What if you’re a gamer at heart and want a tablet? The latest iPads have been powerful tablets with some great games. But Nvidia has been trying to go one step further with its Shield Tablet, a device specifically made for gamers. The company is updating its Shield Tablet K1 with a new cheaper price tag.
At $199, Nvidia’s tablet is a lot cheaper than the latest iPad mini, which starts $399. Compared to other $199 Android tablets, the Shield Tablet is supposed to pack quite a wallop. It comes with a powerful Nvidia system-on-a-chip.
The company hasn’t updated the chip though. It comes with last year’s Tegra K1, but it is still faster than any other Android tablet out there. It comes with 16GB of storage, a mini-HDMI port and a microSD slot. At 13.7oz (390g), it’s a bit heavier than your average tablet.
The tablet features an 8-inch 1080p display, two front-facing speakers. You can also buy Nvidia’s version of the smart cover — it can also acts as a kickstand. And of course, you can pair it with an (optional) Shield controller to turn in into a gaming console. It’s a good device to play games using Grid, Nvidia’s streaming Netflix for games.
Previously, the Shield Tablet K1 was available in two variants — a 16GB version and a 32GB version with LTE. It’s unclear whether the 32GB model will stick around. The 16GB model used to cost $299. The company had to recall some of them due to fire hazard issues with the battery — let’s hope Nvidia fixed the battery.
The Shield Tablet is also a great way to showcase Nvidia’s work when it comes to mobile chipsets. As a reminder, Nvidia announced an updated mobile chip at CES in January 2015. The Tegra X1 features a 265-core Maxwell GPU, an 8-core 64-bit ARM CPU and can handle 60fps 4K UHD video playback in either H.265 or VP9 coding.
It’s supposed to be a lot faster than the K1. The company is already using the X1 in its Nvidia Shield for TV.
Given that Nvidia rebranded the Nvidia Shield Tablet to the Nvidia Shield Tablet K1, an X1 update might not be too far.