Toshiba Australia has confirmed that they will launch an Android Tablet in April and a Windows Tablet later this year on proviso that Microsoft improves their Windows OS for tablets. The Japanese Company has also used the 2011 CES show to demonstrate 3D working on a 55″ TV without glasses.
During an exclusive interview at CES 2011, with SmartHouse and ChannelNews Toshiba Australia executives admitted that they are in a strong position as IT merges even further with AV with the release yesterday of new “Sandy Bridge” technology from Intel.
According to Rob Wilkinson General Manager of Toshiba Australia’s Information Systems Division (ISD) and their AV Division a lot of work has to be done “educating consumers on the benefits of Sandy Bridge technology” before it starts to take.
In a hint that Sandy Bridge technology will not necessarily be widely adopted Toshiba executives said that they were still offering AMD technology and NVIDIA graphics boards in their products in 2011.
According to Toshiba their first Intel Sandy Bridge notebooks will be on sale in April in Australia. “We will have a staggered launch with new Quad Core product going on sale first” said Wilkinson.
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In a unique move Toshiba is set to offer colour coded notebooks with five colours set to be offered with Australian consumers. Among those colours are Blue, Orange Brown Green and Yellow.
Research already conducted in Australia reveals that the three most popular colours are Orange Brown and Green in that order.
The coloured backs will also be available for the new Toshiba tablet range with a 10″ Android set to go on sale in April. The tablet, which can be cradled in a dock for use with a keyboard, will also have access to a TV tuner and NAS hard drive via the dock in the future.
Toshiba upcoming 10.1-inch Android-based tablet and its 3D TV technology that doesn’t require viewers to wear special 3D glasses are set to put the Company in a strong position in Australia with the company now aiming to grab a larger share of the premium and large screen TV market.
The new range of 3D TV’s which we were able to witness first hand on both a 20″ and 12″ and a Toshiba notebook are impressive. The technology which tunes to a viewer’s eyes is after a few minutes of viewing impressive with 3D images coming through strongly.
Toshiba’s been selling its glasses-free HDTV in Japan for a while now, mostly in the smaller size, 12 inch model. The TV on display at the Toshiba stand at CES is a 56-inch model which at this stage is still in prototype mode however Company executives are confident that 3D without glasses could be on sale in Australia by Xmas 2011.
In the test that we took we found that the best pace to view was dead-centre in front of it. If you stood a little to the left or the right, the image come out of sync but I suspect after talking to Toshiba engineers that they are very close to delivering a significantly wider viewing angle by the end of the year.
Toshiba’s tablet is very intriguing, and while the Android version will be on sale by April I suspect that the Windows version which Toshiba Australia executives are describing as being more of a “production input” device will not go on sale in Australia this after a Toshiba US executive told me that there was too many problems with the windows version to put it on sale in 2011 in the USA.
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“We are currently working closely with Microsoft and I suspect that we will get a new OS version for tablets before the end of the year, which will give the device more appeal while speeding up the device”.
According to Toshiba Australia executives the Android model that will go on sale in Australia is the same size as the iPad, but a bit thicker and heavier, with rubberized back. It’s got a full-sized and mini-USB ports, and an HDMI port that can output full, 1080p, high-definition video. It also has a user-replaceable battery, which you may need to do sometimes because it also can run Flash Web content.
When it launches it’s expected to be priced to be “competitive with the iPad”, a Toshiba spokesperson said. Given that the iPad runs between $500 and $830, depending on the configuration, Toshiba has a wide target it can hit.
