HP Android Tablet Tipped With Tegra 4

The former smartphone manufacturer and current PC giant HP has once again been reported to be dipping in to the smart mobile device market, this time running Android. HP is the once-proud purchaser of the smart device group by the name of Palm, having in the past created a collection of smartphones and one infamous tablet (the HP TouchPad) running a mobile operating system called WebOS. That plan went a bit sour, and this week's anonymous tipster lets the world know that HP may be hitting the mobile sector again, hard, this time with a tablet running Android on an NVIDIA Tegra 4 processor.

This processor is one of the world's most powerful mobile SoCs, having been introduced at this year's CES convention with 4 CPU cores and 72 GPU cores. This processor takes the place of NVIDIA's Tegra 3 processor, also known as the world's first quad-core mobile SoC. Though very few products have been announced with the NVIDIA Tegra 4 for the market thus far, it wouldn't be out of the question for a group like HP to grab hold this soon after the initial reveal.

With HP's last several years, it's not unlikely that this Android rumor is just that – a figment of someone's wild imagination. We've seen Android HP tablet rumors in the past, and we're sure to see them in the future as well (if this one proves to be dust, that is). HP has also revealed their first Chromebook running the Google OS Chrome just this past month, so it's not out of the question that HP is working closer with Google than they ever have before.

The same sources speaking with Read Write Web have also tipped that HP will release Android smartphones by the end of 2013 – though previous comments from HP's Meg Whitman, we're not expecting it to come any time soon. With the WebOS debacle still a stinging pain in HP's past, the company wont be jamming out any devices in any quick fashion, that's for certain.