Aakash India Tablet US$35. India has unveiled the world's cheapest touchscreen tablet computer, The Aakash. It's priced at US$35.
According to reports, it will run Android 2.2, has a seven inch screen, two USB ports, a 3 hour battery life, 256MB RAM and can support web browsing and video conferencing. It has also been reported that instead of a hard drive, it will be using a memory card used by mobile phones and can also run on solar power.
The device is aimed at students.
A commercial version of the tablet, named the UbiSlate, will be released later this year. It will be priced at about US$60.
Critics have already started to doubt if the device can perform well, given the price and the specs.
An executive at Quad Electronics has confirmed that they are manufacturing around 700 units a day of the device. They are planning to manufacture 100,000 of these. The source also added that Quad has never manufactured a tablet before.
The factors involved in this project seem to indicate the future of this device. A price that's unbelievably low, specs that seem disjointed (256mb ram? Video conferencing?), and a manufacturer that has no experience in making the product.
If India manages to pull a rabbit out of its hat and make this work, the Aakash and the UbiSlate will be under a lot of Christmas trees this year. Well, mostly in India.
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