Jan 14, 2011 11:10 GMT  ·  By

Research In Motion is expected to mark a success with its BlackBerry PlayBook tablet PC as soon as the device hits the shelves, some of the latests forecasts on the matter suggest.

Apparently, the company might be on track to ship a number of one million PlayBook devices during the first quarter of the ongoing year, although the company would put the tablet PC on shelves only in March.

The new device from RIM would face tight competition from Motorola's XOOM tablet PC, which was unveiled officially at CES in Las Vegas last week, and which should arrive on shelves this quarter with Google's Android operating system on board.

A recent article on DigiTimes notes that Quanta Computer already started volume production of RIM's PlayBook tablets, and that industry sources recommend the device courtesy of its appealing operating system.

The PlayBook will arrive on the market with Wi-Fi connectivity options on board sometime in March, with a 3G model to follow shortly. RIM also plans launching a 4G-capable device in Q2 on Sprint's airwaves.

The PlayBook was rumored at one time to have been delayed a little, due to a series of issues that affect its battery life, but it seems that RIM is on track with the planned Q1 release of the device.

Moreover, some of the latest reports on the matter suggest that the device would manage to get around 8 hours of life from its 5300-mAH battery, which should sound pretty good for most users.

The tablet PC should come to the market with a 7-inch touchscreen display that boasts a 1024 x 600 pixels resolution, a 5-megapixel photo snapper on the back and a 3-megapixel front-facing camera, dual-core 1 GHz processor, 1GB of RAM, and other features more.

The device would compete against Apple's iPad, as well as against a wide range of Android-based tablet PCs, the most important of which comes from Motorola, the XOOM tablet, with a 10-inch display, a dual-core processor, and LTE upgradeability. A Wi-Fi only XOOM tablet might emerge as well.