NVidia has been making great strides with Android gaming, their Tegra Zone games, paired with processors built with gaming in mind, while somewhat fragmenting the Android experience has garnered them quite the following. The NVidia Shield hand-held gaming system, is quite the feat of engineering with solid hardware and interesting software features like GameStream (their PC Streaming service), has now been turned into a tablet – the Shield Tablet.
The NVidia Shield Tablet isn’t their first attempt at the tablet market, with NVidia launching the budget minded Tegra Note reference platform last year. What the Shield Tablet is, is NVidia’s first attempt at the higher end tablet market, and from the looks of the hardware included they’ve included some pretty nice specs here.
The NVidia Shield Tablet features an 8″ 1080P display, framed by dual front-facing stereo speakers on the sides, with a 5MP front-facing camera included as well. It’s powered by the Tegra K1 SoC, which includes a 2.2 GHz ARM Cortex A15 CPU and a 192 core Kepler GPU. It’s got 2GB of RAM and options for either 16GB or 32GB of storage, with a microSD Card slot to back it up.
Connectivity wise, the tablet will come with a Wireless N WiFi, as well as Bluetooth LE and GPS, with GLONASS. It will also come in LTE versions if you’re willing to pay the extra price.
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| Processor | NVIDIA® Tegra® K1 192 core Kepler GPU, 2.2 GHz ARM Cortex A15 CPU with 2GB RAM |
| Display | 8-inch 1920×1200 multi-touch Full HD display |
| Audio | Front facing stereo speakers, dual bass reflex port with built-in microphone |
| Storage | 32 GB (WiFi+4G LTE) / 16 GB (WiFi-only) |
| Wireless | 802.11n 2×2 Mimo 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz Wi-Fi Bluetooth 4.0 LE GPS / GLONASS |
| Connectivity | WiFi+4G LTE or WiFi-only Mini-HDMI output Micro-USB 2.0 MicroSD storage slot 3.5 mm stereo headphone jack with microphone support |
| SIM Card | Micro-SIM |
| Motion Sensors | 3-axis gyro 3-axis accelerometer 3-axis compass |
| Gaming Features | SHIELD wireless controller compatible NVIDIA GameStream™ NVIDIA ShadowPlay™ GRID Cloud Gaming Beta Console Mode Gamepad Mapper |
| Cameras | Front: 5MP HDR; Back: 5MP auto focus HDR |
| Video Features | 4K Ultra-HD Ready |
| Stylus | DirectStylus 2 with 3D Paint (Included) |
| Software Updates | SHIELD software upgrades directly from NVIDIA |
| Battery | 19.75 Watt Hours |
| Weight and Size | Weight: 13.7oz / 390g Height: 8.8in / 221mm Width: 5.0in / 126mm Depth: 0.36in / 9.2mm |
| Operating System | Android KitKat OS |
| Software | Google Play™ NVIDIA SHIELD app Trine 2: Complete Story Multi language Handwriting Recognition NVIDIA Dabbler™ JusWrite Evernote Adobe Reader Camera Awesome |
| Cellular Connectivity | North America: Unlocked (compatible with AT&T and TMobile, please check bands supported) LTE, HSPA+, 3G, 2G, GSM, EDGE Outside-North America: |
| Cellular Bands | North America: LTE: Bands 2,4,5,7,17 (1900, 1700, 850, 2600, 700) HSPA+: Bands 1,2,4,5 (2100, 1900, 1700, 850) Outside-North America: |
| Optional Accessories | SHIELD tablet cover SHIELD wireless controller SHIELD AC adapter SHIELD Stylus |
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Software
The Shield system isn’t just about the hardware though, as nice as it looks, the software is where NVidia has been really appealing to even PC gamers. Their GameStream PC Game streaming software has been a compelling enough reason for many Australian’s to import the Shield Hand-held unit to our shores and the Shield Tablet will again support GameStream. You will of course need some grunt in your PC, with GameStream requiring an NVIDIA GeForce GTX 6xx series or greater GPU.
GameStream is also being linked with a service which NVidia is trialling – in California only at the moment – which will allow them to stream, and then save game progress directly to the cloud. An interesting feature which if rolled out world-wide could do great things for gamers the world over.
SHIELD Tablet: Built For Gamers
As a gamers platform, the NVidia Shield Tablet will integrate Twitch and NVIDIA ShadowPlay. This is a feature which will let ‘users save and stream their greatest gaming moments’ using the Twitch platform. You can also stream your face live to the world using that 5MP front-facing camera.
But, let’s talk games and apps. You can of course use Google Play on Shield, giving you access to the over 1 Million apps and games on Google Play. But with Tegra Zone or NVIDIA SHIELD Hub as it’s now known, NVidia has built quite a relationship with developers and they’ve leveraged that to have titles available specifically for the Shield Tablet at launch.
Included on the Shield Tablet is Trine 2, an online RPG which looks to be quite popular. They’ve also been working with Valve and you can grab two of THE best games, available exclusively on the Shield Platform: Portal and Half Life 2.
NVidia has also compiled a list of ‘Featured Games’ the list includes : Anomaly 2, Burn Zombie Burn!, Dungeon Defenders: Eternity, Chucks Challenge 3D: Reloaded, Flyhunter: Origins, Mount and Blade, Prime World: Defenders, Pure Chess, Real Boxing, Rochard, Wonder Momo, The Walking Dead: Season Two, Z2: Steel Soldiers and Zombie Tycoon.
With Shield running Android 4.4, you should be right for compatability. NVidia has been pretty good about keeping the Shield Hand-held up with the latest Android updates, which bodes well for the Shield Tablet.
Accessories
There will be a bunch of accessories for the Shield Tablet. First and foremost, included with the tablet is the DirectStylus 2. The DirectStylus 2 is promised to be twice as responsive as the previous version and NVidia advise that it’s ‘the first GPU-accelerated 3D painting experience’. Paired with NVidia Dabbler app, there should be some interesting art created with this stylus.
There will also be a Shield Tablet cover, a three part cover which will allow you to prop the tablet up or cover the screen when not in use.
Next, the gaming controller. Because Shield is all about gaming at it’s core and unlike the Shield handheld, there’s no built-in controller. The Shield Tablet allows for up to four of these controllers to be connected to the Shield Tablet using Wi-Fi Direct connectivity.
The NVidia Shield hand-held is quite a nice controller having a nice weight to it, so the Shield controller for the tablet is expected to be similar. The controller includes a gaming headset jack, built-in touch pad, volume control and NVidia is also doing some interesting things with in-game voice commands and search.
Pricing and Availability
So, where can you get one. Well, the answer isn’t pleasant. The Shield is now available for pre-order in the US and Europe, where it will begin shipping to pre-order customers as well as stores on July 29th. There’s no plans at this stage to sell the tablet in Australia.
Last year we saw Mobicity begin offering the NVidia Shield Hand-held, so hopefully if they receive enough requests, they’ll do this again. Alternatively you could always utilise one of the many shipping forwarders in the US and have one sent – almost – directly to you.
Pricing for the Shield is as follows:
| North America | United Kingdom | Mainland Europe | |
| 16GB Wi-Fi SHIELD Tablet | $299 | £239.99 | €299.99 |
| 32GB 4G LTE SHIELD Tablet | $399 | £299.99 | €379.99 |
| SHIELD Wireless Controller | $59.99 | £49.99 | €59.99 |
| SHIELD Cover | $39.99 | £24.99 | €29.99 |
We enjoyed our time with the NVidia Shield Hand-Held last year at the EB Games Expo, we are again hoping that NVidia will make an appearance at this years expo, hopefully with a Shield Tablet in tow.
Will you be importing an NVidia Shield Tablet?
I really wish I hadn’t read the review for this tablet. It seems “perfect” for my needs as a pretty avid Android gamer. However I’m quite concerned about what happens if the tablet needs to be returned for service. I can just imagine how “fun” it would be trying to get this shipped back to the US. 🙁 Did anyone end up purchasing a Shield and have to RMA it? I think I can wait for a little while until the Nexus 8 is announced later in this year. By this time, hopefully nvidia will come to their senses and… Read more »
I thoroughly enjoyed my time with my Shield, but I always wished for a slightly bigger screen. Perhaps this will do it, but having the device split in two doesnt really do much for me to be honest.
Where is my JXD, hardware wise, is bang-on for me; it is let down by poor software implementation. If I could get a 7″ JXD-ish thing, but running a Tegra and better OS/Software – I’d be one happy chappy.
It does look good. I’ll be chasing an upgrade to my 2013 N7 at some stage and this may get a look in depending on how the (alleged) Nexus 8 is specced and priced. I do already have an original Shield and it sounds like some of the new games and updates will filter through to it too, which is nice. On a side note, Nvidia seem to be doing really well at keeping the Shield up to date. I’m not sure what version of Android the Tegra Note is running, but compared to some of the other manufacturers, well… Read more »
Those US prices are more interesting than the UK/EU prices, maybe you don’t want it officially launched here if they are the markups.
Worth bearing in mind – no wireless charging, and its a bit of a chunky monkey as far as thickness goes.
Also interesting that the quad core 32bit K1 and the dual core 64bit K1 benchmark around the same level – so maybe google won’t be able to jack up the price of the Nexus 8/9 by much, given this as competition.