Acer shows off ICONIA and slew of other tablets,

Acer threw their hat back into the race yesterday with a slew of touchscreen releases, a smartphone and an app store. Despite Steve Job’s now infamous declaration that non-iPad-sized tablets DOA (600,000 Galaxy Tab owners might disagree) Acer have brought out a variety of tablets in different shapes and sizes.

Most exciting, clearly was the ICONIA, a 14” dual touch-screen device. Dual screens open up a number of interesting possibilities – you can have a video on one screen and pull up related info on the other – I’d love an additional screen when working on certain things on my iPad so I can see some advantages. The ergonomics of reaching for the top screen to manipulate it seems dubious, but it’s something that we’d love to test. There is also the question of how well the touch screen keyboard works – although the gesture to summon it – simply placing both hands on the screen did look cool.

The 10.1 Android tablet comes with WiFi and 3G, as well as an HDMI out and full HD support – enabling you to display content on the big screen. The 10-point multi-touch system, gyro meter control and HD screen should be excellent for gaming – an Acer promise an entertainment experience on par with the best games consoles. If Acer can deliver this remains to be seen.

There is also a Windows 7 flavour tablet that combines touchscreen goodness with a physical-keyboard-attached docking station and more connectivity options – which I’m guessing means Ethernet. And of course the now standard front and back facing cameras. Well standard with one glaring exception.

There is also a wee 7” Android tablet that comes with Dolby Mobile Technology. Wi-Fi and 3G connectivity and front and back video cameras. It also have a dual core processor and support for Flash 10.1 – although how this affects you performance and battery life has yet to be determined.

The app store announcement came as a bit of a surprise (I’ve never had problems filling my PC with content). Dubbed “alive” it gives access to a variety of digital content such as music, books or games and is managed by content providers. Acetrax: provides over 2,000 titles available from top Hollywood studios to Rent or Buy, to stream or download. There is a news service, audio book from Audio G, magazines from Zinio, Casual games, Adobe’s InMarket app store for Adobe AIR applications.