RIM has announced the arrival of the BlackBerry PlayBook tablet, the iPad’s rival, unveiled just days after the presentation of another competitor from Samsung.
One by one, tablets are flooding the market with presentations. The iPad kicked off the dance, and now here comes the new device from RIM (Research In Motion): the BlackBerry PlayBook.
At its heart is the BlackBerry Tablet OS and a 1 GHz dual-core processor. Its aesthetics feature a 7-inch high-resolution screen, a microUSB port, and overall slimmer dimensions than the iPad: the PlayBook weighs 400 grams and measures 17.8 cm – about 6 cm less than Apple’s tablet. Furthermore, the PlayBook is equipped with two cameras, one 3 Megapixel (on the front) and the other 5 Megapixel (on the back).
The processor allows for smooth navigation, supporting WebKit/HTML5, Java, Adobe Reader, Adobe Flash Player 10.1, Adobe Mobile AIR, POSIX, and OpenGL (while the iPad bans Adobe).
Mike Lazaridis, President and Co-CEO of Research In Motion (RIM), presented the BlackBerry PlayBook, specifying that its arrival in the US market is expected in early 2011, while Europe will have to wait until at least spring.
The BlackBerry PlayBook allows for multitasking (making it a step up from the iPad in this regard) and, as is tradition for BlackBerry, it is particularly useful and successful in business contexts. Regarding connectivity, this first version will feature Wi-Fi and Bluetooth, but new versions with 3G and 4G systems are already planned for release in the months following the product’s launch.
Therefore, at the moment, the PlayBook can be connected to a BlackBerry via Bluetooth.
Nothing has been revealed about the price of the BlackBerry PlayBook, but more information will certainly be available in the coming weeks.
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