JooJoo Tablet Review [Specs, Video]

CrunchPad may have been declared Dead, here comes JooJoo creating life from it’s ashes. Built by Fusion Garage, this tablet is worth a look, even though Apple iPad Video Review claims iPad as the winner.

Note: This is a “early” First Look Review

What’s In: The device runs on a  1.6GHz Intel Atom processor with 1GB RAM.  The screen is Multitouch 12-inch, 1366×768 resolution. On the graphics part, GPU + CPU combination, looks like an Nvidia Ion chipset. Since, the device is able to play 1080p YouTube videos smoothly, it’s supposed to have a good Nvidia acceleration for HD. Currently, only Nvidia Ion finds it`s place in portable FullHD video.

There’s an accelerometer that takes care of the orientations.

Other Features include 3.5mm headphone jack, a microphone jack, a built-in 1.3 megapixel webcam, a charging port and a USB slot.It will ave an option to plugin a 3G card. The built-in speakers for playing back audio are pretty average.

Overall Feel

Browsing on the Tablet is a charm. Page loads pretty fast, though not something comparable with Chrome. The Tab switching animation/transitions are handled very smoothly by the device.

It’s fast, and handles gestures (pinching to go back a level, swiping to move up and down) just fine. There are other gestures that will be included in the final build, like two finger swiping for going back and forth in history and a bookmark swipe, but we didn’t get to see that. But, you can’t zoom into text. That’s partially because the pinching is already used for going in and out of your windows into the home screen, but also partially because the screen is 12 inches. You don’t need to really zoom into text on a laptop-sized screen of 12 inches.

Your home screen is composed of icons—shortcuts—to web applications. The screen is customizable with your own applications, eventually.

As for multitasking, it’s easy to switch among tabs just like the WebOS. For example, if Twitter refreshes in another window and you’re watching a YouTube video, a popup will show and tell you you have something else going on.

On the outside, the body is solid, sturdy. The back is curved and made of a hybrid plastic good on hold, and it doesn’t feel heavy even after prolonged use.

The entire system is just like Chrome OS: Browser. The Browser is based on Webkit, the same engine that powers Safari and Google Chrome.  And they also said they may make LARGER sized tablets as well, with 12 being their smallest size.

Engadget got a handson video review:

And here’s an exclusive one from back in time when JooJoo was half-baked.

Unlike what the video says, the Keyboard is something I’m worried about. The on-screen keyboard is totally crappy and makes it almost impossible to type fast or with both hands. May be future software upgrades will fix that.

The concept remains same as Chrome Netbooks launching year-end: “internet is the application”.

What seemed strange was that there is no support for PDF natively, you have to depend on the online Google Docs for reading all PDFs.

Verdict?

If you want a Chrome OS concept Tablet, JooJoo looks solid.  Fusion Garage had their homework well done on the device specially on the Video/multimedia part.

A Price of $500 definitely worries me coz apple has their miracle iPad set at a similar price.

Of course no one has stress tested the device for heavy videos and webapps. So waiting a while makes sense. Stay tuned for more on the device.

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