Verizon, Moto working on Android-powered TV tablet?
Wednesday, August 4, 2010 at 07:09PM What would you say to an Android tablet with a 10-inch screen, dual cameras (with a front-facing lens for video chat), Flash support, mobile hotspot capabilities, and the ability to watch TV shows via Verizon’sFiOS network? You want?
Our tablet rumor du jour comes courtesy of the Financial Times, which claims (based on tips from the usual "people briefed on the plans") that Motorola and Verizon Wireless are working on an Android-powered slate that "will allow users to watch television on it."
The supposed tablet would boast a 10-inch display — slightly larger than the iPad’s 9.7-inch screen — and would be "thinner and lighter" than the iPad, the Financial Times says.
The rumored Moto tablet would also try to one-up the iPad as a TV-on-a-slate that would "tie closely" VerizonFiOS, the fiber-optic digital cable service that’s making inroads against traditional cable carriers (and which, incidentally, has yet to arrive on my block in Brooklyn, much to my disappointment). And guess who happens to build the set-top boxes for Verizon FiOS? You guessed it: Motorola.
If the integrated FiOS TV isn’t enough for you, the Financial Times piles on with some other enticing — but still only rumored — features, including Flash support, a front-facing camera for video conferencing along with a second lens in back, and the ability to act as a mobile hotspot that shares its data connection (3G, I’m assuming, although LTE could eventually be a possibility) with nearby Wi-Fi devices.
The mystery tablet could arrive "as early as this autumn," says the Times, which doesn’t offer any details on how much the thing might cost.
This isn’t the first time we’ve heard rumors of an Android tablet on Verizon; back in May, the Wall Street Journal reported that Verizon and Google were working on a tablet that would compete with the iPad, but the story didn’t mention any manufacturers by name — and there was certainly no chatter about the tablet acting as a mobile-TV device.
Speaking of which ... how would that work on the supposed Motorola tablet, exactly? Would we simply be talking more streaming video over, say, a Verizon FiOS portal, similar to the ABC streaming app on the iPad? Or might this be true live TV, with a FiOS tuner app for Android installed on the device? Would anyone be able to tune in, or would it only work for household FiOS subscribers? If it’s a case of actual live TV (assuming the FT story is true, of course) that you could watch anywhere over Verizon’s 3G network, well ... that would be pretty awesome.
Again, though, we don’t have any solid word on the tablet quite yet; none of the three entities involved (Motorola, Google, or Verizon) would comment for the Financial Times article.
So, would you snap up a Motorola-built Android tablet with dual cameras, Flash support, and mobile TV via FiOS, all on Verizon?
From Yahoo News
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