The internet is a place where “he said, she said” type rumors quickly become major news and then through some weird prism of logic somehow become fact. One such rumor was that Google’s upcoming Android 3.0 tablet optimized mobile operating system would require a minimum set of system specifications in order to even run. That minimum spec sheet has changed with time and at one point was so ridiculous, with dual core processors and an ultra high resolution screen, that Dan Morrill, Android Open-Source & Compatibility Program Manager at Google, had to chime in with this tweet: “#dejavu Random note: there’s no hard minimum processor requirement for Honeycomb. Trust me, if there were I’d know.”
That pretty much makes the “minimum specification” rumor dead. It could very well be possible that a lot of the first Android 3.0 tablets that are due to launch this summer share similar internals. They’re all using the same NVIDIA Tegra 2 chip, which features a pair of 1 GHz ARM Cortex A9 processors and a graphics processor that’s ungodly quick. They also all have the same 1280 x 800 pixel screen. Assuming that just because those are the specs for first generation products that Google somehow enforces a minimum bar of performance attributes is a bit … dumb.
Anyway, most if not all of the devices that were announced at CES not only failed to come with a price tag, but a launch date as well. We don’t really know when you’ll be able to hop into your car and head to the closest BestBuy to pick up a tablet or dual core smartphone, and we really wish we did! Have you seen anything at the show so far that you’re considering picking up? Our boys on the ground in Las Vegas are working their tails off trying to get you the best coverage of the event.