Underwhelmed by Apple’s new iPad? Well, then, good thing it’s going to get some competition. The folks at TechRadar have gotten confirmation that Asus has an Eee-branded tablet device in the works: the Eee Pad.
Asus Corporate VP Eric Chen spilled the beans when asked if his company intended to compete with Apple’s latest gadget:
“A slate? Yes, sure. We have the Eee Pad. Which right now is still under development. Basically, it will have an ARM CPU and a 3G connection so you are always connected to the internet, so just like with the Eee Book you are always connected.
“And you can choose to play video or something, when you like. Now the key is how to combine the content together. That will be the key. We have studied how people will want to connect to their content and also how they want to interact with the user interface (UI).
“You look at the iPhone, for example. The reason the iPhone is so successful – and call quality is really not that good – is the UI function, I think, is just the best. So this is also the way that we need to improve.”
That pretty much validates the slew of rumors we’ve been hearing recently, although judging from TechRadar’s write-up, Chen wasn’t willing to go into more detail. For what it’s worth, the rumor mill suggests the Eee Pad will feature an Nvidia Tegra system-on-a-chip (presumably of the second-gen variety) and will launch in June with a price tag somewhere under $500.
The Eee Pad’s ARM processor should rule out Windows 7, so we wouldn’t be surprised if Asus ended up with Google’s Android—perhaps with a custom user interface on top of it, since Chen seems to realize the importance of having a snazzy UI when going head-to-head with Apple.
