There are a number of tablets available with a 9.7-inch screen, but the best and most well known have either an Apple or a Samsung badge. There are a number of devices available for sale in China running either Android or Windows, or in some case both operating systems. Today we’ve word of another tablet with a 9.7-inch display, but this one made by Taiwanese company ASUS: the ZenPad 9.7 Z500M, with an internal model designation of P027 as already revealed. Although the device has not yet been officially announced, it has been put through the FCC and its specification has been revealed. There’s good news for ASUS and tablet fans, too: the device has a respectable specification.
Firstly, that 9.7-inch screen appears to have a resolution of 2,048 by 1,536 pixels and is a Tianma TM097QDSP panel with support for the ASUS Z Stylus pen. The Z Stylus uses dedicated electronic circuits and a 1.2mm tip for a precise, accurate input. The ASUS Z Stylus is recognized by the screen when hovering a short distance above the display. The stylus has two buttons and the display also features palm rejection technologies to prevent accidental inputs. There’s a six core MediaTek MT8176V System-on-Chip, clocked at up to 2.1 GHz in the FCC documentation. This MediaTek chipset is optimized for tablets and is designed around a big.LITTLE architecture, with a dual core ARM Cortex-A72 backed up by a quad core ARM Cortex-A53 cluster. MediaTek have designed the chipset to be able to run all six application cores at maximum speed in order to deliver best performance. The System-on-Chip is backed up by 4 GB of RAM and a choice of 64 GB or 128 GB of internal storage. Around the back, ASUS have provided an 8MP camera, backed up by a 5MP front facing camera. There’s high speed 802.11 Wi-Fi plus a 5,900 mAh battery and Android 6.0 Marshmallow runs the show.
ASUS have released a large number of tablets over the last few years with varying specification depending on the markets they are destined for. The Z500M model, with what might be considered as an industry standard 9.7-inch, 4:3 aspect ratio screen, could be a strong seller providing ASUS can market the tablet to the right audience. Unfortunately, at this time we do not know then the Z500M will be released or how much it will be, but we will let you know when we have more information.
