While Android “Honeycomb” had fairly strict hardware restrictions that kept most low-end tablets from ever getting past Android 2.x, this isn’t the case with Android 4.0 ICS. With lower restrictions, we are starting to see new entry-level tablets arrive on scene that take advantage of ICS.

One of these is the ViewSonic ViewPad e70. At $169, you get Android 4.0, a low-res 800×480 display, and an unidentified ARM-based 1GHz single core processor. Still, the device is said to be fairly responsive for such lower-end specs and manages to have a capacitive touchscreen over the cheaper ‘resistive’ variety.

The e70 also has a Micro-SD card slot for expansion, micro-HDMI, and 4G of storage. Honestly, I feel like 4GB is rather paltry for a tablet, but keep in mind this is an entry-level model.

The bad news? No official Google Android Market, instead we have the Amazon Appstore and Amazon Kindle app pre-installed.
While the Ainol Novo 7 still manages to retain the record for lowest-priced ICS tablet, at least Viewsonic’s offering is from a little more recognized and trusted brand who knows how to make decent displays.

Additionally, the Viewsonic uses an ARM processor, which means better compatibility than the MIPS-based Novo 7.

ViewSonic is expected to ship the E70 sometime during the first quarter of 2012.

[ source ]

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News from Engadget about the Ainol Novo 7 Basic (or Knight Paladin, in some Chinese retailers parlance) coming to the US for approximately $119 didn’t make much of a splash so far. At the least, it was no more a splash than the news about this strange, very Chinese slate being chosen as the first official Ice Cream Sandwich tablet endorsed by Google’s Andy Rubin, of all people. Obviously there’s no big rush to get this device as a holiday present or something. But even if it were, there’s no vendor on US soil to get it in time — it doesn’t matter if it was really endorsed by Google, or maybe it was just a joke.

The Ainol Novo 7 Basic by its specs does actually look like a joke. First, with the US 7″ tablet market dominated by the Nook Color, Kindle Fire, and Nook Tablet with their 1024×600 IPS-class LCD displays bringing in an abysmal 800 x 480 TFT LCD 7-incher is a recipe for failure. Especially when adding just $20 worth of 1024 x 600 display to this Ainol could bring the tablet into more or less comparable state for competition.

XBurst SIMD instruction set, 8-stage pipeline, 16/32-bit LP-DDR/DDR/DDR2 SD RAM interface, 8/16-bit SRAM interface, NOR Flash SLC/MLC/TLC NAND Flash interface, 4/8/12/16/20/24 bit ECC, SRAM interface, 12-ch DMA, 500MHz Xburst VPU, 1080p HD video decode, 444MHz Vivante GC860 GPU, OpenGL ES2.0 and ES1.0, OpenVG1.1, AC97/I2S/SPDIF, Audio Codec, LCD interface, LVDS, TV Encoder, EPD interface, 16.7MP camera interface, Touch ADC, 1-wire, PCM, I2C, SPI, UART, SIM-IF, SD/MMC/SDIO, USB Host, USB OTG 2.0, TS-IF, GPIO, Ethernet MAC, OTP Slave

The tablet itself looks like an ordinary cheap Chinese device of a 7-inch caliber. It sports 512 MB of RAM, 8 GB ROM, bezel buttons, 0.3 MP front camera, 2 MP rear camera, microSD slot, mini-USB port, 4000 mAh battery, HDMI 1.3 video out, but no Bluetooth, and no GPS. However, the presence of USB host may bring in the possibility of using a 3G USB dongle with the device. Attaching USB keyboard/mouse are also possible, maybe even some 2.5″ HDD enclosures with small power consumption.

So far, it is shipped not with the declared ICS 4.0.3, but with some quirky beta of ICS 4.0.1. That is, if you’re lucky: the tablet at a Chinese online store is advertised as Honeycomb 3.2 device. Android CTS certification notwithstanding, list of working apps from the Google’s Market (pre-installed) is quite short. Obviously, one thing is certification, the other thing is a real-life implementation.

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