They show an 8.4″ capacitive (M9C) and resistive (M901) Android tablet (resistive is about $30-$40 cheaper) running the Rockchip RK2818 ARM9 processor.
Category: Rockchip
Neostra Onda Android Tablets
They use Rockchip ARM9 and Telechips ARM11 in these approximately $100 bulk priced 7″and 8″ Android Tablets.
Dwco Android Tablets
Dwco Electronics Limited is showing an 8″ resistive tablet, as well as 7″ and 10″ Rockchip powered tablets.
Pierre Cardin 9.7″ and 7″ Android Tablets
Pierre Cardin Communication Electronics also called Shenzhen Vogues Industries are showing these new interesting Android tablets, one is 9.7″ same LG IPS capacitive panel as on iPad running on Rockchip RK29xx series with front and back cameras, another tablet is 7″ capacitive Samsung ARM Cortex-A8 Hummingbird tablet to be sold at $150 in bulk, and they also make a probably cheap 3.5″ Qualcomm MSM7227 mobile phone as well.
the-digital-reader.com: Newsmy Rockchip powered Android Tablet “kindle clone design”
Rockchip was powering about 50 Android tablets at CES 2011, Nate the Great liked this Android tablet design presented by Newsmy at the Rockchip booth:
This video was posted at: the-digital-reader.com
the-digital-reader.com: Gajah BK 7009 Android tablet
Nate the Great found this Gajah BK7009 7″ Android tablet with a customized Android UI for e-reader mode:
This video was posted at: the-digital-reader.com
Zaidtek E7 and Zaidtek H7 Android Tablets
Zaidtek E7 is an ARM11 Qualcomm MSM7227 based Android 2.1 capacitive tablet. You can notice that it looks similar to the Aigo N700 tablet that I posted earlier. This video also features the Zaidtek H7 Rockchip ARM9 RK2818 Android tablet. Prices are $350 and $250 respectively both including the built-in 3G modem for bulk orders of at least 200 pieces.
Ocean Star 1024×600 7″ capacitive Rockchip RK2818 Android Tablet
This tablet comes for $140 in bulk with a 3G option for $50 more or a 800×480 resistive/capacitive downgrade for $25/15 less.
Archos 101 Home Tablet, possibly cheapest 10″ capacitive ARM Cortex-A8 tablet
Rockchip RK29xx based 10.1″ capacitive Android 2.3 Gingerbread tablet. It may cost something like $199 at retail, price is to be confirmed by Archos once this product is ready to be released. Release depends approximately on Rockchip being able to mass manufacture and deliver their new RK2918 ARM Cortex-A8 high performance yet affordable processor.
Rockchip presents RK2818 and RK29xx series Processors at CES 2011
Rockchip is doing some awesome work to provide ARM Processor platforms highly integrated with stable turn key solution Android software at very cost effective prices, thus they are powering many of the cheap affordable and usable Android tablets and other devices coming up including Laptops, Set-top-boxes, Mobile Phones and more.
Rockchip RK2818 and RK29 demonstrated and explained
Rockchip released their next generation of ARM9 based processor RK2818 and are teasing their next generation ARM Cortex-A8 RK29 to be shown by CES. RK2818 can be made with up to 1ghz frequency, supports more and faster RAM memory, comes with a fast DSP and GPU core to accelerate graphics and user interfaces. This new Rockchip processor makes it possible to run up to Android 2.1 on cheaper tablets such as the new $149 (possibly $179 with margins) capacitive Archos 7 Home Tablet v2, and have them perform better for web browsing than their previous generation ARM9 RK2808 processor, video playback and other things are also improved. Rockchip’s next gen RK29, to be showcased at CES, they say is ARM Cortex-A8 better than Apple A4, with 1080p encode/decode, 30 million triangles.
Suli SL-7, 7″ Capacitive-Glass RK2818 $249 Android Tablet
Here’s an exclusive unveiling for an upcoming new Android tablet design made by Suli International Co., Ltd. It’s a nice combination of the new higher performance Rockchip RK2818 (ARM9 600mhz + 550mhz new high performance DSP) with Glass type 7″ Capacitive multi-touch touch screen. It supports 3G USB dongles on the USB host connector. Plays back mp4 and rmvb video at up to 1280×720 (bitrates/high profiles not yet confirmed). The Rockchip RK2818 improves web browsing from RK2808. At $249 this one is thus positionned $150 cheaper than the ARM11 Qualcomm MSM7227 3G-enabled Foxconn 7″ Tablet (also known among other brands as Viewpad 7).
(comparison graphics provided by Suli International)
Suli International also says they have a 8″ capacitive Android tablet coming in 2 weeks using either the Amlogic or the next generation ARM Cortex-A8 based Rockchip RK29 design!
Here are some pictures of the Suli SL-7 tablet:
Archos 7 Home Tablet teared down by EETimes at ARM Techcon 2010
Before interviewing me on my interests in ARM Devices, EETimes editors Brian Fuller and Patrick Mannion went ahead and opened up the Archos 7 Home Tablet in front of a large audience of about 100 people at the ARM Techcon 2010 exhibitor area theater stage. They talked about the features of some of the processors that are used.
OnTop 8″ 4:3 Android Rockchip based Tablets
8″ 4:3 aspect ratio Android tablets.
Elonex 750ET 7″ Rockchip based Android tablet
This one will be released for 139 pounds with a 29 pound leather case USB keyboard option.
I filmed the Augen $99 smartbook 6 months ago
Engadget and a bunch of other blogs have been reporting these last few days about the cool Augen branded Android Smartbook and Tablets that are being released in the US market at affordable $99 and $149 prices by Super Market chain KMart. I just would like to remind my readers that I posted my video review of the Augen Smartbook 6 months ago on January 29th as it’s based on the Hivision PWS700CA and its cool RockChip ARM9 processor that runs Android in this video: http://138.2.152.197/2010/01/29/android-laptop-review-hivision-pws700ca/
and that the Telechips ARM11 800mhz based Augen $149 7″ Tablet that Engadget and plenty other blogs also are talking about seems to be based on the same 7″ resistive tablet hardware design that I filmed 5 months ago presented by MAG Digital at CeBIT 2010 in this video: http://138.2.152.197/2010/03/02/mag-digital-presents-windows-ce-that-looks-like-android-in-a-tablet/
To let you know my opinion. I think it is fantastic that Augen and KMart are promoting such cheaper Android Laptop and Tablet form factors as alternatives to the much more expensive Apple iPad and Intel Netbooks. Archos has also been selling the similarly priced Archos 7 Home Tablet on the worldwide market which I video reviewed 5 months ago, which is now broadly available in many retail and online stores below $200 for the 8GB version (and the 2GB version originally planned at $149, then $179 but for now they are mostly selling the 8GB version). That Rockchip based Laptop and Tablet platform also being upgraded to 1ghz still ARM9 to support newer Android 2.2 versions.
But as we have heard from Canonical developers and from hearsay and off camera chatter by Google people at the Google Q&A at Computex about Chrome OS on ARM Laptops, although the second generation 45nm ARM Cortex A8 with faster DDR RAM and faster I/O performance can be enough, the coming of ARM Cortex A9 platforms may be preferable to achieve the full desktop web browsing experience that most consumers may require for them to consider the ARM platforms as fully usable alternatives in the Intel/Microsoft dominated Laptop market. And the iPad and the whole bunch of smart phones that are currently spread all over the market, those may kind of set expectations at capacitive and ARM Cortex A8 performance at the minimum. So it will be interesting, capacitive touch screen manufacturers allowing, to see how soon and how cheap those capacitive Android tablet designs at full user interface speeds can reach the market. ARM9 and ARM11 resistive tablets are not bad for a start, they can give the consumers and bloggers a taste of what can be done with Android at retail prices below $200 and even below $100. The ultimate goal should be though that we should have full speed ARM Cortex versions of all these devices in all the stores, with the best capacitive screens for tablets or non-touch screens for Laptops, preferably Pixel Qi screens, and available below $200 without contracts, running free Linux based Android or Ubuntu OSes.
Rockchip RK2818 to come at 1ghz with improved DSP
Rockchip may be the new “China Processor”, that ARM Processor coming out of China that can be found in some of the cheap Android Tablets and Laptops. This could be a major part of China’s attempt at providing every component of future low cost computing devices, even the processor. The new version of the Rockchip processor is said to be faster, RK2808 is 600mhz while RK2818 can go to 1ghz. But according to Toms Hardware, this new Rockchip RK2818 might still be ARM926EJ-S ARMv5 based.
In practice, RK2808 reached 1.1 DMIPS per MHz, while a core based on the Cortex A8 is 2 DMIPS per MHz and the recent Cortex A9 is 2.5 per DMIPS MHz. Even at 1 GHz, a Rockchip will be about two times slower than what the Cortex competition offers (at a higher price).
The question might be, how much cheaper are ARM9 based devices? Rockchip might still be only for low-end lower cost devices mostly made by Chinese manufacturers. The good news is this new Rockchip can support Android 2.1 and 2.2 (while RK2808 can only do Android 1.5). It’s got to be thanks to its newer and better DSP graphics accelerator, with screen support at up to 1024×768 which could be great to power cheap ARM Powered laptops and low cost 10″ Android Tablets. Availability may be after September for a bunch of new RK2818 based products or maybe also simply quick upgrades of RK2808 based designs. I wonder if the new 720p video playback on RK2818 may be improved, while RK2808 could only playback H264 MKV 720p at up to 2.5mbit/s.
Source: Toms Hardware France (in french)
$88 5″ Android Tablet: Acorp EM501R
Acorp is releasing the EM501R, 4.8″ Android Rockchip RK2808 powered tablet to be sold at only $88 (for distributors buying at least 1000 pieces). This is the Acorp 5″ Rockchip 600mhz ARM9 based Android tablet. This sized tablet fits just fine in most pockets and provides better view of web browser, video and apps than on a 3.5″ phone.
Hott MD700 Android Tablet
So you might have seen my video of the Hott MD500 that I posted from CeBIT here last month. Hott is now showing the 7″ Android tablet called the MD700 at the China Sourcing Fair in Hong Kong. The price in bulk is said to be probably around $130 USD.
Source: shanzai.com
Hott MD500, 4.8″ Android Tablet (priced $92 to distributors)
Chinese manufacturer Hott is launching a design for a 4.8″ tablet based on a version of Android which they have customized to work for them on the ARM9 Rockchip based processor which comes with full video playback support. Check out these interesting Android customizations in this product that they proudly define as “iPad-killer”.
The design of this 4.8″ Android tablet by Hott is the most compact that I have seen so far. I think it is very nice that it only has a minimal screen bezel. Check out it’s size compared to my Archos 5 Internet Tablet with Android in the following pictures posted to Picasa (click to see the full size versions on Picasa):