The Attack of the iPad Clones - Cheap Android Tablet PC & MID devices from China

by elaine

Since the iPad launches, there has been much discussion about the possibility of an android tablet PC as an alternative to the iPad. Due to the open source nature of android, several manufacturers in China have been launching their own version of cheap android tablet PC.
Tech blogs has been reporting these android tablet PCs since early April this year with different variants of names from Apad, iPed to iRobot.
APad and iRobot is mostly referred to the so called Moonse E-7001 which is based on Rockchip RK2808. It is a 7" android tablet PC or MID running on Android 1.5. It has a 7 inch, 800 x 480 pixel display with resistive touch screen, a 600MHz ARM-based CPU and 550 MHz DSP (Digital Signal Processor), 2GB of storage, and an SDHC card slot for expansion. It also has 802.11b/g WiFi for internet connectivity.
The iPed which is unveiled by the Japan News Network is actually the third android tablet PC launch by Eken therefore it is also known officially as the Eken M003. It is an 8 inch devices based on WonderMedia VIA MW8505 which runs Android 1.6. The appearance of this device is almost an identical clone of the iPad with a smaller display and wider bezel. Even the packaging box is also a copy of the iPad's with the "iPad" written as the "iPed".
These cheap android tablet PC is priced at around $90 to $190 which is more than 60% cheaper to the most basic iPad which is at $499 and this really is a quite a bargain. All of them support basic android apps such as Google Maps, Gmail, Facebook, Twitter, Youtube, and so on. These android tablet PC and MID also support the android market which has a huge collection of apps downloadable therefore it may be a perfect device for casual internet, eBook reading & multimedia entertainment on the couch.
Let's hope that these cheap android tablet PC will soon be upgraded to Android 2.2 so that Flash will be supported. With Flash supported, these android tablet devices will transfrom from mere iPad clones to the iPad Killer.