The BlackBerry PlayBook will be “very competitively priced”, and will cost under $500 (about £310), according to RIM co-Chief Executive Officer Jim Balsillie. That’s ridiculously cheap. To put it in perspective, that’s over £100 less than an unlocked BlackBerry Torch 9800.

It’s also without a contract too, as the BlackBerry PlayBook will be Wi-fi only at launch (although it will tether for data on the go). If the BlackBerry PlayBook was to clock in at such a low price, it would be undercutting the Toshiba Folio 100 by a pinch, and the Galaxy Tab by great handfuls. The 7″ PlayBook, priced at £310, would be priced in the midst of budget Android tablet pretenders like the Creative ZiiO, Elonex and Next tablets. It’d be posing a real threat to the current favourite budget Android tablet, the Advent Vega.

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News of the price range for the BlackBerry Playbook gave RIM shares a welcome boost yesterday too, which is good news for a company whose market share has slipped over the last year. The BlackBerry PlayBook will hit US shores in the first quarter of next year, and make its way to us over the pond in the second quarter of 2011.

Does this make you think again about the BlackBerry Playbook? Is it on your wish list? Drop us a line in the comments!

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  • RobHWales

    Jennifer,

    As usual when comparing UK and US prices you conveniently forget that sales tax / VAT is not included in the $ price. So if you add the 17.5% ($587.5) and convert it with the current post office exchange rate (1.5708) rather than the google financial markets driven one you end up with £374 – that's 20.6% higher than your quoted £310 that you lead the story with.

    Surely the story here is that the Playbook is priced to undercut the iPad

    PS – Dont feel I'm singling you out, it's not just electricpig that does it – 9to5mac have got a sensationalist post this morning about how the iPad is super expensive here….

  • http://chrislord.net/ Chris Lord

    You can't call the Advent Vega a favourite when it hasn't even been released yet… Come on :p

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