Compact consumer tablet size, but much tougher
How big should an IoT handheld be? That depends entirely on the application. While the smaller IoT Handheld Device G55 looks like a modern smartphone and is the form factor of choice when space is at an absolute premium, the Rugged Tablet GT78 is more in the iPad mini 3 category. Both are handhelds, but sizewise the IoT Handheld Device G55 is in the smartphone class whereas the Rugged Tablet GT78 is a small tablet.
The picture to the right shows where the Rugged Tablet GT78 fits in terms of size. The lineup shows — from left to right and in scale — Apple's iPhone 6 Plus, the Google Nexus 7, the AMobile Rugged Tablet GT78, and finally the Apple iPad Air 2.
The Rugged Tablet GT78 measures 8.6 x 5.7 inches, versus the iPad mini 3's 7.9 x 5.3. Its 8.75 inch diagonal screen size is virtually same as that of the iPad mini 3 (7.9 inches), and with its 4:3 aspect ratio display it is visually almost dwarfing 7-inch tablets that mostly come with narrow aspect ratio screens.
Screen size, though, is only one part of the overall package. As a ruggedized device, the Rugged Tablet GT78 is 0.78 inches thick, and weighs 1.35 pounds. That's quite a bit thicker and heavier than today's consumer tablets. The iPad mini 3 is sliver-thin at 3/10th of an inch and weighs barely more than half as much as the Rugged Tablet GT78. The picture above shows how the Rugged Tablet GT78 compares in thickness to the Apple iPad mini 3.
So while the Rugged Tablet GT78 looks just like a compact consumer tablet from the front, it's in fact a completely different device, one that's much tougher and offers much more functionality. And while some consumer phone makers now offer versions of their phones that look largely the same as their standard issue models but are better able to withstand abuse and the elements, there aren't (m)any weather-protected compact consumer tablets, and even the few more durable devices are still far less rigid and durable than the Rugged Tablet GT78.
IoT device technology
Customers interested in a rugged compact tablet such as the Rugged Tablet GT78 likely intend on using it in a variety of potential capacities, ranging from general-purpose rugged tablet computer, to dedicated IoT edge device, to data capture tool, to simply a super-size version of a modern smartphone. What sort of specs and technologies did AMobile provide to help the Rugged Tablet GT78 address all these requirements?
Powering everything under the hood of the Rugged Tablet GT78 is, just like in the smaller IoT Handheld Device G55, a ARM Cortex A7 processor from MediaTek. However, whereas the IoT Handheld Device G55 uses the 1.0GHz MTK6589 designed for smartphones, the Rugged Tablet GT78 is based on the tablet-oriented MTK8382 running at a quicker 1.3GHz clock speed. Both are quad-core designs built on contemporary 28nm process technology, but whereas the MTK6589 uses a PowerVR SGX544 graphics processor for parallel graphics acceleration, the MTK8382 hands that duty to an ARM Mali GPU.
There's a gigabyte of RAM and 8GB of Flash for storage. While 8GB doesn't look like much compared to the 16/64/128GB available in current iPads, it's more than adequate if the device can use expansion cards. So for the Rugged Tablet GT78 it's the 8GB and what is in its user-accessible micro SDHC card slot accessible from the right side of the tablet.
There is an 12.6mp documentation autofocus camera with LED flash on the backside. Customers may also opt for an additional 2mp vidcam in the front, but it's either that camera or an integrated scanner but not both. As for the documentation camera's impressive imager size, the megapixel count is being pushed by some consumer smartphone and tablet manufacturers to differentiate themselves, and we certainly welcome that trend. Apple, though, stayed with 8mp in its iPad Air 2 and just 5mp in the iPad mini 3, so AMobile is ahead of the game compared to most.
The Rugged Tablet GT78 has a user-accessible and easily removable 22.9 watt-hour Li-Ion battery. That's just a tad less capacity than the iPad mini 3's 23.8 watt-hour, and AMobile 's estimate of "up to 10 hours" of battery life between charges is the same as Apple claims. Charging is via a standard micro-USB port. Wireless charging is available via optional docks (see Qi wiki). Very cool.
Despite Apple's use of it in its small iPad, 8-inch displays with the wide 4:3 aspect ratio are relatively rare in tablets. Most small tablets have been using 16:9 aspect ratio 7-inch screens, with large-size smartphones now increasingly eating into that market. The 4:3 8-inch form factor does offer substantially more display real estate than 16:9 7-inch screens, and for that reason alone many users prefer the larger format for more demanding types of work. That the Rugged Tablet GT78 uses the smartphone-pioneered projected capacitive ("procap") multi-touch technology rather than a resistive digitizer is pretty much a given, considering that procap is clearly the popular choice these days, and also that Android was designed for it.
All modern smartphones and tablets have sensors, and their presence is especially important in a device that's also designed for IoT duty. As a result, AMobile equipped the Rugged Tablet GT78 with a proximity sensor, a 3-axis accelerometer, a 3-axis magnetic field, a barometer, and an ambient light sensor to adjust backlight intensity.
Wired connectivity is via micro-USB 2.0. For wireless connectivity there is integrated Class 2 Bluetooth 4.0LE + EDR, 802.11b/g/n WiFi, NFC, both A-GPS and dedicated GPS, and mobile broadband of the WCDMA UMTS variety.
The image below shows the Rugged Tablet GT78 from the front and from all four sides. It's an elegant design that combines the all-black glossy look of a modern consumer tablet with the protective rubber-cladding, meticulous sealing, and space for industrial grade expansion like a vertical market device.
Going around the Rugged Tablet GT78 reveals a number of controls but not much in terms of ports. This is a well-sealed device, and that means the fewer openings that must be protected against immersion the better.
The left side has a programmable button that can be used to trigger the scanner. On the right side are a volume up/down rocker and, underneath a clip-on cover, the tablet's protected SIM and MicroSD card slots. On top are, beneath protective hinged rubber plugs and flanking the industrial-grade 1D/2D imager window, the unit's earphone jack and micro-HDMI port on one side and its micro-USB port and power button on the other. The bottom does not contain any controls or ports, but provides access to the tablet's battery.
The front of the Rugged Tablet GT78 is dominated by the large display whose surface glass extends well beyond the perimeter of the LCD, a characteristic common to virtually all capacitive touch devices, so that fingers do not bump into a border during touch. The protective rubber cladding of the Rugged Tablet GT78 does make for a protruding border around the perimeter of the device, but it's far enough away from the extent of the LCD to not get in the way, and it only sticks up by roughly a millimeter.
Beneath the display are three Android controls (Menu, Home, Back), implemented here as capacitive touch areas with icons outlined in white and illuminated from the inside when the Gladius is in use. That's a bit different from the currently standard trio of Android buttons, those being Multitask, Home, and Back. The "Menu" Android button officially vanished with version 4.0, but apparently AMobile considered "Menu" more important than "Multitask."
What's inside the Rugged Tablet GT78?
When it comes to design and construction, consumer tablets are facing two big problems these days. First, there's only so much design you can do on a product that primarily consists of a large rectangular piece of glass. Second, since consumer tablets must be fashionably thin, much of the effort inside goes into miniaturizing components.
Designers of industrial tablets have a bit more design freedom as those remain very much tools for the job. Compact size and low weight are still important, but they usually aren't deal breakers. The Rugged Tablet GT78 is a good example of that. At first sight it looks just like another sleek consumer tablet. But look closer and it quickly becomes obvious that it's an entirely different kind of product. Let's find out how different.
The picture to the right shows the backside of the Rugged Tablet GT78. On the upper left is the camera and flash window, on the upper right a red plastic lens for use with optional/custom IR port. The top and bottom areas have a rubberized feel, the center area doesn't. The perforated band near the bottom looks like just a design feature, but it actually includes the grilles for the tablet's stereo speakers.
The vertical bars to the left and right of the center area are actually snap-on plastic pieces. On the left side they cover the GPS, WiFi, Bluetooth, and mobile broadband antennae. On the right side the SIM card and microSD card slots. Like the IoT Handheld Device G55, the Rugged Tablet GT78 has dual SIM card slots, allowing for two separate mobile connections/accounts.
The tablet's flat, rectangular 3.8V 6,200mAH (23.6 watt-hour) Li-Ion battery is replaceable and user-accessible. To get to it, there's first a small cover with two screws at the bottom of the unit to remove, and then there's prying out another piece of plastic that seals the battery compartment. The battery can then be shaken out. It's not the simplest or most intuitive arrangement, but what matters is that the battery is replaceable.
As stated, while from the front the Rugged Tablet GT78 looks like your standard consumer tablet, it is a significantly more substantial unit. Opening it requires undoing a number of small Philips screws, then a good degree of careful prying apart of the two halves. There are no wires or ribbon cables between the two halves. Instead, connections are made via springloaded pins (for the NFC and WPC antennae).
The two halves are sealed against each other with an intricate tongue-and-groove design, where the groove additionally contains a very thin replaceable O-ring. The O-ring has eight little tabs so that it can be properly placed.
