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    Sharp unveils 7-inch Android Media Tablet with WiMAX, keeps Galapagos line going

    Sharp unveils 7-inch Android Media Tablet with WiMAX, keeps Galapagos line going

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    Sharp's not letting its Galapagos line of e-readers die, introducing a new 7-inch Media Tablet with some compelling WiMAX features.

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    Sharp Galapagos Media Tablet
    Sharp Galapagos Media Tablet

    This past September, Sharp killed off its 5.5- and 10.8-inch Galapagos e-readers after less than a year on the market — but the company's not giving up yet, introducing a 7-inch Media Tablet with some intriguing WiMAX capabilities. The Honeycomb slate combines a dual-core Nvidia Tegra 2 processor, 1GB of RAM, and 8GB of storage with a 1024 x 600 TFT-LCD capacitive touchscreen. A 5-megapixel rear-facing camera and a 2-megapixel front-facing shooter are also on board, but the standout feature here is WiMAX: it connects to Japanese carrier UQ's network for data rates as high as 40Mbps down and 10Mbps up, and can share that speed with up to seven different devices over Wi-Fi. Perhaps not so surprisingly, Sharp didn't provide any battery life estimates for WiMAX usage.

    The tablet takes advantage of Sharp's Galapagos Store, which offers 40,000 newspapers, books, and comic books, and comes preloaded with an array of software, including an Aquos Remote app that controls Sharp's line of televisions and Blu-ray players. It's slated to ship in Japan on December 9th — no pricing information has been announced yet — and while the Media Tablet does offer some compelling features, we'll have to wait and see if that's enough for it to avoid the fate of its predecessors.