We’re barely two weeks into 2014 and Samsung has already announced four tablets. But many people, myself included, were expecting a fifth tablet, the Galaxy Tab 3 Lite, to also be announced at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. Unfortunately, it wasn’t, but thanks to Samsung Poland, the manual for said tablet has been released.
What does it reveal? Actually not that much. And this is where the Polish retailer X-Com comes in. They have the Galaxy Tab 3 Lite available for preorder, including a detailed spec sheet. The first thing that stands out is the processor inside isn’t made by Qualcomm, or Samsung, or Broadcom. Instead, it’s the Marvell PXA986. That uses two ARM Cortex A9 cores clocked at 1.2 GHz and a weird GPU I’ve never heard of called the “Vivante GC1000”. There’s also 1 GB of RAM, 8 GB of storage, a microSD card slot of course, and the screen resolution remains the same as the old Galaxy Tab 3: 1024 x 600 pixels.
Who exactly is this tablet for? If you’re ultra cost conscious and can’t afford the Nexus 7, then this is for you. It’s estimated that the Galaxy Tab 3 Lite will cost no more than $150. And if you add 3G, that number shouldn’t creep up to more than $250. If all you want is a spare video player for around the house or on trips, then it’s hard to find a quality product in this price range, so this might just be the perfect tablet.
