14 DAY TRIAL // Last year at the I/O 2014 conference, Google unveiled the Nexus 9 tablet, which made a debut into the wild with a Tegra K1 processor under the hood. But before the tablet was announced, rumors were flying around that Google was actually working on a Nexus 8 tablet.
It seemed like the obvious inference to make, since the last tablet announced by Google had been the Nexus 7 (2013). Even so, the search giant took folks by surprise when it rolled out a Nexus tablet with a larger form factor.
But what if the myth of the Nexus 8 tablet is not dead?
This year, we are expecting Google to launch two Nexus smartphones (one made by LG and one made by Huawei), thus forfeiting its regular launch ritual which includes one smartphone and one tablet. But what if the tech giant actually ends up rolling out two smartphones and one slate?
The Nexus 8 might show up after all
It’s the possibility the folks at Mobi Picker seem to suggest will happen. Apparently, a Nexus 8 tablet has been spotted in the Geekbench 3 benchmark test, and according to the listing, it has Android 5.1.1 Lollipop pre-installed. But if the slate does turn out to be the real deal, Google will probably launch it into the wild with Android 6.0 Marshmallow on board.
It is also revealed that the slate will supposedly be powered by an octa-core CPU clocked at 1.3GHz. The name of the chipset is not disclosed, but given the 1.3GHz clock speed, it doesn’t seem we’re dealing with a Snapdragon chipset, but rather a MediaTek one.
No word on which manufacturer will be producing the device either. Keep in mind that the Nexus 7 tablets (2012 and 2012) were produced by ASUS, while the Nexus 9 was made by HTC. The Nexus 10 was made by Samsung, so Google worked with diverse OEMs for its line of tablets.
Considering that Google is working with Huawei and LG this year for its smartphone products, could it be possible that one of them also takes up building a tablet?