ViewSonic's 10-inch tablet boots Windows and Android
ViewSonic is making a 10.1-inch tablet that will come with both Windows Home 7 Premium and Google's Android 1.6, and can boot with either operating system, pairing an unlikely duo -- Microsoft and Google -- on the same device. Though some laptops and netbooks dual-boot Windows along with simple, energy-saving Linux OSes, this may be the first true Windows/Android hybrid tablet.
The ViewPad 10 will cost $629, and be available in the first quarter of the new year, ViewSonic said. Another tablet, the ViewPad 7 -- with a 7-inch screen -- is more like the current crop of Android tablets, with no Windows, just the most recent version of Android, 2.2. It will cost $479 and be available late this year.
"With access to the universe of Android apps, our new ViewPads are perfectly suited for enjoying digital entertainment and social media. Office productivity is also a snap with robust Web-browsing functionality," said Jeff Volpe, vice president and general manager for ViewSonic Americas, in a press release.
The 10.1-inch Wi-Fi-only tablet will use an Intel Atom 1.66GHz processor, have 1 GB of memory, a 16 GB solid-state hard drive and expandable microSD slot.
The tablet -- with the closet current competitor being the 9.7-inch iPad from Apple -- is "ideally designed to view Flash-based content and Office programs with Windows, and for an optimized mobile entertainment experience with Android," ViewSonic said.
Apple does not use Adobe Flash for viewing of Web sites, videos and animations, using HTML 5 instead. Apple CEO Steve Jobs contends there are security issues with Flash, and that it is too much of a drain on mobile devices' battery power. Also, only Android devices running 2.2 (or later) can access Flash, so the Android portion of the 10-inch ViewPad will not support it either at launch.
The 10.1-inch tablet will have a 1.3-megapixel webcam with built-in microphone, so it can be used for videoconferencing, ViewSonic said. Screen resolution will be 1024-by-600 pixels, and the capacitive multi-touch screen will use an LED backlit panel.
The 7-inch model is the most similar to the Samsung Galaxy Tab, which has the same-size screen and is being offered by T-Mobile, Verizon and Sprint, all starting this month. In fact, unlike its larger sibling, it will come with cellular connectivity (probably unlocked, for use with certain data plans from T-Mobile and AT&T), and will include Google's mobile suite of apps, including access to the all-important App Market. (The ViewPad 10 will have none of this, according to the press release.)
At Verizon, for example, the Tab costs $600 plus a minimum of $20 a month for a data plan. At T-Mobile and Sprint, the Tab costs $399, but the monthly data plans differ. New T-Mobile customers, for example, pay $30 for 200 MB of data, or $50 for 5 GB, a month; at Sprint, the month data cost is $30 for 2 GB and $60 for 5 GB.
The ViewPad 7, with an 800-by-480 WVGA LCD screen, two built-in cameras, the first a 3-megapixel, auto-focus camera in the rear and a 0.3 megapixel camera in the front for videoconferencing. Its battery life will be "up to 10 hours," ViewSonic says, comparable to that of the iPad.
"The result is the ultimate device for connected fun and multitasking -- in a compact size easier to carry than a netbook and with better media performance than a smart phone," the company said in its statement.
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