TESCO tablet specifications – what to expect from HUDL

TESCO has announced new cheap tablet device offered under its own brand HUDL.
Estimated price is around £100.

Tesco tablet as shopping cart

What we already know? Not so much, so I filled gaps by my “presumptions”:

	Specifications	My presumption (unconfirmed)
Display	7“ IPS, 1280×720
CPU	1.6GHz, quadcore	Cortex-A7 based, Mediatek MT6589T MT8125/8389?
GPU	unspecified quad-core	PowerVR SGX544?
RAM	1 GB
ROM	16 GB
Expansion	Micro SD	SDHC up to 32GB?
GPS	Yes
BT	Yes
Gyroscope	Yes
Accelerometer	Yes
Compass	Yes
Speakers	Stereo
Mic	Yes	Mono?
Main camera (back)	3 Mpx
Secondary camera (front)	2 Mpx
Video output	Micro HDMI
Connection	Micro USB
Charging		Separate power connector?
Battery  capacity	??? 9 hrs video playback
Colors	Black, Blue, Red, Purple

We will know more on 23th of September. Until  now, listen Twitter: #LetsHudl

Source: various

Chromecast device CPU detailed specifications

Currently there are no public info available concerning Chromecast device CPU Marvell 88DE3005. We can look inside of its brother 88DE3100 to get first estimations of Chromecast SoC computation and graphics performance.

Marvell 88DE3100Block diagram

Let’s assume that 88DE3005 is single core:
In this case, power of 88DE30005 is 2.61 DMIPS/Mhz, resulting in 3000 DMIPS when clocked at 1.2 GHz (note that maximum  operational frequency of 88DE3100 is about 1.6 GHz).

This figure (raw performance) can be compared with mainstream smartphones, but it is too low when compared with any modern tablet.

Concerning GPU, Vivante GC1000 is member of low-end family and cannot compete with Mali-400MP4 and newer GPUs. Even its compatibility for 3D games was  questionable –  this is expected to became better as Google adopted this GPU.

Chromecast device specifications

Yesterday unveiled Chromecast dongle was already spotted by FCC

Chromecast device Specifications (preliminary):

• Marvell DE3005 SoC – Sheeva PJ4 ARM core , most probably dual core @1-1.2GHz
• Vivante GC1000 GPU (same as in ActionTec 7029), OpenGL ES 2.0/1.1, OpenVG 1.1, DirectFB, GDI/DirectDraw, Flash Graphics Processing Unit
  (see Detailed Vivante GPU Specifications)
• 512MB RAM 
• 2GB ROM (flash) Micron 29F16G08MAA 
• AzureWave NH-387 wireless/BT/FM combo
  (see detailed AzureWave NH-387 specifications)

We are surprised by using Vivante GPU – one of not-so-widely spread GPU solutions. Vivante GC1000 is widely used in  Chinese tablets equipped by quadcore ATM7029 SoC.

Wireless  chip is not supporting 802.11n 5Ghz WiFi band

Update: 2,4 GHz only,confirmed:

AzureWave NH-387 bands

(sources: @nerdtalker, manufacturer pages)

Vodafone Smart III is made by Alcatel

Vodafone just stared to sell budget-level phone under it’s own brand. It’s sold for 95 GBP w/o contract and it is available with and without NFC.

 

 

 

 

Vodafone 975/975N specifications

• display: 4″ 800×480 TFT
• CPU: MTK 6575, single core Cortex-A9@1GHz (~2500 DMIPS)
• Graphics: PowerVR SGX 531
• RAM: 512 MB
• ROM: 4GB
• front camera: 5MPx, 720p HD video recording
• battery: 1500 mAh
• NFC: just 975N model
• physical dimensions: 123.2 x 64.4 x 10.9mm
• weight: 136g
• Android 4.2 Jelly Bean

Same as its predecessor, Vodafone Smart II (V860), it is made TCT Mobile limited, joint-venture of Alcatel and Chinese TCL Communication.

Top 10 bestselling chinese tablets

Wondered what tablets are sold best in China?

We do not know numbers for whole Chinese market, but they will be similar as those provided by Spemall:

Smartphone vendors rank by shipments

An interesting statistics found? smartphone vendor’s ranking  according to #units sold worldwide. Can you identify the trends?

(Click on preview below for full size picture)

Ranked smartphone vendors by shipments

(via Horace Dediu)

Android tablets selling faster than iPads

Yesterday at Motorola’s press event in New York, Google Chairman Eric Schmidt announced that more than 1.3Mio new Android devices are activated each day.

There is one more important number: Just minor part, only about 70k of them are tablets – all the rest are Android phones. I agree. China market absorbed Android very well and now there are factories producing new phones as Bata shoes.

But there is another big player who is not counted in: Jeff Bezos’s Amazon Kindle Fire. How previously mentioned figures looks when the Kindle Fire is counted into Android tablet column?

New activations by OS and device

Seems that more Android tablets than iPads are activated daily. 

But on the other hand, Apple claims it shipped 17Mio iPads in 2012/Q2, what should result in about 185k iPad activations per day.

Whose figures are right? Who knows….

 

Update: Somebody asked me where I got Kindle Fire sales figures. Cowen analyst Kevin Kopelman estimated Kindle Fire sales as14M units in 2012,  and as Google Nexus7  has been released, he lowered this figure to 12M Fires/year. For more details see here.

How to print from Android tablet

Imagine: You are a proud owner of fresh new Android tablet (mobile handy or any other Android device). After first enthusiasm goes away, you are trying to use it for more serious tasks as p.e. editing documents. When finished, you need get printout.

So you start looking for USB connectors on your tablet, attempts to connect USB printer to tablet, start prying, use magic etc., then:   STOP! YOU ARE GOING WRONG WAY!

There is different way to get printouts, called Google Cloud Print. How it works? Technically, your tablet connects to your printer over internet. One picture worth for thousand words:

Google Cloud Print Architecture

Now we can learn how to configure and use Google Cloud Print in your house, to enable print from all your home appliances (yes, in a two years your fridge will printout your daily diet plan 🙂 , believe me)

What  you will need
1) Either any printer + Google Chrome or Cloud Ready Printer.
2) A Google Clound Print capable application on your tablet.

Steps
First establish your own cloud connected printer. If you own any of Cloud Ready models, then you already have it configured. If not, start Chrome browser on your PC, select Settings   (top right icon with tools), select Show Advaced Settings and find Google Cloud Print:

(You will be asked for your Google account)

Tip: Both of Google Docs and Google Chrome are Cloud Print enabled, so start printing right now!

OYO ebook reader available as eWooky

A  Czech company Wooky decided to include another ebook Reader into their project.

Instead of Archos Arnova 8 G2 used last year,  this time they selected e-ink device, manufactured in India,  known as OYO reader in Europe.

OYO/eWoooky Specifications

• 6-inch SiPix capacitive touchscreen; 800 x 600 pixels; 16 grayscales.
• Formats supported: TXT, ePub, PDF, HTML image viewer, JPEG, PNG, BMP, MP3.
• Micro USB port.
• Dimensions: 154 x 124 x 11mm (6 x 4.9 x .43 inches); weighs 240g (8.5 ounces).
• 5 fonts; 6 font sizes.
• Wi-Fi connection.
• 2GB internal memory; MicroSD slot (up to 32GB).
• Battery life 8,000 pages.

eWooky reader is available for 125 €.

Google Nexus tablet: Asus or Samsung?

According to Slashgear rumors, new Google tablet (expected to be introduced in Google conference June 2012, 27th-29th,  together with introduction of new Android 5.0 Jelly Bean) wil be based on Samsung Exynos 5210 SoC.

If you are not familiar  with Exynos chip family, remember that  Samsung Exynos 5210 is an ARM Cortex-A15 implementation, providing 3.5 DMIPS/MHz.

Does this mean, that Asus is out of the game? Or does it just mean that Samsung Exynos CPU is used, and Asus is still expected to produce Google tablets?

In both cases, it means that Google Nexus tablet will be killer for most of chinese tablets at least from performance point of view. Raw performance of about 15000 DMIPS can not be matched by any of current China SoC producers.
As of now, most powerfull chinese chips used in tablets are dualcore Rockchip3066 and AmLogic AML8726-MX, ARM-Cortex-A9 implementations capable of up to  7500 DMPIS @1.6GHz and equippped with  Mali-400 GPU.