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Motorola Xoom tablet has a barometer to forecast weather, delight meteorologists

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The Motorola Xoom tablet, unveiled last week at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, has a few features not seen on many other tablets -- no buttons, 4G capabilities and even a barometer.

The barometer, which measures atmospheric pressure and can help forecast the weather, is a unique inclusion and might make the Xoom the tablet of choice for meteorologists.

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The Xoom, set to release in the first quarter of the year through Verizon stores, will also be the first tablet to ship with Google’s Android 3.0 Honeycomb operating system, Motorola Mobility said. A price hasn’t yet been announced.

Honeycomb is the first build of Android tailored for tablets, in contrast to previous versions that were built for smart phones and ported over to the larger slate devices.

Motorola is expecting the Xoom to be a big hit, according to reports. Taiwan-based suppliers Catcher Technology and Foxconn Technology have said that orders placed with them and other vendors indicate that Motorola plans to have between 700,000 and 1 million of the tablets built by March 31, Information Week reported.

Morotola has found success with its Droid and Droid X smart phones running Google’s Android and is pitching the Xoom as the first dual-core processor tablet and ‘the first official tablet from Google.’

The Xoom will feature a 10.1-inch screen which can play back high-definition 1080p video, a camera on the front with Google Talk chatting, a 5-megapixel camera on the back for photos and 720p HD video. And an HDMI output will allow connection to an HDTV.

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-- Nathan Olivarez-Giles

twitter.com/nateog

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