MWC: Toshiba turns up with a tablet

JAPANESE HARDWARE FIRM Toshiba has announced plans to launch a tablet into the UK market later this year.

The tablet, which appears to be called just Tablet, will run the Android operating system, has a 10.1-inch, 16:10 aspect ratio 1280x800 resolution touchscreen display and an Nvidia Tegra 2 processor as well as a gyroscope and accelerometer for immersive gaming.

Improving the display further are ambient light sensors and what Toshiba called its Adaptive Display software for automatically adjusting images based on existing lighting conditions. An HDMI port will let users push screen content onto other devices, for example an HD television.

The Tablet has 802.11 WLAN support for connecting to WiFi networks, while a 3G mobile broadband version will also be released.

Firms are apparently always keen to point out the subtle differences between their tablets and the Apple Ipad, and here Toshiba mentioned that its unit has a USB slot and both front and back cameras.

The tablet was first discussed at the CES trade show last year and will, according to Toshiba, hit the UK and other markets in the second half of this year.

This is not Toshiba's first foray into the tablet market, but the firm is hoping that it performs better than the Folio 100 that appeared last year.

One release at MWC would be a lacklustre showing for any firm and Toshiba backed up the Tablet with a handful of laptops, including the R830 and the R850. These are beefy business laptops and the company said that they offer high power and portability.

The laptops come into the Satellite range and the R830 offers a 13.3-inch screen, while the R850 has a more impressive 15.6-inch high definition screen.

That, dear reader, is where the differences more or less end. Both laptops share the same specifications which include WLAN and Bluetooth 3.0 connections, the latest Intel CPUs, up to 500GB HDDs running at 7200rpm, 3D impact sensors and up to 8GB of DDR3 RAM running at 1,333MHz. The operating system preloaded is Windows 64-bit Home Premium.

Laptop spotters should not put away their notebooks just yet, as Toshiba has a couple more slimline units coming, the Tecra R850 and the Tecra R840. Again these share the above features, but with screen differences, in this case the R840 offers users a 14-inch screen and the R850 has a 15.6-inch display.

The extra space is used on the latter machine's body for a numeric keypad. µ