Polaroid Working On Three Ice Cream Sandwich Tablets

Polaroid surprised us earlier this week by unveiling its SC1630, an Android-based 'smart camera' that doubles as a phone. However, it seems the company is also interested in jumping on the tablet bandwagon. Visitors to the company's booth at CES have spied not one but three Android tablets scheduled to launch later this year.

Though Polaroid didn't mention anything about the version of Android its smart camera is running on, the company is advertising these as Ice Cream Sandwich devices and says they'll ship with Android 4.0 from launch. Of course, it wouldn't be a Polaroid product if the company wasn't also touting these tablets' picture-taking abilities. As such, these are being referred to as "tablet+camera" devices. Engagdet reports that these devices will be sold as the Spectrum 7, 8, and 9 when they hit the market later this year.

Details on these devices are a little thin on the ground for now. However, we do know that they'll pack a 1 GHz Cortex A8 processor, 1 GB of RAM, front and rear-facing cameras, up to 16 GB of external storage, WiFi and HDMI out. The Spectrum 9 will also have Bluetooth 3.0. Polaroid hasn't made any official announcement yet, but we'll keep our eyes peeled and update when we know more, such as pricing and actual availability.

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Jane McEntegart works in marketing communications at Intel and was previously Manager of Content Marketing at ASUS North America. Before that, she worked for more than seven years at Tom's Guide and Tom's Hardware, holding such roles as Contributing Editor and Senior News Editor and writing about everything from smartphones to tablets and games consoles.

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9 Comments Comment from the forums

captaincharisma

i hope they come in chocolate :)
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okibrian

If Polaroid can make a comeback then more power to them, but they really need to look into making quality products. Most current models of digital cameras are CRAP. They feel cheap and no longer work in less than a year. It is a shame too because much of what we have in digital photography we would not have if not for Polaroid.
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southernshark

okibrianIf Polaroid can make a comeback then more power to them, but they really need to look into making quality products. Most current models of digital cameras are CRAP. They feel cheap and no longer work in less than a year. It is a shame too because much of what we have in digital photography we would not have if not for Polaroid.

Unfortunately that's true of pretty much all digital point and shoot cameras. Maybe some of you handle them better than me, but I break those LCD screens like popcorn. Compare the build of even a so called quality point and shoot to a cell phone and the difference is obvious. I'd rather the camera be really tough and hard to break, rather than gimmicky.

Worst item I have bought in years was the Pentax camera of adventure, a supposedly shock proof and water proof camera. The LCD screen cracked in my pocket. If a cell phone did that people would be outraged. But in the world of digital cameras, its all the owners fault (you know you aren't supposed to put point and shoot cameras in your pocket... you carry them in boxes or something.... and then they wonder why people have stopped buying them). Anyway Pentax is junk, and threw that model off my roof. But the others ones are nearly just as bad. Oddly enough the only one I have never broken is a Kodak. But its probably just lucky (Although even with luck it must better built than a Pentax).
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southernshark

As for this product, the specs on the one model don't sound so great, but of course we don't know the price point. We also don't know the specs on the other ones.
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fulle

I'm fairly certain that's a typo on the "1 GHz Cortex A8 processor". A8 would suggest a bit older single core part, in the current tablet market dual and quad core Cortex A9 SOCs are used. For an example, the Tegra 2 SOC uses a dual core Cortex A9, and the Tegra 3 SOC uses a quad core cortex A9... with an additional, "companion core". The likelihood of a product like this releasing with a Cortex A8, is incredibly unlikely.

Someone at some point said A8 on the Spectrum models, and all the parrot reporters just went out repeating that all over the internet.... Engaget, android phone sites, and so on. So, I'm not presenting this as an issue with Toms, this is just where I read my parrot report articles.
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I bought a Canon Powershot SD in 2009 , lugged it backpacking across Europe, China, and japan, and taken it out on a dozen or so rock climbing trips, scratched up the LCD screen but nothing ever broke and it's working great. Digital Cameras are just another you get what you pay for, who is pentex anyway?
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"Polaroid" isn't Polaroid. It is just a branding company that puts its purchased name on what they can.
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Gus99999: So true. I bought a cheap 'Polaroid' 7' tablet, it was actually just produced by a company called Southern Telecom.
For those interesting, the thing sucks. Resistive touchscreen, and it's still sluggish despite the 1GHz A8 processor. Ironically, it also has no camera. Runs Android 2.3. It retails for $120, and is not worth it at that price.
Since this one had an A8 processor, its entirely possible that the next one might too. Who knows.
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eddieroolz

Not the first name that comes to mind, but if they can provide decent sub-$250 tablet then it would be nice.
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