Playing videogames is the top activity that consumers do on tablets. So Archos is releasing this awesome thin, light and very well prices $149 Archos Gamepad. It’s got a 7″ 1024×600 capacitive touch screen but more importantly for gaming, it’s got game controller buttons on each side of the screen. This device runs on the Rockchip RK3066 dual-core ARM Cortex-A9 processor with the quad-core Mali-400MP4 GPU. Thus gameplay support is quite decent, especially considering the $149 retail price of this device. Archos software engineers implement a very innovative mapping software layer solution on top of Android, to map the hardware controls to touch-screen input. Thus a large portion of existing touch-screen optimized games are thus very well playable like this. As a transition until all Android games become fully optimized for normal gamepad input. Not only as portable Android gameplayers come with buttons, but for the Android home consoles, HDMI sticks, Set-top-boxes, Google TV and more, all suggesting that Android is about to become by far the biggest video games platform in the world. In this video, I showcase one N64 emulator that I could find on the Google Play Store, though N64 and Dreamcast emulation is still a work in progress, as many more consumers start getting access to these types of Android gaming devices, hopefully it’ll encourage more game developers to improve emulators and new games support on the platform. There isn’t specifically need for game developers to specifically target the RK3066 and this device, since as I understand a lot of the hardware acceleration happens through standards based Open GL ES 2.0, but for sure as more gamers and developers start using these devices, the optimization level of gaming can reach perfection, or at least a very satisfactory and impressive level at that price.
Here’s an update from the Chairman of the HKEIA Education Foundation on the HKTDC Electronics Fair, and about Hong Kong’s position and role in the electronics industry.
The electronicAsia trade show happens with the HKTDC Electronics Fair, in the same buildings and at the same time for 16 years now. It’s a trade show about components used in the making of all consumer and industrial electronics. Ronald Unterburger is the managing director of MMI-Munich International Trade Fairs who co-owns and organizes the electronicAsia trade show with the HKTDC.
Archos is launching two more sizes for their Generation 10 Android Tablet series, including the $199 Archos 80 XS and the $299 Archos 97 XS, each with the optional $49 Archos Coverboard Keyboard Dock. I’ve been using my Archos 101 XS every day during these past 45 days, replacing my broken $1000 Intel Ultrabook for all of my on-the-go productivity and 10.1″ Tablet usage. It’s much thinner and lighter than an Intel laptop, the thin and light keyboard dock ads productivity to the already very awesome OMAP4470 tablet. The same priced $299 Archos 97 XS runs on the same OMAP4470 and the $199 Archos 80 XS runs on the Rockchip RK3066 processor to achieve thus a Nexus7-like price point with its own awesome thin and light magnetic Keyboard dock.
Rockchip Vice-President Chen Feng presents their new single-core ARM Cortex-A9 SoC for cheaper, faster, lower power consuming tablets! They call it the Single-core Terminator. They simplify to lower the cost of the SoC thus of the entry-level ARM Powered device all the while improving the performance to provide for better entry-levels tablets.
Here’s one of the latest interesting ARM Powered laptops by Hivision, powered on VIA’s latest single-core ARM Cortex-A9 processor. With Ethernet, HDMI out, 2 USB Host and more.
Westin talks about their $190 Samsung Exynos 4412 9.7″ 1024×768 and $160 Rockchip RK3066 9.7″ 2048×1536 tablets and MT6577 Smartphones at the HKTDC Electronics Fair.
Geniatech uses the AmLogic AML8726-MX Dual-core ARM Cortex-A9 SoC in their new HDMI stick solution, first with support for USB DVB-T tuner. You will be able to buy it for $99 with free (standard) worldwide shipping as a sample in the ARMdevices Members Store: http://138.2.152.197/members-store/ (I just need to set it up within the next couple or three of days). Here’s Geniatech’s press release on the availability of their new ATV120 dual-core HDMI Stick: http://www.geniatech.com/news/dual-core-hdmi-stick-atv120.asp
U-Force shows a range of impressive and cool MediaTek MT6577 dual-core based smartphones and tablets, the price difference is only $3 to get the dual-core MT6577 over the single-core MT6575. They also show some phones with the new MT6515 2G phone.
Alldocube shows their latest new Rockchip RK3066 based Tablets in many sizes and features, all of them seem to be at quite impressive pricing. $79 for 7″ 1024×600. $93 for 8″ 1024×768.
Ramos shows tons of interesting new tablets here in Hong Kong. They are one of the first with an Exynos 4412 quad-core tablet, one of the first with the new Actions ATM7029 Quad-core ARM Cortex-A9 processor and here also one of the first to show a Dual-core RK3066 with a 2048×1536 IPS screen. As far as I think I have heard, those are all to be sold at around $160 in bulk.