• Motorola Xoom: Priced at $800; Unveiling on Feb 24

    Motorola Xoom: Priced at $800; Unveiling on Feb 24

    Nachiket Mhatre, Feb 07, 2011 1147 hrs IST

    Wi-Fi disabled unless 1 month data plan is purchased

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The iPad 2 killer everyone is excited about just got a price tag and release date, thanks to a Best Buy advert. The ad puts the release for Motorola's Xoom tablet on February 24 and the price tag is a hefty $800 (Rs. 36,000 approx.). That's cheap by no means, but the Honeycomb tablet sure packs in a massive wallop with its dual core NVIDIA Tegra 2 chip clocked in at 1GHz, a gigabyte of RAM and a 1280 x 800 display that'll do HD without a sweat. We hope the prices aren't jacked any further after the 3G connectivity is upgraded to ultra-fast LTE 4G.
 

Look closely below the tablet photograph in the Best Buy pamphlet and you'll notice the fine print that says you need to buy at least a month of data subscription plan to activate the Wi-Fi connectivity. Motorola isn't going to let you use your home Internet infrastructure till you pay some moolah to Verizon for their troubles. One wonders if the same strategy will be employed when the tablet reaches our shores, but one thing is for sure - some wily hacker most probably will have created a workaround for the restriction by then. We believe Motorola disabling a crucial connectivity feature to appease its telecom partner is hitting under the belt, especially since it already commands a premium of $800.




 

Image Source: Engadget

 


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Discussion Board
(2) Comments
Kevin Juft
,Allentown, PA, on Feb 07, 2011 11:36 PM
Big fail on Motorola's part. They should have offered more options. Consumers like to have an option. Also, requiring users to purchase at least 1 month of data in order to unlock wifi is just plain wrong! http://www.xoomblog.com/is-verizon-locking-down-the-wi-fi-on-the-motorola-xoom/
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Sameer
,Mumbai, on Feb 07, 2011 12:35 PM
Its plain rubbish on the part of motorola to disable something as basic as WiFi in this age. When phones worth $200 have WiFi, why would they want to be such stupid.
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