Kite tablet runs Ubuntu 12.04 and Android 4.0, makes dual booting look viable
The last time a Linux tablet made news was when the KDE Vivaldi tablet was being worked on, and while it did ship to buyers, it didn’t get very much coverage and certainly hasn’t changed the tablet market yet. Of course, even though the Vivaldi may not have caught on, the idea of a Linux-based tablet certainly isn’t done yet.
While it isn’t purely a Linux tablet, the Kite tablet from DaVinci Mobile Technology may serve to bring Linux on tablets back into the spotlight, even if only a little. The tablet is very likely rebranded generic Chinese hardware (although it doesn’t look bad at all), but the device runs both Android 4.0 and Ubuntu 12.04. The hardware backing up the software looks quite good as well, and includes a Samsung Exynos 4412 quad-core processor, 2GB of RAM, and 10.1-inch 1920 x 1200 display.
Currently, the tablet is up for preorder in Europe for the price of €309, or about $415 USD, although direct conversions aren’t always accurate. There’s no telling whether it will make its way to the US, but I wouldn’t expect it anytime soon, if at all. It seems that for now, this tablet won’t change the fact that Linux fans currently have make due with dual booting Ubuntu on other tablets like the Nexus 7, with builds supported by the community.
While the build quality of the tablet might be suspect, the hardware specs seem unlikely to lie, and as such this tablet seems like a very interesting proposition to me. Between the high resolution screen and quad-core processor, a docked version of this tablet might be a better laptop replacement than the Transformer series, simply because of the full desktop OS. There’s no telling if or when this tablet will be updated, or how good the support will be, but I’m still glad to see a high quality device on the market running a full Linux desktop OS, even if it does come with Android as a backup.
[Engadget]
