It appears the rumors of a tablet by RIM (NASDAQ: RIMM) were accurate, as RIM unveiled its PlayBook, a 7-inch 1024x600 widescreen touch screen tablet on Monday. My observation in last Friday's commentary that RIM was clearly not interested in playing catch-up by blindly mirroring the capabilities of the iPad appears to be accurate--RIM was quick to tout the PlayBook as the "first professional tablet." 

The hardware roundup looks impressive, and consists of a 1GHz dual-core ARM processor, 1GB of RAM and an OpenGL capable GPU. Connectivity options are a MicroUSB and MicroHDMI port, while 802.11n WiFi and Bluetooth rounds up the wireless front. A 3MP front-facing camera and a 5MP rear-facing one rounds up the announced hardware specifications. As reported earlier, the PlayBook will pair with a BlackBerry smartphone to share its 3G data connection. RIM did confirm that built-in 3G and 4G options are planned for eventual release. 

The use of a smaller display allowed RIM to design the PlayBook with a thickness of 9.7mm and a weight of 400grams, both of which are superior to the larger iPad. Under the hood, the PlayBook will run the "BlackBerry Tablet OS," which is an operating system based on QNX. QNX's founder said that because the underlying QNX was "designed with symmetric multiprocessing for multitasking," that it will "enable things you've never seen before."

Eager to avoid the inferior browser that has dogged earlier iterations of its smartphones; RIM says that the PlayBook will support "full web experience" with HTML and Flash 10.1 support. Developers will be able to create applications using Flash or AIR, as well as Java, web APIs or native applications. It is understood that apps written for the upcoming BlackBerry OS 6 will also run on the PlayBook. 

Overall, RIM does appear to have a strong product with the PlayBook, which is slated to arrive in the U.S. at the beginning of next year, and "international markets" in the second quarter.  In the meantime, you can watch the promotional video about the BlackBerry Playbook Tablet on YouTube here.

For more on this story:
- check out this article at CNET News
- check out this article at The Register
- check out this article at Ars Technica
- check out this article at Telegraph.co.uk

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