Hands on with Wikipad: ‘World’s first 2D & 3D tablet without glasses’

There are plenty of tablets on offer at CES International 2012. Some of them are from big players such as Samsung, while others are from small outfits, looking to find a place in an already crowded market. The Wikipad, however, is the only one I’ve seen so far that is taking on 3D and serious gaming right off the bat.

A representative of the company showed me the prototype of the of the 3D tablet which, apart from being a little thicker because of the 3D overlay, functions like any other Android device of the breed. Then again, that’s pretty much what it is.

Rocking an 8″ screen, the tablet boasts 1080p HD video playback, a mini HDMI and USB 2.0 that allows connectivity and compatibility, 8GB of flash storage with expandable micro SD storage to 64GB, and integrated front and rear cameras for photos, video recording, and video chat.

The company reckons its product is the perfect all round tool, ideal for business, pleasure, and education. The pleasure part is a little bulky and comes in the form of a peripheral gaming attachment with controls that will be familiar to any gamer.

Look, you’re not going to be carrying it around on the bus with you, but it does mean that you can play games that don’t react so well to the swipe technology found on tablets. With the quality of tablet-specific games emerging, future iterations could conceivably replace your console. Add in that HDMI output capability and that possibility takes a distinct step closer to reality.

At this stage, however, this is all just speculation as the prototype model on display didn’t fit the gaming attachment.

If the prototype model is anything to go by you probably shouldn’t hold your breath when it comes to the 3D capability. From what I saw, video playback can get pretty sketchy at times.Then again, the Wikipad is the first of its kind, Genesis if you will. One massive plus is that, unlike the glasses-free 3D display of the Nitendo 3DS, it didn’t give me a splitting headache within 10 seconds.

One potentially very cool application of the technology, should it fulfil its promise, is real-time 3D video conferencing. A definite must for any tech-savvy business person.

The tablet will ship internationally in March, so look out for a full review on Gearburn as soon as we get our hands on a working model.