Joining the party
Handheld multimedia device maker Archos has announced it will be extending its Internet Media Tablet (IMT) product line by adding mobile phone functionality and combining Google's Android operating system with its own.
This is a strategic move by Archos to move into the increasingly congested ‘converged device' market, which combines PC and mobile phone functionality. The popularity of netbooks has renewed the interest in a converged form factor residing between smartphones and full-blown notebooks.
These are the key features of the new IMT as stated by Archos:
- PC-like Internet experience enhanced by a high-resolution 5" screen and full-width page viewing
- Adobe Flash and Flash Video support, full screen
- Access whenever and wherever to TV, movies, photos, music and games
- Uncompromised TV recording and High Definition (HD) playback, all formats
- Hundreds of hours of video storage, up to 500 GB
- Innovative design: compact 10-mm ultra-thin tablet
- Long battery life, 7 hours' video playback
- 3.5G 7.2 Mb/s HSUPA
- Laptop-like performance from the first implementation of OMAP3440 processor based on the ARM Cortex-A8 superscalar microprocessor and DSP
The new device is not expected to make an appearance until Q3 of this year and Archos has yet to release any images. Here's one of the five inch Archos 5, on which it will presumably be based.
