Once upon a time tablets aimed at gamers had touchscreen displays surrounded by gaming buttons so you could hold the tablet in two hands while playing it like a giant Gameboy or PlayStation Portable.
These days companies are taking a different approach. The NVIDIA Shield Tablet is aimed at gamers… but the 8 inch tablet has a touchscreen display and no special gaming buttons. Instead NIVDIA offers an optional wireless gamepad.
Now Chinese tablet maker Ramos is taking a similar approach with the Ramos i9s Game Edition.
The new tablet from Ramos features an 8.9 inch, 1920 x 1200 pixel IPS display, an Intel Atom Z3735F quad-core Bay Trail processor, 2GB of RAM, and 32GB of storage.
It runs Android 4.4 KitKat, has a 5MP rear camera, stereo speakers, micro HDMI output, and a microS Dcard slot.
But what really makes this tablet a Gaming Edition device are the bundled accessories. It comes with a Bluetooth game controller and a stand that lets you prop up the Ramos i9s Gaming Edition tablet while you’re playing.
While the Intel Atom Z3735F isn’t the fastest mobile chip on the market, it scores pretty well in benchmarks and should have enough power to handle most modern Android games.
The Ramos i9s Gaming Edition tablet is available from Chinese retailer JD for about $255. There’s no word on if or when this model will be sold internationally.
Companies really need to stop calling tablets used with wireless controllers “gaming tablets” – IMO that’s a complete misnomer if you need a surface/stand with which to prop up the tablet. Until the tablet has a controller that physically attaches to it, it’s no different than any other tablet paired with a bluetooth controller.
Unfortunately, most of the tablets with built-in/detachable controllers have been pretty garbage. I was really hoping Nvidia’s shield tablet would break the mold here, but they failed to release an attachable controller…
My guess is that no matter how cool looking the controller is it will suffer from lag due to bog standard components being used, but hey prove me wrong, China!
Also I have the black version of that stand.
It’s a little bulky but quite versatile.
I don’t think the Shield controller is Bluetooth. I think it’s some kind of adhoc wifi if memory serves. I seem to remember them talking about the better speed and increased bandwidth so they can do audio and everything with it too. No?
ahh, you’re right. I’ll update the article to make it clear that it’s a wireless controller, but not necessarily Bluetooth.
https://shield.nvidia.com/controller-faq/