Barnes & Noble, the world's largest book retailer and a successful supplier of electronic book readers and media tablets, has released 8GB version of its popular Nook Tablet gadget. The novelty costs $199, in line with Amazon Kindle Fire 8GB. The company also slashed price of Nook Color e-book reader to $169.

“For any customer who likes to read digitally, watch movies or TV shows, browse the web, or help their kids read and learn through interactive books and apps, our new $199 Nook Tablet with 8GB is the best product value on the market,” said William Lynch, chief executive officer of Barnes & Noble.

The introduction of Nook Tablet 8GB at $199 is an attempt to compete directly against Amazon Kindle Fire 8GB, which costs the same amount of money. Back in Q4 2011 Amazon managed to sell 3.885 million of Kindle Fire 8GB 7" media tablets, whereas B&N sold 3.25 million of Nook Tablet 16GB devices, according to IHS iSuppli. With lowered price, B&N hopes to outsell its direct rival and thus gain additional ability to sell content through its platform.

B&N Nook Tablet 8GB has 7” multi-touch display with 1024*600 resolution with Corning’s Gorilla glass and anti-glare coating. The device is based on a dual-core ARM Cortex-A9 Texas Instruments OMAP 4 system-on-chip (with PowerVR SGX540 graphics core) as well as Google Android operating system with B&N’s own user interface. The device is equipped with 512MB of random access memory, 8GB of flash memory and has a microSDHC slot, Wi-Fi 802.11b/g/n wireless local network controller, micro-USB 2.0 connector, 3.5mm stereo audio jack, speakers and so on. Unfortunately, the Nook Tablet 7” does not feature any cameras, microphone or 3G/3.5G connectivity. The Nook Tablet product weighs ~400 grams (14.1 ounces) and can work for 11 hours continuous reading or 9 hours video playback.

Nook Tablet offers access to popular movies, TV shows, music and more through the top entertainment services, including Netflix, Hulu Plus, Pandora and others, plus a collection of high-quality apps, fast Web browsing and e-mail. Nook Tablet features Barnes & Noble’s color reading experience, with access to the world’s largest digital bookstore via Wi-Fi. Barnes & Noble offers Nook Tablet customers a wide array of Nook Apps. However, it does not look like the tablet fully supports Android-compatible applications designed for other platforms.

Tags: Barnes and Noble, Nook, Nook Tablet, B&N, Android, iPad, Amazon, Apple, Kindle, Kindle Fire