Leaked Dell road maps show next-gen smartphones, tablets on the horizon

• By:shrey joshi

Some allegedly reliable sources have leaked internal Dell documents laying out plans for its coming smartphone and tablet products.

Fan blogs WPCentral and AndroidCentral have acquired internal product maps for Dell’s forthcoming smartphone and tablet lineups.  According to the images, we can expect three new smartphones and a variety of tablets fromDell from now until the first quarter of 2012. Here’s a quick rundown of what’s apparently coming our way.

Smartphones

Venue Pro updateIn a little more than a month, Dell will update the Venue Pro. We’re guessing this means multitasking for the VenuePro, which Microsoft has been promising it will upgrade for Windows Phone 7s in the near future. “Near future” should come sometime in April.

Wrigley, a next-generation Windows Phone 7 device
The long-awaited Windows Phone 7 OS upgrade isn’t anything to lose sleep over, we know. But in the third quarter, Dell is launching something codenamed Wrigley, which is decidedly more excited: which will use the next-generation of Windows Phone 7. A look at the specs:

• Vertical, QWERTY slide-out keyboard
• 1GHz CPU
• 4-inch display; 800 x 480 resolution
• 8-megapixel camera; 720p video recording

Hancock This Dell addition will feature Android Ice Cream and launch in September. This is the only horizontally-positioned smartphone, with its own slide-out keyboard. Check out its specs:

• 4-inch qHD display
• Front- and rear-facing cameras
• Dual-core processor
• 1080p video recording

MillenniumIn the fall, Dell is set to introduce this Android Ice Cream device. The tiny image and specs (see below) make it look like this phone deviates the most from the rest of the lineup.

• 4.3-inch qHD display
• DLNA support
• 8-megapixel front-facing camera with VGA resolution
• Dual-core processor

Tablets

Dell isn’t kidding around when it comes to tablets this year. The Streak 7 is scheduled for an update, and theGallo will be here in April with Honeycomb included. A Windows 7 tablet internally called Rosemount is set to debut in June. According to reports, this should be a 10-inch tablet, and as you can see it will feature a 1,366 x 768 resolution HD display.

The Android-OS Sterling will follow soon after in the fourth quarter. Conveniently, around CES 2012, Dell is scheduled to unveil three tablets – the Opus One and Silver Oak (both running Honeycomb) and Peju. There was talk that a tablet running Windows 8 could’ve made it to this most recent CES, but apparently that’s in the cards for next year with Peju.

It should go without saying that all of these products are extremely subject to change, and it wouldn’t be terribly surprising if something were killed off or replaced. But users should at least be able to get an idea of whats in the cards for Dell this year.