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Samsung Galaxy Tab redesigned for KDDI, hitting Japan in late February as SMT-i9100

Japan's KDDI is in the midst of its biannual hardware refresh and in among its new roster of phones is a familiar 7-inch slate device we're more familiar with as the Galaxy Tab. Samsung has stripped all branding (and 3G, boo!) from the SMT-i9100, while refashioning its exterior a little and letting KDDI throw in a bit of custom au-branded software aboard. Beyond the cosmetic changes, which include the capacitive buttons being aligned for landscape (rather than portrait) utilization, you're mostly looking at the same machine as the rest of the world, with a 1024 x 600 resolution, 512MB of RAM, MicroSD expandability, and a built-in webcam. The internal storage is quite a bit more frugal at 4GB, but you will get a handy docking cradle as a consolation prize, plus a mobile router that'll turn this into something very similar to Verizon's iPad plus MiFi offering in the US. All that said, KDDI won't have the i9100 on sale until February, by which time the Android tablet market could be somewhat better populated.