Google will jump into the tablet market this year with its own 7-inch device, according to a DisplaySearch analyst.
The tablet market has experienced rapid growth over the past couple of years thanks to devices such as the iPad 2, Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 and Kindle Fire and it looks as though Google wants in on that cake, with its Ice Cream Sandwich operating system providing it with a good starting point.
Speaking to Cnet, analyst Richard Shim suggested that a self-branded, 7-inch (1280x800) Google tablet running Ice Cream Sandwich would start production in April.
Shim went to say that he predicts initial production will be between 1.5 million and 2 million units, but was unable to say if Google would market the tablet as a premium device or a low-end Kindle Fire rival.
It's thought the Google tablet may look to directly compete with Amazon's Kindle Fire 7-inch tablet which has seen strong sales since its launch last year, mainly due to its low price.
Google has recently inherited three tablets after its purchase of Motorola Mobility saw it take control of the Xoom, Xoom 2 and Xyboard tabs and Google chairman Eric Schmidt did hint in December that the company was preparing "a tablet of the highest quality".
Could the tablet Schmidt muses about be this rumoured 7-inch device, or is he referring to a tablet made by a third party manufacture (Motorola perhaps?) which Google will back, a la the Samsung Galaxy Nexus.
We were expecting to see a host of new tablets announced at MWC 2012, but it now looks like that will not be the case.
The rumour mill says this, not the iPad, is Google's target. We think the rumour mill's right
We know that Google is working on a tablet, and we know when it's coming out - not because of internet rumour-mongers, but because of ex-CEO Eric Schmidt.
This won't be a me-too Android tablet, but something very different. So what can we expect?
The Google Nexus Tablet release date will be summer 2012
That's what Eric Schmidt says, anyway. "Noi nei prossimi sei mesi contiamo di mettere sul mercato un tablet di altissima qualita," he said, because he was in Italy. In English, that's "we'll bring a tablet of the highest quality to market in the next six months", or perhaps "I'll have the pasta, but hold the parmesan".
UPDATE: On 24 February 2012, analyst Richard Shim said that Google will launch its 7-inch (1280x800) Google tablet running Ice Cream Sandwich with production starting in April. Shim added that initial production would be between 1.5 million and 2 million units.
The Google tablet specs will be more Kindle-y than iPad-y
Everybody assumed that Google's tablet would be an iPad rival. The fools! There are already stacks of iPad rivals running Android and costing roughly the same amount of cash, and it's hard to imagine what Google can bring to that party beyond heavy subsidy.
It makes much more sense to believe DigiTimes - yes, that DigiTimes, the one with the rather patchy track record when it comes to predictions - and its claims that Google is going after the Kindle Fire.
That means the Google tablet specifications will include a seven-inch screen rather than a ten-incher. OLED-display says the panel is coming from Samsung, and will run a resolution of 1024 x 600.
It's a much bigger potential market, and one that Apple isn't in at all. Unless it drops the iPad 2 price out of sheer badness when the iPad 3 comes out.
The Google Nexus tablet will be a media tablet
Again, think Kindle Fire - but with Google Books, Google Music and YouTube instead of Amazon content.
The Google tablet will be called the Google Nexus tablet
That's what most people think, anyway: Google already uses Nexus for its reference smartphones, although we suppose it's always possible that they might call the Google tablet something else, such as the Google Boogle.
The Google tablet operating system will be Android 4.0
This one's a no-brainer: Google's Nexus tablet will come with the most up-to-date version of Android, and if it's going to ship by the summer that means the Google tablet OS will be Ice Cream Sandwich, aka Android 4.0.
The Google Nexus tablet user interface will be Holo
Google's laid down the law on this one: All future Android 4.0 devices must feature its default theme, Holo. It's hardly going to dig out MS Paint and ruin the UI for its own super-tablet.
The Google tablet price will be below ?200
There's no point competing with the Kindle Fire if your product is more expensive. That means a heavily subsidised US price of no more than $199, which works out as a UK price of ?150 to ?199.
Like Amazon, Google's going to lose money on each one it sells - and like Amazon, it hopes to make the money back from other sources of income. For Amazon that's media sales; for Google it's media sales and advertising.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Liked this?
A new face for Motorola but not for Google. Bloomberg News reported today that Google will announce Dennis Woodside as the new CEO of Motorola Mobility replacing Sanjay Jha .
Previous rumors had suggested that Google would appoint Nikesh Arora to run Motorola after their acquisition deal closed. In that scenario Woodside would have taken Arora?s job, but it appears that he somehow leapfrogged him.
Woodside has been at Google since 2003, according to his LinkedIn profile, and has held a variety of positions. He has held the roles Director of Business Operations, Managing Director of Emerging Markets, Managing Director and VP of Google UK, President of Google Americas, and Senior Vice President of Google.
Google agreed to acquire the hardware-manufacturing arm of Motorola for about $12.5 billion last year. The United States and European Union gave regulatory approval for the deal earlier this month, but China has yet to sign on.
Source: Bloomberg and LinkedIn
Linux 1 GHz Motorola ARM dual-core CORTEX A9 OMAP 4 Andreas Legler : Bought MOTOROLA XOOM Android Tablet as a xmas gift
for my dad. He loves it! Came quickly. I think it's very cool and may
end up buying for myself. Armando Giesbrecht: I bought this MOTOROLA XOOM Android Tablet from this website last week. Up to this moment, I am happy with this guy. Laverna Gauron: I have been using this MOTOROLA XOOM Android Tablet for 1 week now. Nice built quality. Augustine Rodriguz: I was skeptical about the high quality of MOTOROLA XOOM Android Tablet in this cost
range. taking many hours, I agree with previous reviewers. Jeniffer Megeath: Everything is great. There is really nothing bad about MOTOROLA XOOM Android Tablet .
The internet search behemoth and everyone's favorite Android creator, Google, has joined a consortium of over 400 companies called The Digital Advertising Alliance. The coalition of companies has agreed to support a "do-not-track" button in browsers, so that the amount of information that advertising companies can gather from users who activate the button will be greatly limited. The feature has already been implemented in Firefox, Internet Explorer, and Safari, and will be added to Google's Chrome by the end of the year. Even though the feature was already implemented within those other browsers, it was of limited functionality because advertisers and tracking companies had not yet agreed to abide by it.
The button will restrict the data that websites can collect about a user through cookies when it is activated. The 400 companies, including Google, that have agreed to the standard will begin adopting it within the next nine months.
At the end of this year, your next Android device may not be a smartphone or tablet at all. According to some fairly detailed industry intel, not only is Google working on a set of digital heads-up display glasses... they are also very close to reality. In fact, it is very likely we will see a set of Android-powered digital heads-up display shades with 3G/4G & GPS tracking by the end of this year. The report indicated that this project is primarily just an experiment by the Google engineers; however, this particular "experiment" is actually being lead by none other than Sergey Brin and Steve Lee. If you will recall, Sergey Brin is one of the co-founders of Google, and Steve Lee is the engineer that is responsible for creating Latitude. Accordingly, if the experiment turns out to be a success, then Google will look at making the glasses for potential business model & revenue streams.
Regardless, the HUD glasses will supposedly be priced in the $250 to $600 range, and will also boast a low-resolution camera that can monitor things in real-time and provide location specific augmented reality information. It is interesting to note that Google is paying attention to any possible privacy implications that this feature might touch upon, and Google is developing the system so that it can "ensure that people know if they are being recorded by someone wearing a pair of glasses with a built-in camera."
Further info suggests that the glasses could be similar in styling to Oakley Thumps, and will also have built in motion sensors that help the user navigate through the interface. Seth Weintraub, a blogger for 9 to 5 Google, seems to have dug up some additional info on that navigation system. He said, ?The navigation system currently used is a head tilting to scroll and click. We are told it is very quick to learn and once the user is adept at navigation, it becomes second nature and almost indistinguishable to outside users.?
All I can say is... if they make them look as cool as a pair of Oakleys, so that when I wear them I don't look like a reject from a bad eighties "Revenge of the Nerds" sequel, then sign me up for a pair! What do you guys think?
Source: DroidMatters
funny how the world is totally moving towards sci-fi movies. is it doing that because science fiction writers are able to predict the future or because we accept the scifi writers' image of the future as what it should be?
hmm...waaay too deep for 2 am
Tablet2Cases.com - your best case scenario
All about tablet cases including latest news, reviews, online shop & wikipedia.
Find cases for over 70 Android powered tablet PCs.
Perhaps it's simply inherently in our nature to create what we imagine. The other question is... are we really ever creating new ideas, or are they simply filtered to us from some collective unconscious that has it all figured out from the beginning to the end? Maybe we are part of that collective mind, but we imagine ourselves as separate and limited for the experience of re-discovering the infinite possibilities of ideas that exist completely outside of time.
Or... God farted and humans were the result... it could really go either way I suppose.
You know someone will drive with these on
Sent from my A500 using Android Tablet Forum
In the UK? Click 
