The most exciting Android tablet this year is coming from Dell

September 22, 2014

The most exciting Android tablet this year is coming from Dell

Intel and Dell unite to produce the world's thinnest tablet.

You wouldn't know it by the name, but the Dell Venue 8 7000 Series is shaping up to be a pretty special tablet. Measuring a measly 6mm in thickness, this Atom-powered Android slate surpasses even Sony's Xperia Z3 Tablet Compact in the race to be the world's thinnest tablet. But whereas the Sony device has sizeable bezels all around its display, the Venue 8 has almost none on three of its sides. There's less than an inch of bezel on one side, which houses the speaker and front-facing camera while also serving as a handle for the user. It's the same approach that Sharp took with the Aquos Crystal smartphone and the visual effect is just as striking.

Michael Dell was on hand at the Intel Developer Forum to demonstrate the Venue 8 on stage. Launching "in time for the holidays," the new tablet will be the first to feature Intel's RealSense depth-mapping technology, which formed the focus of Dell's demo. Employing no less than three cameras on the tablet's back, Intel's photo technology allows for post-capture refocusing and other fun stuff made possible by having depth information — such as precise space measurements and selective color exclusion based on distance from the camera.

An aluminum unibody shell and an OLED display both contribute to the Venue 8's thinness as well as its overall appeal. The 8.4-inch display promises to be a particular highlight, as it comes with a Quad HD (2,560 x 1,600) resolution that should make for superbly crisp and beautiful images. That high resolution didn't make much of a difference on the 5.5-inch LG G3, but the larger screen of this Dell Venue tablet could benefit more from it. In any case, it looks like an exciting device that's been engineered to reach the very edge of what's possible, and now it's just a matter of waiting to see the price and specific release date that Michael Dell has in mind.

Thanks to The Verge for the article