Archos announces its G9 tablets

TABLET MAKER Archos has announced two dual-core 1.5GHz processor Android Honeycomb tablets, the 80 G9 and 101 G9.

Archos has upped the ante with its latest tablets, pushing the market with the high specification devices. In addition to a speedy ARM Cortex A9 dual-core processor, each has a huge Seagate 250GB hard drive.

Archos said the, "tablets enhance a user's web browsing experience with page load time reduced by up to 50 [per cent] over tablets running the Nvidia Tegra 2 processor at 1 GHz."

The two are expected to be available in September from prices of £199 and £249 for the 80 G9 and 101 G9 respectively.

The 101 G9 will rival the Apple Ipad 2 and similarly sized tablets because of its 10.1in screen with 1280x800 resolution. The 80 G9 will enter a more niche class of 8in devices with 1024x768 resolution.

Both tablets will come with Android 3.1 Honeycomb, the version of the operating system that is currently being rolled out to existing devices like the Motorola Xoom.

A unique feature of the G9 series is that they are compatible with USB 3G dongles, allowing a cheaper option for mobile internet access. So there's obviously a USB port on each of these tablets and they also come with an HDMI port.

Archos said the tablets are "the first to offer such high performance at such affordable price, making ARCHOS G9 tablets the best cost-performance value." µ