Barnes and Noble is back in the tablet game. After taking a brief break, the bookseller has partnered with Samsung on a special version of the company’s Galaxy Tab 4, dubbed the Galaxy Tab 4 Nook. The new tablet, which comes in black or white, features a 7-inch HD display, quad-core processor, 8 GB of storage, Android 4.4 Kit Kat, and is thinner and lighter than previous Nook devices at 9.74 ounces. The new Nook also adds a 3-megapixel rear camera and 1.3 megapixel front camera, firsts for Nook devices.
Barnes & Noble unveiled a new device this morning at its flagship store in Union Square in New York, but will it be enough to turn around its sagging digital business? The new Nook Samsung Galaxy Tab 4 — the company’s first new tablet sincetaking a break from making tablets last year — is sleek, small and comparable with similar devices in cost and features (it retails today for $179). But why would anyone want to buy it when they could have an iPad or just a regular Samsung tablet? The new Nook comes with $200 in free content, including several best-selling ebooks (headlined by mega best-seller The Fault in Our Stars by John Green), digital magazine issues, television shows and $5 of Nook store credit. Barnes & Noble CEO Michael Huseby said in the unveiling presentation that the company has the “Barnes & Noble advantage”: essentially, its sales-force across its nearly 700 stores nationwide, which would also act as an in-person customer service team, something Amazon can’t match.