14 DAY TRIAL // Motorola XOOM, the first tablet PC that mobile phone maker Motorola officially introduced this year, is expected to land on shelves in a matter of days without all of the previously touted capabilities included into the mix.
When it hits the market on February 24th, the Android 3.0 Honeycomb-based device won't include Adobe's Flash Player technology, it seems.
The Motorola XOOM is expected to become available for purchase on Thursday on Verizon Wireless' airwaves, and the company has already placed a listing for it on its website.
According to Verizon, the Motorola XOOM is the “first tablet powered by Android 3.0 (Honeycomb).” The wireless carrier also notes that the tablet would become available on February 24th, and lists some of its main features.
Among these, we can count: - 1 GHz dual-core processor and fully Flash-enabled for video-rich web - A 10.1-inch HD widescreen display and a 3D interface that gets in your face - With Google Maps, you'll get quick-loading 3D vector maps that you can tilt, rotate, and zoom into with photo-real Street View
However, although Verizon says that XOOM would support flash-based content, the small print at the bottom of the banner reads: “Adobe Flash expected Spring 2011.”
Some of the latest reports on the matter suggest that the Flash version that Motorola XOOM should arrive on shelves with would be Flash Player 10.2, which was announced for mobile devices at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, and which should arrive in a matter of weeks.
Until that actually happens, the XOOM, and all other Honeycomb-based tablet PCs that should hit the shelves soon, would have a disadvantage in front of devices running under Android 2.2 or 2.3, as well as in front of Apple's iPad.
Adobe announced at MWC that it is hard at work with the release of Flash 10.2 for mobile devices, but no specific info on when would the software become available emerged for the time being.