14 DAY TRIAL // The XOOM tablet from Motorola seems to have finally come to the point where its maker decided it really couldn't do without a price cut, so the WiFi version is now able to compete with the iPad and rival Android-loaded slates on the same footing.
Now that the tablet market has reached a sort of more or less unspoken consensus as to what price is appropriate, Motorola finally brought the XOOM on the same page as the rest of them.
Months ago, when the Motorola XOOM was first launched, reviewers found it to be far too expensive, something that customers seem to have agreed with, given the fairly low sales of the first weeks.
Meanwhile, Apple's iPad 2 and various Android slates emerged, hovering around the $500 price point.
Needless to say, this put the XOOM, at least the WiFi version, in a somewhat tight spot, what with it selling for $600 while not having that different a spec sheet.
Also, extra assets or not, the consumer base doesn't appear to be willing to part with too much money at once when it comes to these multimedia electronics.
Now, as stated in a Tweet and the official website of the company itself, Motorola has reduced the tag of the XOOM WiFi.
Where it once sold for $600, it is now at the $499 price point, ready to truly wage war with the likes of Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1, though no mention of quick sell-outs have been made yet.
For those that want a reminder as to what the Andrid 3.1-loaded slate can do, it is based on the NVIDIA Tegra 2 ARM-based SoC (system-on-chip) platform.
This SoC has two cores with a frequency of 1 GHz and is backed up by 1 GB of RAM (random access memory). Also, the LCD (liquid crystal display) has a resolution of 1280 x 800 pixels.
Finally, Motorola threw in, besides the expected connectivity and I/O, two webcams, one of 5 megapixels on the back and another one, of the 2 megapixel variety, on the front.
Those who want the full set of information or want to set an order need only drop by this particular web page.