After hearing that Motorola was trying to make it hell for those looking to apply modifications to the Atrix 4G in the form of a locked bootloader, they’ve redeemed themselves by giving the Xoom tablet a bootloader that can be unlocked for developers.
Giving the first Android 3.0 Honeycomb tablet a bootloader that you can unlock is not only is very pleasing to hear, it makes a lot of sense as well. Being the flagship Honeycomb tablet, the Xoom having an unlockable bootloader will help developers test out applications made for the tablet in mind. I’m sure Google having a hand in the Xoom’s creation also lead to the option, since it is a Google Experience device.
Unlockable bootloaders allow for the installation of custom ROMs, and while we doubt anyone is going to flash Gingerbread onto the Xoom, it could lead to cosmetic changes with the UI, in the form of themes and other modification. Either way, this is certainly good news that Motorola isn’t coming down with a complete iron fist, but don’t expect many other products to come with this option.
It may not be the cheapest tablet available, but the Xoom is certainly the most feature rich tablet on the market today. That may all change once March 2nd comes around, as we may see the announcement of the iPad 2. Nonetheless, the Xoom will likely remain the go-to Android tablet for quite a while, with the G-Slate possibly stealing some of the limelight once it’s launched.
This is great news for developers and those looking to tinker around with the Honeycomb tablet and we can’t wait to see what they come up with.
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