Since the Fusion Garage engineer Chandra Rathakrishnan gave a webcast yesterday concerning the Joo Joo and it’s legal / branding adjustments people have been eagerly awaiting a hands-on demo as was promised by Rathakrishnan.

Well Cnet seemed to be first in the queue and have plenty of pics and a video to demo the device for all to see.

The specs at this time are as follows and the release date is the 11th December 09.

• 12.1 inch, 1,366 x 768  HD capable capacitive touchscreen
• 4GB internal memory
• 5 hours of battery life
• Built-in mic, and speakers
• 1 USB port
• A card slot (multi-format or SD – we’re not sure)
• No details on the CPU, GPU or screen manufacturer
• Linux-based OS designed to only boot to browser which happens in 9 seconds and includes Flash.
• Gesture based browsing support – to include dog-earing of webpages for bookmarking them in the future.

Of course it would be great to see a strip down of the device hardware and better still a Linux full OS hack – I’m thinking Moblin, Chrome OS, CrunchBang or your favourite Linux flavour.

We’re really keen to see this device come to market and the competitive bandwagon be hoped on by all and sundry. And with rumours around of a Google handset being released next year (not just Android OSed but actually Google branded) how long before they edge in to the tablet market?

Hands-on demo @Cnet

Of course the news of the Crunchpad being cancelled was going to shock readers and leave some without hope of ever seeing a decent tablet device available for purchase (sorry PMPs but you’re just not up to scratch).

Well prepare to be shocked all over again. Fusion Garage – the folks who were working on the original Crunchpad tablet – have issued news that a non-Crunchpad branded Crunchpad will become available soon.

Rebranded as the Fusion Garage Joo Joo Tablet (bit of a mouthful compared to Crunchpad) this should include almost everything the Crunchpad was promised to utilise. But what they left out could lead this tablet to it’s own death before it even takes off – a decent battery life, a reasonable £250-300 price tag, 3G amidst others.

Whether it is greeted with acclaim or dissent, you’ll have to wait till the 11th of December.

TheJooJoo.com