Android By Russell Holly Mar. 21, 2014 12:00 pm
Rumors have begun to surface regarding an HTC Nexus tablet to match the 8.9-inch Google Play Experience tablet already in the Play Store. While there’s no real evidence pointing to this being a real thing, it’s an interesting concept to entertain.
HTC has had a rough couple of years. The company has gone from being the first Android handset manufacturer, first Nexus partner, and significant power in the mobile space to a company that has struggled significantly over the last couple of years. As the first into the Android field, HTC has a loyal fanbase that has long held on to the hope that they would return to being widely considered the best smartphone manufacturer in the mobile space. Recently rumors have surfaced pointing to HTC returning to Google’s side as a manufacturer of Nexus products, specifically a powerful 8.9 inch tablet that would offer significant competition for everything else being offered this year.
Google hasn’t had a lot of success with large tablets. The Nexus 10 struggled to remain relevant despite being technically superior to the devices available at the time, and has not yet received a refresh from any of Google’s current Nexus partners. The Nexus 7, on the other hand, has made an impressive place for itself thanks to a low price and an acceptable set of specifications.
Google worked with LG to release a Google Play Edition of the larger LG G Pad 8.3, but nothing larger has been publicly discussed since the failed launch of the Nexus 10. If the rumors are to be believed, HTC is working with Google to produce a tablet that is larger than the G Pad in an attempt to offer a functional Google Experience in these larger sizes.
When HTC decided to dedicate their resources to the Sense UI, and announced that they had no intention of making another device that didn’t run Sense by default, the company was strong. They had just released their own tablets, the smaller HTC Flyer and the larger HTC Jetstream. Both devices were great in their own way, but the Flyer was released before Google had really started to invest energy into tablet design and the Jetstream was terribly expensive.
HTC hasn’t made more tablets since these two, but the rumors would have you believe that an 8.9-inch design is being built with a 2560 x 1600 resolution display. That would make the display the same resolution as the original Nexus 10 and Google’s Chromebook Pixel, but in a frame that was less than 9 inches. The rumor included vague language about the rest of the specs, describing it as a “high-performance” device with a price tag that somewhere over $300. When you consider that the 32GB version of the comparably much simpler Nexus 7 is almost $300, that claim seems more than a little obvious.
While HTC is certainly capable of manufacturing such a device, and Google is certainly in need of a larger tablet to compete with the iPad Air in their Nexus or Google Play Experience line, these rumors fall short of being believable by quite a way.
HTC fans the world over would be more than excited to see such a tablet come into existence, and if Google could manage a price point that competed with Apple’s pricing it would be an impressive sight to behold. But it feels like we’re a lot farther away from this being reality than it would seem. Stranger things have happened, and Google has been known to surprise us all in the past, but this sounds far too good to be true.
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HTC has had a rough couple of years. The company has gone from being the first Android handset manufacturer, first Nexus partner, and significant power in the mobile space to a company that has struggled significantly over the last couple of years. As the first into the Android field, HTC has a loyal fanbase that has long held on to the hope that they would return to being widely considered the best smartphone manufacturer in the mobile space. Recently rumors have surfaced pointing to HTC returning to Google’s side as a manufacturer of Nexus products, specifically a powerful 8.9 inch tablet that would offer significant competition for everything else being offered this year.
Google hasn’t had a lot of success with large tablets. The Nexus 10 struggled to remain relevant despite being technically superior to the devices available at the time, and has not yet received a refresh from any of Google’s current Nexus partners. The Nexus 7, on the other hand, has made an impressive place for itself thanks to a low price and an acceptable set of specifications.
Google worked with LG to release a Google Play Edition of the larger LG G Pad 8.3, but nothing larger has been publicly discussed since the failed launch of the Nexus 10. If the rumors are to be believed, HTC is working with Google to produce a tablet that is larger than the G Pad in an attempt to offer a functional Google Experience in these larger sizes.
When HTC decided to dedicate their resources to the Sense UI, and announced that they had no intention of making another device that didn’t run Sense by default, the company was strong. They had just released their own tablets, the smaller HTC Flyer and the larger HTC Jetstream. Both devices were great in their own way, but the Flyer was released before Google had really started to invest energy into tablet design and the Jetstream was terribly expensive.
HTC hasn’t made more tablets since these two, but the rumors would have you believe that an 8.9-inch design is being built with a 2560 x 1600 resolution display. That would make the display the same resolution as the original Nexus 10 and Google’s Chromebook Pixel, but in a frame that was less than 9 inches. The rumor included vague language about the rest of the specs, describing it as a “high-performance” device with a price tag that somewhere over $300. When you consider that the 32GB version of the comparably much simpler Nexus 7 is almost $300, that claim seems more than a little obvious.
While HTC is certainly capable of manufacturing such a device, and Google is certainly in need of a larger tablet to compete with the iPad Air in their Nexus or Google Play Experience line, these rumors fall short of being believable by quite a way.
HTC fans the world over would be more than excited to see such a tablet come into existence, and if Google could manage a price point that competed with Apple’s pricing it would be an impressive sight to behold. But it feels like we’re a lot farther away from this being reality than it would seem. Stranger things have happened, and Google has been known to surprise us all in the past, but this sounds far too good to be true.
More...
