Blackberry launches Playbook tablet

As the tablet market heats up, Blackberry is coming out with its own version of its competition to iPad.  As we said in an earlier post, that future of computing is going to be decided by the mobile computing as opposed to laptops of today.

• 7-inch display, Cortex A9, 1GHz dual-core CPU, 1GB of RAM, an e-reader app

• Ability to work with Blackberry phone and will connect via Bluetooth to BlackBerry devices

• Runs Flash 10.1 and HTML 5 along with supporting hardware accelerated video

• HDMI (HDMI connection can output video to dual displays) and USB ports

• Video playback: 1080p HD Video, H.264, MPEG, DivX, WMV

• Audio playback: MP3, AAC, WMA

• Front and rear-facing camera

• PlayBook is fully compatable with BlackBerry Enterprise Servers right out of the box

• Measurements: 5.1″x7.6″x0.4″ (130mm x 193mm x 10mm)

• Will use new operating system from QNX Software Systems acquired by RIM recently

• Will have full OpenGL and POSIX support

• Will offer 3G and 4G models in future.

It was also announced that BlackBerry Messenger system will be opened up as like a social platform for applications.  It will be available in early 2011, although no price point was mentioned.