ASUS $99 Nexus 7 leaks again, could be headed to CES

We’ve been hearing quite a bit about the next big budget tablet from the folks at ASUS, and possibly Google. Many are calling this a Nexus 7, and while that’s yet to be confirmed, we do know this will be a budget $99 tablet from ASUS running Android Jelly Bean. In what seems to be the norm as of late, the tablet has leaked in benchmarks, and now has appeared on Picasa — making this a legit device. More details below.

Back in September we heard reports that Google and ASUS were preparing a $99 Nexus 7 tablet, then late last month that same tablet appeared in some online benchmark results. Now to complete the usual round of leaks we’re seeing some images uploaded to Picasa (from an ASUS account) testing the camera on this unknown tablet.

As usual we’re able to pull the EXIF data (which can be faked) of the device taking the picture, and that has given us some details yet again on this $99 ASUS branded Android tablet. Clearly the EXIF data shows the same model number, which is ME172V. As a comparison the Nexus 7 is listed by ASUS as the ME370T. This model has been tossed around multiple times as the $99 Nexus 7 tablet from Google and ASUS.

While I’m hesitant to call this a Nexus, one thing is for sure. ASUS is preparing an extremely budget 7-inch 1024 x 600 resolution tablet for the Android world and we’ll be seeing it fairly soon. Most likely we can expect it to be revealed early next month at CES in Las Vegas. Reports are still suggesting a $99 price point, and that is lining up quite nicely about now. Would you buy a $99 budget dual-core low resolution 7-inch tablet. Or spend an additional $100 and get the Nexus 7 with its quad-core glory and HD screen? We’ll have to wait and see.

[via The Digital Reader]