The battle will be over tablets
Google may be eager enough to head off Microsoft’s clear bid to cut into tablet PC sales that it will rush the release of the next version of its Android operating system.
The DigiTimes story says Android 5.0, aka Jelly Bean, will be optimized for tablet PCs and will also support Google’s Chrome operating system.
The story notes, “Brand vendors can either choose to adopt only Android 5.0 or add Android 5.0 to Windows 8 devices with the ability to switch between the two OSes without the need to shut down the computer,” which isn’t strictly true.
That scenario may be possible with Windows 8 on x86 machines, but not with ARM devices, which are tuned for long battery life and include the popular tablet form factor.
Tablet makers won’t be able to support the two operating systems on ARM devices because Windows on ARM (WOA) specifications explicitly prohibit dual booting. So there will be no loading both Jelly Bean and Windows 8 on the same ARM tablet, at least not without violating Microsoft certification requirements.
That means customers won’t be able to have the best of both worlds on ARM devices, so it will become a head-to-head battle between Android and Windows 8 for those tablets, scraping for those customers not already in possession of an iPad, another ARM tablet.
If the DigiTimes prediction holds, Jelly Bean could be released by mid-year, giving it and hardware vendors at least three months to push Android 5.0 gear before the projected release date of Windows 8. That’s not a lot of time, especially when customers might be willing to wait for Windows 8 out of sheer curiosity.
So there may be a flurry of activity late this summer that could result in good prices on Android tablets. The pressure will be on Google to deliver a new version of Android that is more compelling than Android 4.0 was for tablets, notebooks and netbooks.
