Eight months after it was first unveiled to the world, the RAmos W7 Android MID is finally officially available in China for only 999 yuan (~$146), nearly four times less than it's been selling for on eBay.
Pocketables has been following the W7 since it was still an unbranded mystery device, but here's a rundown of its main specs in case you missed them the first 500 times. The device currently runs good old Android 1.5 (upgrades are possible though not guaranteed) and has a 4.8-inch WVGA capacitive touchscreen, one of those HD-decoding Rockchip RK2808 processors clocked at 600MHz, all kinds of video/audio format support (including MKV), WiFi, 128MB of RAM, and 8GB of internal storage.
Built-in 3G and support for Adobe Flash (Lite, I assume) were both mentioned eight months ago, but since RAmos only has a W7 teaser image up that doesn't go anywhere right now and ZOL doesn't mention it, neither is confirmed to be included. Considering the low price, though, I'd say no on both accounts but who knows.
A few months ago, there was also some talk of the device having legitimate access to Android Market and all the Google apps, but it seems highly unlikely. ZOL does specifically mention Gmail, Maps, and Gtalk, but I still need to see it in action to believe it.
A member of the mumumusic forums has already posted some very nice photos of the W7 and is sharing hands-on impressions in installments. So far, the device is shaping up to be quite good for the price. It's certainly more compelling than the eviGroup Wallet MID and a lot of the other Android MIDs from China we've seen. I may have to look into getting one.
Thanks, ChowFun!
Hello, do you know where we can get it without being Ebay? Thanks
A few stores taking pre-orders or expecting to get some stock..
houseofdap.com
mp4nation.com
allpmp.com
I have to say it does look nice and the build looks good. Do like the styling. However there are a few issues already. Firstly everyone exporting it seems to be coming up with absolutely ludicrous price bumps. Secondly I would expect performance to be sluggish with the ARM9 based RK2808 and 128mb of ram. A proprietary connector in the place of where a 3.5mm headphone jack should be is not helping much either. Android 1.5 and knowing Ramos probably no plans to update to 2.1 or higher, again not ideal.
Android Market is another lingering question but not completely unrealistic as they have been promising it and other cheap Chinese MID’s like the Moonse/Apad MID seem to have implemented the Market.
I’m still at a loss though as to why we have not seen any cortex based android MID’s emerge from chinese manufacturers. When you consider that the A8 based wits a81/Wielession MID is on sale now for $200 (ok it’s Win ce 6.0 but still) you wonder why other manufacturers have not followed suit. If they ever manage to implement the promised capacitive screen/android 2.1 build that could be interesting although the hardware design does not look that great.
However…despite the mentioned short comings, at the china price the W7 may just be worth it for a budget option. But with most exporters listing it at over $220 not sure that price can be justified based on the hardware. Have to see how it’s received…
Will you guys be doing a review on this? I’m really interested in how this will handle video playback!
Nice MID but 128MB of RAM is not sufficient for multi tasking….even HTC has 256MB…
I wonder if the android dev community will try and root this thing and upgrade it themselves and make custom roms for it. Its already at 1.5 where u need to be to root