Windows 8.1 Hits The Ultra-Budget Tablet Market With PiPO

The PiPO W4 is an ultra-budget tablet, the kind of tablet you'd expect to be running Android. But it's not some less-than-worthy junker. It's running Windows 8.1 – so there's no way it's not going to get done what you need to get done, right?

We've run our fair share of low-cost tablets over the review bench. When an inexpensive tablet comes around that also does well running through our review process, we let you know about it. It's a big deal.

The brand PiPO is attempting to take the market by storm with the lowest price for a Windows 8.1 product. At just 499 CNY ($81 USD), they're poised to do it. But whether or not they're going to provide you with a tablet that's worth owning – that's a different question entirely.

• Display: with an 8-inch IPS LCD with WXGA (1280x800px) resolution you're getting an OK panel. This is fine for everyday work – unless you've got a smartphone with a larger resolution. If you own a Nokia Lumia 520, for example, you've got 800 x 480 pixels over 4 inches that's 233.24 pixels per inch. The PiPO W4 has 188.68 pixels per inch – not as sharp as the least expensive Windows Phone on the market.

• Processor: Quad-core Intel Bay Trail-T 3735F processor. That's a notably low-cost processor and more than likely rolling with the bare minimum to run Windows 8.1 – with 1GB of RAM, you can bet on it.

• Battery: The only really good thing about this tablet we can see based on specs alone is the battery. With 4500mAh paired with such a low-resolution display, it's hard to imagine this tablet not lasting several hours on one charge.

Should you buy this tablet? We'd warn against it. Not until we review it ourselves, anyway – be cautious.

VIA: PiPO forums