Motorola was showing off their Xyboard 8.2 inch and 10.1 inch at CES this year and both were released in late December. You can think of these tablets as the second version of the Xoom and really are far more relevant hardware wise then the Xoom ever was. The big news to come out during the last week was that the company will be shipping WIFI only models in the next few days and the 8.2 inch we reviewed was a Verizon exclusive.
The Droid Xyboard features a 8.2 inch screen with a resolution of 1280×800 and has capacitive multitouch. It packs 1 GB of RAM and keeps things trucking along rather quickly with the dual core 1.2 GHZ processor. Internal memory is dependent on what model you choose and influences the cost with either 16 or 32 GB. There is a front facing 1.3 MP camera for video chatting and a rear facing 5 MP for taking pictures.
Software wise this tablet is running Google Android 3.2 and the company told us at CES that they will serve up a treatment of Ice Cream Sandwich, but like most vendors had zero clue on when it would happen. Obviously with higher end tablets you get full access to the Google Android Market to get your fix of applications. The unit is bundled with a number of cool television apps such as Televation which will give you a great way to watch Cable TV on your tablet. I noticed this tablet was quick and snappy and of course internet speed was quick with the Verizon 4G network. Why all of these new tablets at CES were Verizon exclusives was beyond me, check out our full hands on video of the tablet in action.
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.
