KDE’s ‘open’ Spark Tablet goes up for preorder

Following an announcement from KDE developer Aaron Seigo last month on its upcoming Spark tablet, the device is now available for pre-order over at the Make Play Live website. A credit card is not required at this time as it just secures you a place in line to purchase the tablet once it becomes physically available a bit later in the year. It's been said that it should start shipping to customers sometime in May.

What mostly sparks the Spark versus the mass of other tablets on the market is the platform it will run on. It's not your typical Android tablet, rather it will ship with a tablet-friendly user interface based on KDE's Plasma environment and behind the scenes is the Mer platform which is a community-driven mobile Linux environment that is more or less an extension of the MeeGo project. Ie. This will be the first of its kind in a new breed of upcoming lower cost ‘Plasma Active' tablets.

Specs wise, the Spark features a 7-inch 800 x 480 display and is powered by a 1GHz ARM processor, Mali 400 GPU, 512MB of RAM and with 4GB of internal storage. There's a 1.3 MP front-facing webcam tacked on along with WiFi and a microSD card slot.

Keen to see it action? Take a look at the brief video demonstration below :-

More details including an in-depth Q & A here.

KitGuru says: We're hearing that it will launch at €200 (US $262). If it gathers enough interest (and it should – an open ARM ecosystem is a lovely thing!) KDE will likely shift focus onto producing a larger 10-inch version with additional features.

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