14 DAY TRIAL // News on the tablet market has been mixed this past week. While the JooJoo seems to have made a not-so-positive impression, the iPad has already sold by the hundreds of thousands, showing the vigor of the newly established tablet market. This can be seen as both encouraging and disheartening for those companies planning on joining the fray in the future. For ICD, however, this seems like the perfect time for a leak, with the folks at Engadget even managing to get a comparison sheet between Notion Ink's Gemini tablet and the only currently available slates, the iPad and the JooJoo.
The NVIDIA Tegra 2-powered device will measure 300mm x 191mm x 15.6mm, will have a multi-touch, resistive touchscreen with stylus support, an 11-inch display with a maximum resolution of 1,366 x 768, 4GB of storage and 512MB of memory. In addition, the electronic will boast 3G connectivity, Bluetooth, 802.11n WiFi and a 40Wh battery, which, for peace of mind, will be user-replaceable. Granted, these specs aren't all that different from those of the iPad, but the Gemini also plans to bring a series of functions that the iPad and Joojoo, for the most part, lack.
For instance, the 3G connectivity will not only enable cellular data, but will actually allow cellular voice, commonly known as making phone calls. Secondly, the slate will be able to pick up FM radio waves, allowing it to act as a portable radio. ICD's tablet will even boast a MicroUSB slot, which will allow it to interface with USB peripherals, and will even have a 2-megapixel forward-facing camera (for video calls and chat) in addition to the 5-megapixel rear-facing one. Other special capabilities include GPS, the ability to send and receive SMS/MMS messages and a built-in SD slot, which allows the 4GB internal storage to be increased by up to an extra 32GB.
The ICD Gemini will run Google's Android OS. Unfortunately, there is still no information on when and where it will become available, nor on what its price point will be. Hopefully, the significantly broader feature set won't increase it by much.