Microsoft’s plans to build more hardware products appear to extend beyond its rumoured Surface smartphone. The Verge has learned that the company is also working on a 7-inch gaming tablet. Rumours of such an Xbox Surface tablet first surfaced back in June and appear to be accurate according to the report.
Rather than a smaller version of the Surface tablet, it will sport a custom Windows kernel. It will support traditional tablet functions like messaging but will be focused on gaming. While the final hardware architecture has not been finalized, the selection of components such as a custom ARM processor and high-bandwidth RAM will emphasize this focus. It’s not clear why Microsoft would opt for a customized gaming tablet rather than a Windows one with additional gaming capabilities. The report suggests that it could still be axed in favour of a full Windows version, suggesting that Microsoft may be looking at both options.
The report indicates that the Xbox Surface tablet is in the final stages of implementation. It could be announced as a companion device to the next-generation Xbox gaming console sometime in 2013.
Read more: The Verge