Pricing is still to be announced.

£TBC, www.T-Mobile.co.uk, Out early 2010

4. Lenovo IdeaPad U1 hybrid

The 11.6-inch Ideapad U1 hybrid from Lenovo features a detachable, tablet-style screen. When the screen is locked in to the chassis it’s a Windows 7 Home Premium laptop with an Intel Core 2 Duo processor. When it’s pulled from its shell it becomes a Qualcomm Snapdragon-powered, multi-touch slate with 16GB storage, running Lenovo’s Skylight Linux system.

The notebook has built-in Wi-Fi and can use the tablet’s 3G connectivity to get online. Better still, whether you use the notebook or tablet to create documents, all data will be synchronised once the hardware is re-attached. A novel approach to the standard tablet design.

$999 (£610), www.Lenovo.com/uk, Out Summer

5. Dell Android Slate

This sexy looking slate is currently referred to as the “Dell Concept Tablet”, seeing as it’s a tablet concept made by Dell. It’s got a five-inch screen, runs the Android OS and also totes a five-meg camera with LED flash. The device is expected to have 3G and Wi-Fi capabilities and there are rumours of a SIM card slot and a choice of different screen sizes.

£TBC, www.Dell.co.uk, Out 2010

Read also about Google Tablet, JooJoo and Tablet PC Wars.

Sources:

1. T3

JooJoo Tablet PC: Ready for War

JooJoo has released their Tablet PC and ready to compete in Tablet PC market. JooJoo was formerly known as CrunchPad, a $200 touchscreen tablet. The tablet is designed and developed by a Singapore-based company, Fusion Garage.

JooJoo’s has 2.4 pounds weight, 12.1-inches capacitive touchscreen display, one USB port, a standard headphone and microphone jack. JooJoo seems to be a tablet-like gadget for internet surfing and small application. JooJoo runs with a custom operating system built by Fusion Garage which can boost in just under nine seconds directly to a homepage screen. JooJoo comes with Wi-Fi access but no 3G connectivity, the company may offer 3G in later models.

The homepage screen is divided vertically into three sections: Be connected, Be informed, and More apps. Under the ‘Be connected’ tab, there are web services such as Twitter, LinkedIn, Flickr, Facebook and YouTube among others. The ‘Be Informed’ tab features sites such as The New York Times, Reuters, AOL and CNN. More apps has icons that link, for instance, to Google docs, Yahoo and Hulu.

“Pre-orders have exceeded our expectations,” says Chandra Rathakrishnan, CEO of Fusion Garage. “We think the market is big enough for both Apple and us.”

JooJoo is priced for $500 and target to ship at the end of February 2010.


Sources:
1. Wired
2. JooJoo Tablet PC (Youtube Video)

Google Tablet PC!

Google has been seriously competing Apple in smartphone and tablet PC markets. Google’s ‘the superphone’ Nexus One has shown its superiority to Apple iPhone 3GS in features and technology. And now, Google Tablet seems would have possibility to crush the Apple iPad’s.

A concept of Google Tablet has been quietly showed up on Chromium Projects website. Chromium Projects is the project of Google’s Chrome OS User Experience; it is an open-source project that aims to build an operating system that provides a fast, simple, and more secure computing experience for people who spend most of their time on the web.

Google Tablet will run with Chrome OS, in 5-10 inches touchscreen display. Some pictures indicate that Google is still experimenting with several different UIs. Glen Murphy (Google Chrome’s UI lead designer) says “these concept images as well as concept in-action video show what the team building the Chrome OS are brainstorming for future projects. Note that there will possibly be multiple “Google Tablets”, given that Chrome OS won’t be tied to a single device, similar to how the Android OS was implemented”.

 

It is also shown in a video that browser windows are treated as objects which can be readily manipulated in the screen for the best use possible depending on the site you are at. The video also shows Google Tablet will support multitasking.

 

 

Sources:

1. Chromium Projects

2. The Chrome Source

3. Slash Gear

4. Google Tablet Concept (Video)

Tablet PC Wars: Apple iPad vs. HP Slate vs. JooJoo vs. Android Tablets

Year 2009 was the wars of netbook and smartphone.

Now everybody is talking about Tablet PC, especially after Apple iPad was released last week. There are actually some other players in Table PC; Archos, HP, JooJoo, Lenovo; and some more will release their product soon.

Nicholas Negroponte predicted that year 2010-2011 will the era of Tablet PC. Seems the trends will go as predicted.

Dan Nosowitz of Gizmodo has made table comparing some available Tablet PC’s in the market.

As you can see, they have different strengths and weaknesses, some of which will become more clear in the coming months as we learn more about each tablet.

iPad has the most storage, cheap 3G, the proven iPhone OS and its mountain of apps. But iPad missed some important features such as webcam and multitasking. Notion Ink Adam with Android OS maybe the most interesting, with its dual-function transflective screen, it can be either a normal LCD or, with the flick of a switch, an easy-on-the-eyes reflective LCD that resembles e-ink. Its hardware is also surprisingly impressive – it seems Android would be really the right OS for 10-inches Tablet PC.

Dell Mini 5 and Archos 7 are also coming with Android OS. They are almost oversized smartphones in their feature sets. JooJoo comes with their own OS, but it does not really have apps and can not multitasking. Archos 9 with Windows 7 OS has been available since September, and it is the only slate that lacks multitouch, and is the only one with a HDD instead of solid state memory.

Lenovo IdeaPad U1 is even weirder, in which it is actually two computers – the specs listed above are for the tablet detached, but when it is attached to its base, it switches both hardware and software. In its attached form, it is s a Windows 7 laptop with a full keyboard and trackpad, Core 2 Duo processor, 4GB of memory, eSATA, VGA- and HDMI-out.

Which Tablet PC you want to buy?


Sources:
1. Gizmodo

Apple Unveils iPad Tablet

Apple has officially unveiled their new gadget, called iPad. With the slim, large screen and the same user interface device as iPhone, Apple iPad just looks like iPhone in bigger size. However, iPad offers some surprise features.

Specifications:
• Thickness 0.5 inch, weight 1.5 pounds
• 9.7 inches display with 1024 x 768 pixel resolution, with capacitive multitouch similar to iPhone
• Processor 1 GHz Apple A4 chip (Apple’s own processor)
• Run with iPhone OS 3.2
• 16 GB to 64 GB flash storage
• Includes speaker, microphone, accelerometer and compass
• Can be used in both landscape and portrait mode
• Battery is up to 10 hours, 1 month of standby time
• Connectivity: Wi-Fi and Bluetooth
• Optional 3G access from AT&T. With $30 a month, users can get unlimited data and some others service offerings
• Price $499 for 16 GB, $600 for 32 Gb, and $700 for 64 GB
• Additional cost $130 if you want to include 3G connectivity (3G model will be available in 90 days)

Missing features:
• No camera
• No flash confirmed
• No multitasking
• No GPS for the Wi-Fi model

Apple will start shipping the iPad in two months.

Pictures:

Sources:
1. Apple iPad
2. Engadget
3. Wired

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XO 3.0 Concept: New Concept of OLPC

One Laptop Per Child, or OLPC, has announced a brand new concept laptop/tablet that it believes it can have be ready for 2010. The concept is glorious and the shots provided exciting enough to publish in their entirety.

Instead of just making a cheap, basic machine that could tough it out in its target third-world market, Nicholas Negroponte’s supposedly $100 laptop instead chose to both patronize and confuse with an over-simplified interface. At the same time, as the price rose and dates slipped by, the Rise of the Atom put cheap netbooks within reach of anyone with a few hundred bucks.

The new hardware (read: vaporware) will come in the familiar green and white livery, only this time it is a tablet (surprise, right?). The XO 3.0 will be showing its 800Mhz, 8.5-by-11-inch face in 2010, when hopefully the technology will exist to build what is essentially a giant iPod Touch for just $75.

But making an impossibly cheap entertainment device for developing countries (for what else is a tablet but a handheld media-center? Certainly not a functional computer or Microsoft’s earlier tablet PC efforts would have been successful) is not the only mission of the OLPC group. Negroponte told Engadget that there will be an OLPC 1.5 appearing in January, a $200 update to the current hardware, and an OLPC 1.75 in 2011, which will make good on the dual-screen promise first teased in May this year.


Sources:
1. Wired
2. TechRadar
3. OLPC
 
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