You may remember the Cherrypad, a sub-$200 Android tablet that, while receiving less-than-stellar reviews, still sold a few units out of sheer cheapness. The latest version of this budget device, however, isn’t so budget. The specs have gone up, and with them, the price.
Mobile Magazine has gotten hold of the specs for the new Cherrypad (unconfirmed at the moment), and the improvements actually put it in the running… well, not with the Xoom or iPad, but certainly with the Galaxy Tab. It’s getting a higher-res 7″ screen (1024×600) and a capacitive touchscreen, replacing the lower-res resistive screen of the old version. It’s also getting dual cameras with flash and 8-16GB of onboard memory (plus MicroSD slot). Android 2.2 is what it’ll probably ship with.
Most importantly, perhaps, there’s a new 1GHz Cortex A8 CPU with 512MB of RAM, HDMI out, and a GSM antenna. That makes it a relatively modern, all-purpose tablet. The price, please? Apparently “in the $300-$400 range” — unfortunately for them, that doesn’t undercut the far more well-known Nook Color, and may even get direct competition from the iPad, depending on what happens over the next month.
At any rate, it should get an official announcement in a few weeks, and we’ll keep you posted.