The Archos GamePad is a 7 inch Android tablet with built-in buttons and joysticks designed to make video games easier to play without obscuring the on-screen actions by placing your thumbs on a touchscreen.

Already available in Europe, Archos showed off the GamePad at CES last week, and promises the tablet will be available in the US in the next few weeks (probably around February) for $169.

Update: Make that March, for $179.

Archos GamePad

While most Android games are designed for touchscreen displays, Archos offers a button-mapping tool that lets you move the action to the sides of the screen.

Those buttons can also come in handy if you’re running emulators to play classic Nintendo, PlayStation, or other games. I’ll just go ahead and assume that you’ve legally purchased those games and ripped them yourself rather than downloading them from the internet.

The GamePad features a 1.6 GHz Rockchip RK3066 dual core processor, Mali 400 graphics, a 7 inch, 1024 x 600 pixel display, 8GB of storage, and Android 4.1 software.

In addition to the physical controls, the tablet features a capacitive touchscreen with support for 5-point multitouch input.

via ARMDevices

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5 replies on “Archos GamePad $169 gaming tablet coming to America in February”

  1. The price may be higher but I think I prefer the Nvidia Shield because controls on the sides of the screen make this device possibly impractically big. I can’t tell without holding one in my hands but this 7″ device will probably have a width more comparable to a 10″ tablet, at that sort of size you’re not keeping this in a pocket like you would with a PSP that this design appears to be based from.

    1. I like the layout and controls shown on the JXD S7300 Android gaming tablet a little better than this (real D-pad as opposed to a button cluster), although there is no guarantee of quality in this piece either, really.

    2. It fits any jacket pocket easily. I can carry the Archos Gamepad in any of my jacket pockets which I’ve been carrying 7″ tablets in nearly every day when going outside (in jacket cold weather) since Archos had their first 7″ tablets on the market since about 2005. The Archos Gamepad is actually impressively thin and light for a 7″ gaming tablet. My guess is that the Archos Gamepad is more pocketable than the Nvidia Shield, because the Nvidia shield seems to be quite thicker and maybe also heavier even though its 5″ screen is smaller.

  2. archos needs to build in all codecs to unit for sale and not require US users to go to their archos web store to buy a needed codec.

  3. From what I saw of the CES coverage this item was a bit shakey in performance and consistency when demoed on the floor.
    The emulator lover in me likes the design, but the tech geek/former retail dude says this is going to be just painful as a daily driver simply because of where it comes from.

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