Akash Tablet, the ‘world’s cheapest Android tablet’ will be launched in the month of November and while its too early to comment on tablet’s future, Jaimon Joseph of CNN-IBN has done a great job of reviewing the tablet.
First, Aakash Tablet Specs:
Hardware:
- Processor: 366 Mhz. Connexant with Graphics accelerator and HD Video processor
- Memory (RAM): 256MB RAM / Storage (Internal): 2GB Flash
- Storage (External): 2GB to 32GB Supported
- Peripherals (USB2.0 ports, number): 1 Standard USB port
- Audio out: 3.5mm jack / Audio in: 3.5mm jack
- Display and Resolution: 7? display with 800×480 pixel resolution
- Input Devices: Resistive touch screen
- Connectivity and Networking: GPRS and WiFi IEEE 802.11 a/b/g
- Power and Battery: Up to 180 minutes on battery. AC adapter 200-240 volt range.
Software:
- OS: Android 2.2
- Supported Document formats: DOC, DOCX, PPT, PPTX, XLS, XLSX, ODT, ODP
- PDF viewer, Text editor
- Multimedia and Image Display
- Image viewer supported formats: PNG, JPG, BMP and GIF
- Supported audio formats: MP3, AAC, AC3, WAV, WMA
- Supported video formats: MPEG2, MPEG4, AVI, FLV
Review: Aakash Tablet
As per Jaimon,
The student version we got came loaded with applications. Everything from Facebook, to stuff that lets you create and edit documents. There are games, a calendar cum organiser, even advanced lessons in Physics – though they used up just a quarter of the screen and were hard to read.
- The screen is rather unresponsive. Sometimes I had to push the screen really hard to get a response.
- It also heats up really fast. Which means in the heat and dust of India, it could face problems.
- The tablet failed to install anything from the Android App Market.
So in short, the tablet does perform what you would expect a Rs. 3,000 tablet to perform – but the key question is whether this will really improve the education system in India?
And we wonder – why not give this tablet to Indian politicians (instead of the costly iPad/Galaxy Tabs?)
Opinion: Who Pays For Government’s Aakash Tablet? [Answer: You]
