Latte Communications unveils 5″ ICE Smart Android device

Bigger displays on smartphones are always welcome as it provides a better viewing experience when watching movies or playing games or even surfing the web, but a device that sports a 5″ display without phone capabilities isn’t exactly considered a tablet either. It’s sort of in limbo between a tablet and a smartphone, which is where Latte Communication’s ICE Smart device is sitting.

Latte Communications are touting their device as the “first Android based 5-inch full HD media player in the market.” Given that 5″ Android devices aren’t exactly overrunning the market, it’s not that hard of a claim to believe. The ICE Smart is powered by an 800MHz ARM 11 processor with a built-in 3D accelerator. The device boasts full HD 1080p video playback which is viewed on the 800 x 480 pixel resistive touchscreen display that supports dual touch, or alternatively it can mirrored on a HDTV via the mini HDMI out port.

It also features 8GB of onboard storage, with a micro SD card slot providing up to an extra 32GB of storage space if desired. Perhaps more interestingly it features USB On-The-Go (OTG) support which means that the device can be connected directly to USB devices such as digital cameras or external HDDs for transferring files without the need for a PC. At $189.99 (on sale) it does seem like a pretty handy device, albeit not a very powerful one.