Welcome to the Good E-Reader continuing coverage of the Computex Tradeshow in Taipei! Today we took a stroll around to check out what the folks at VIA were doing. We had heard rumors that this company was going the budget tablet route, similar to Eken with their M003 line of sub $200.00 Tablet Computers.
They had 2 or 3 Tablets to show at the booth, we saw most of them with pretty cheap looking plastic cases that did not do anything for us aesthetically. Each of the units had 7-inch resistive touch displays, and was running Android 1.6 on the company’s WonderMedia WM8505 ARM 9 based processor.
Although, it pains us to see more devices running Google Android 1.6 with no word of compatibility with the new Froyo 2.2 Android OS, they did have some neat looking Smart book devices that did run Android 2.1.
VIA told us, that they are looking to release 2 or 3 tablets in the USA market and overseas by October of this year, and will be in the range of $150.00 to $200.00 US.
Finally, these prototypes they showed off, looked like earlier demos that we saw at the CES earlier this year, but to us, they look like glorified digital photo graph frames.
For more news on Computex and E-Reader and Slate PC’S check out our Good E-Reader Forum and our June Issue of the Good E-Reader Magazine just came out! Make sure to support us and subscribe for $1.99! PayPal accepted.
[cincopa 10623149]
Michael Kozlowski is the editor-in-chief at Good e-Reader and has written about audiobooks and e-readers for the past fifteen years. Newspapers and websites such as the CBC, CNET, Engadget, Huffington Post and the New York Times have picked up his articles. He Lives in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.
