Archos and Texas Instruments announced yesterday that they plan to launch an Internet Media Tablet which will use the Google Android software.

"Archos was proud to announce the introduction of its Archos 5 HSDPA IMT last year with SFR. We are continuing to advance our efforts in the IMT space with the introduction of this new product," said Henri Crohas, the founder of Archos and its chief executive, in a statement. He also added that the support provided to the Android-based devices represents a great opportunity for the company and also that users will surely be satisfied with the results.

The release has been scheduled for the year’s third quarter and it is considered a follow-up to the company’s Archos 5, launched in October. The price has not yet been released, but Archos did provide some details about the new tablet: the IMT measures 5 inches on its diagonal and it is 10 millimeters thin; it features a high-resolution 5 - inch touch screen that will have full-width page viewing; it is powered by Texas Instruments' OMAP3440 processor, which is based on the ARM Cortex platform; it connects to the Internet via a 7.2 - Mbit/s HSUPA 3G connection; it contains up to 500 GB of storage, has Flash and Flash Video support and it can play back up to seven hours of HD video on a single battery charge. It is also expected to include a full HTML browser.

The announcement was received with great enthusiasm and the only thing left now is to wait for the news on the official release date.