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Sony engineers are building a 9.4-inch display tablet that will be PlayStation certified, reports suggest.
It is claimed that the uniquely shaped tablet will be an outlet for Sony’s new PlayStation Suite framework – a platform allowing developers to port new and old games to the Android operating system.
Tech site Engadget claims the tablet, codenamed ‘S1’, will run on Google’s Android 3.0 ‘Honeycomb’ OS, and is being developed across several Sony divisions.
Sony has not confirmed the story. The company has yet to confirm an interest in building tablet devices.
The rumour is that the S1 is being built by engineers at Sony’s VAIO unit, with help from the company’s PlayStation, Reader, and Sony Ericsson divisions.
Engadget also said the S1’s form-factor will be one-of-a-kind, built to feel like "an open paperback stuffed into the back pocket, or a magazine folded backward upon itself such that only a single page is visible to read."
It is thought the device will be built on Sony’s new on-demand content service, called Qriocity, which supplies music, games, e-books, and video.
If the rumour is true, the Tablet would represent another ploy from Sony to expand its business onto new and emerging platforms.
The company appears to have turned a corner; it is set to break a fifteen-year tradition by allowing games to play on non-PlayStation platforms, and even on platforms that Sony doesn’t own.
Next month Sony Ericsson will release Xperia Play – a smartphone with the same ‘open-platform’ as the rumoured tablet device.
Like Xperia Play, the S1 is thought will come packaged with a pre-installed PS1 game.
The device is thought will run on a Tegra 2 processor, and feature 1280×800 resolution, cameras and other sundries.
The device appears to be close to being finalised, as a price of $599 has already been set for a Wifi-only version.
