Did Nvidia Just Confirm the HTC Nexus 9?
Been looking for a new Android powered tablet? You may have one of the best choices available soon enough: a post on a site called Bright Side of News (via Neowin) seems to have stumbled upon confirmation that HTC is indeed behind Google’s new Nexus 9 tablet, set to come out sometime in the third quarter of 2014…which is right about nowish.
The confirmation comes from a legal document that was formerly on Nvidia’s website – since removed – that was part of the company’s lawsuit against Samsung and Qualcomm for infringement on its GPU patents. Here’s the portion of the document that seems to spill the beans:
Now, there are a few important things to note about this bit of text. For starters, it seems to confirm the existence of the HTC Nexus 9. However, it does stop just short of actually making a definitive statement on the subject. It says that the HTC Nexus 9 is “expected” in the third quarter of 2014, and that it is also “expected” to use Nvidia’s Tegra K1 GPU. Neither of those uses of the word “expected” can really add up to confirmation – but they come damn close, don’t they?
The fact that the document has been removed from Nvidia’s site it telling…admission through omission, and all that. Furthermore, HTC has another press event lined up for early October, though it does seem somewhat doubtful that a new Nexus tablet would be unveiled at an event not run by Google.
Of course, neither Google nor HTC have confirmed the existence of the new Nexus despite all the hints popping up online. It’s also possible that the new device being announced on October 8 is, in fact, the Nexus 9 tablet…only it won’t sport Google’s branding that day. The Nexus 5 smartphone from Google is very closely modeled after the LG G2 smartphone, and the former was made by LG. HTC is looking to do everything it can to bolster its reputation as a high-end device maker, so it stands to reason that we’ll see its take on the new Nexus tablet next month, just before Google unveils the slightly altered Nexus version.
Maybe? Possibly? Who knows? What do you think?
[Sources: Bright Side of News, Neowin]