UPDATE: 22nd May 2012. Following initial delays, and promises that the Child Pad would be on sale by the middle of May, we've been told by Archos that the budget Android tablet has yet again been hit by more delays. This time there's no information at all about when it will go on sale. As soon as we can get our hands on one we'll bring you a full review.
Archos Child Pad
There are more new tablets around than you can shake an iPad at. Archos wants a slice of the budget market with its new Child Pad: a 7-inch tablet running Android Ice Cream Sandwich (ICS), which will retail for £99 in March.
The design and interface have been tailored to appeal to kids. There's a Kids App Store that includes 10,000 apps in 14 family-friendly categories. As well as games, you can download books, comics, multimedia, sports apps and more.
Archos has tweaked the Android interface to make it easy for kids to use.
On the home screen, for example, there are folders for direct access to Games, Learning, Entertainment, Apps, Video, Music, Pictures and Puzzles.
28 apps are pre-installed on the Archos Child Pad, including the ever-popular Angry Birds.
The specifications are impressive considering the sub-£100 price: a 1GHz processor and 1GB of RAM.
Tablets for children were incredibly popular during Christmas 2011, with Leapfrog's LeapPad Explorer and VTech's InnoTab kids tablets selling out as parents rushed to entertain their children ... and protect their own iPads.
Archos has a strong history with multimedia devices, and has produced a number of tablets – most recenbtly the Archos 101 Internet Tablet.
There's no word on storage capacity and expansion, but we do know that parental control software will be pre-loaded to keep little ones safe when browsing the web.
The Child Pad was originally slated to go on sale at the end of March. It was then delayed until mid-May, and now there's no ETA at all, so it may be another month or even longer before you'll be able to buy one. We'll keep this article updated when we receive more information.
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Comments
Louise Burnyeat said: these are on sale now so much for updating the article
Lutche1978 said: i just bought childpad for kid but i have difficulties to open it i mean to unlock please tell me how to unlock coz i think the screen freeze at the same time my kid did not have a chance to play it yet
M Cooper Hollis said: App lock from google play works a treat Looks like a safe
Paulolner said: you can already buy it just goto the arnova website
Andrey Guryev said: hi thereanybody knows a tablet with a touch screen lock mechanism hard key or a program tool to restrict my baby to touch the screen when she watching learning program
Johnyboy said: How eminently sensible about time a child safe phone was made available