7-inch Spark Linux Tablet – Insert Witty Amazon Kindle Fire Related Joke Here
- What runs a Linux distribution that isn’t Android and measures 7 Inches?
- Spark.
Not funny? Well, that’s what you get for even thinking about using a custom-cooked Linux distribution on your tablet computer, punk!
On the other hand, creators of the Spark don’t seem to have a problem with that, which is exactly why they’re elbow deep in the process of releasing a Linux-powered tablet.
The rig is a 7-inch capacitive touch screen measuring 800 and 480 in the important dimensions. Behind that hides 512MB of RAM for muscle, 4GB flash for storage. Of course it’s got Wi-Fi. 3G didn’t make it to the handheld, but it is going to be added along with GPS in a future release.
The device depends on a Mali 400 GPU and a 1GHz Cortex-A9 ARM CPU to run the show. You aren’t seeing things if you find the combination somewhat familiar. Computer-on-a-stick (Cotton candy for the Discworld-impaired) sports the same hardware. So does the Samsung Galaxy S II. Apart from the fact that the Spark is clocked 200 MHz below those.
And what’s the show it runs? Linux. A MeeGo spinoff, Mer + KDE Plasma Active, to be precise. Out of the box it does not run Android apps, but the curious, yet highly-advanced geek that you are will find a way to weld an Android distro on it and do it anyway.
The default operating system goes something like this:
The asking price reportedly stays at the very wallet- and customer-friendly $265 / €200 / £165. Expected time of delivery for the first batch is May at the moment, but pre-orders start in February.
via Liliputing, photo via zockah.de
