Saturday, November 05, 2011

Barnes & Noble Set to Launch Nook Tablet; $99 eReader with "No Annoying Ads"

PublishersLunch
Engadget has obtained a number of internal Barnes & Noble documents in advance of Monday's Nook press conference. The materials indicate the company will launch a $249 fully-featured media tablet with specs that meet or exceed the Kindle Fire. With Amazon's tablet releasing November 15 and Kobo's new Vox already out, the Nook tablet it set to arrive in stores for demonstration on November 15 and be available to customers on November 16.
The internal spec documents indicate it will have double the ram of Fire, a faster processor, and twice as much internal storage, at 16 GB. They are say it offers "everything the Nook Color [does] + the best in HD entertainment," boasting apps for Netflix, Hulu Plus, Pandora and more. Visually it looks similar to Nook Color, and at 14.1 ounces they claim it's slightly lighter than Fire (and 1.7 ounces lighter than Nook Color).
At the lower end, Nook has a refreshed version 1.1 of their Nook Simple Touch, first launched in May. The biggest news, though, is the price drop to $99, which matches Amazon's brand-new touchscreen model with "no annoying ads." (The ad-free version of Amazon's touchscreen reader is priced at $139.) BN is claiming a "breakthrough E Ink display with 25% faster page turns than any other eReader."
For Nook Color, they are dropping the price to $199 and added what they call their "largest software update" that adds "tablet essentials," including Hulu Plus and a number of music services.
Engadget

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