14 DAY TRIAL // When Tesco announced it was launching a budget-conscious tablet of its own, the news was greeted with a high degree of skepticism.
But then the company rolled out the device and despite being quite affordable, the tab offered a range of decent specs, which were enough for the average Tesco shopper.
Naturally, Tesco wanted to profit some more from the success of the tab, which reportedly sold in half a million units. At some point, the company announced they would soon be offering a wallet-friendly smartphone too, alongside the next-generation Hudl 2.
No Tesco smartphone will be coming
But if you were high on hope regarding the Tesco smartphone, we hate to burst your bubble: it’s not happening. The project has been shelved, as the company has chosen to focus on the advent of the next-gen Tesco 2 tablet.
Tesco writes on their official website that “the mobile market has become even more competitive” so they had to put the phone project on hold. This is just about right, considering the plethora of worthy new smartphones and phablets we have seen at IFA 2014.
So you can kiss goodbye to a Tesco affordable, quality 4G handset, at least for the time being. However, we’re quite skeptical we’re ever going to see such a device arrive in the wild, because once a project is shelved, a revival becomes highly unlikely.
On the other hand, Tesco might have had way too bigger ambitions for its budget-friendly phone. At some point, it was said that the handset would be comparable to the Samsung Galaxy S5 which is a flagship, premium device, so the prospect is a little bit laughable.
The supermarket giant is focusing its efforts on tablets
Anyway, for the time being the Hudl tablet lineup is still holding its ground, but the successors are expected to arrive in the upcoming weeks.
The tablet popped up in a benchmarking database at some point and the Tesco blog also reveals a thing or two about the new product, saying it will be “improved on just about every area of its predecessor, from screen size to speed, design and accessories.”
If we are to rely on what the GFXBench database revealed a while ago, the Hudl 2 could arrive with a 8.2-inch display with 1920 x 1200 pixel resolution, which is actually better than the average on the market.
The powerhouse of the device will be a 1.8GHz quad-core Intel Z3735D processor fitted with 2GB of RAM and 16GB of internal storage.
In the upcoming weeks, we’re probably going to know if the Tesco Hudl 2 will actually bundle the above specs or not.