14 DAY TRIAL // Low-cost tablets will be getting better and better judging by the announcement budget chip manufacturer Allwinner made this week.
As Liliputing notes, the company said it is planning to make its 64-bit ARM processors a reality by the end of the year. That means low-cost Android tablets taking advantage of this architecture will be equipped with 4K video decoding capabilities.
These new processors will take advantage of the ability to decode H.265 video, which is a 4K standard. What this means for the average tablet owners is that they will be able to shoot 4K video with the device or stream 4K to an external third-party display.
However, if users want to view video shot at 4K resolution, they will have to do so by bringing in the picture a 4K TV with HDMI.
Currently, Allwinner chips can be found in super affordable tablets like the HP Slate 7 Plus which sells for as low as $99 / €73.
Surely Allwinner isn’t the only company bringing ARMv8 chips out on the market in 2014, as competitors as MediaTek, Qualcomm, Samsung and NVIDIA are planning to do the same in the budget-friendly market. It remains to be seen which company will release their products earlier.
Going back to Allwinner, tablets taking advantage of the chip detailed above should sell for around $200-$250 / €148-€186.
We shouldn't expect these low-cost offerings to arrive with screens comparable to what Apple and Samsung are offering (Retina display standard and up), but they should provide a better than average quality nevertheless.
Curious onlookers will be able to take a glance at the 64-bit processor when at the Hong Kong Electronics Show Fair which is scheduled to kickstart in October. The chip will be showed off in a reference board compatible with an Android version developed by the non-profit organization called Linaro.
But the final aim is to make the board compatible with Google’s new 64-bit Android L OS. As we wait for the first low-cost 64-bit low cost Allwinner tablets to arrive on the market, we are taking an opportunity to remind you that the company has been doing quite well in the past few quarters and is looking to maintain the trend.
Back in March, IDC reported that Allwinner pushed over 18 million tablets chips in Q4 of 2013. That’s about twice as much processor as one of its biggest rivals, Rockchip and thrice as much as popular chip marker, Intel. Will the new 64-bit processor help Allwinner grow even more?