We’re finally getting a bit more information about the PerantiSiswa tablet loan scheme by the Communications and Multimedia Ministry. Students will be able to apply for the tablet loan scheme from this Friday, 15 April 2022 onwards, and yet before this there was still no information on the actual tablets offered to students. Well today the ministry has officially announced the full minimum specifications for the tablets that will be loaned out to students, which are:
- A 10.1-inch display with 1280x800p resolution
- 4GB of RAM
- 64GB of storage
- A 2MP front camera and an 8MP rear camera
- Built-in speakers
- A 3.5mm audio jack
- Dual-band WiFi and 4G LTE support
- Bluetooth 4.1 and above
- A 4,500mAh battery
- Android 10 and above
- Comes with a USB charger, Bluetooth keyboard and stylus
Based on those specs, we did a quick search across the possible tablets and we found a few possible options. Not counting tablets launched before 2021, there’s only a few that would still make the cut, assuming of course that PerantiSiswa ends up using tablets that are already in the market that is. It should also be noted that there’s also the possibility of different SKUs of tablets being offered out to students, seeing as the specs given by the ministry are deemed the minimum, not the exact.
We start with a pretty popular device actually, the Realme Pad. It starts at just RM899, but that doesn’t meet the PerantiSiswa requirements as it only has 3GB of RAM. Instead, for the Realme Pad with 4GB of RAM, 64GB of storage and LTE connectivity you’d be forking out RM999 for it. It’s powered by MediaTek Helio G80 processor, and has a 10.4-inch WUXGA+ LCD display. There’s a 7,100mAh battery powering it too, along with an 8MP camera on each side.
Other than that, there’s also the Nokia T20. Despite its name, it’s a much more entry-level device, packing a Unisoc T610 processor that’s similar to the Helio G80 but with lower clock speeds. It still meets the listed out specs though, with its 10.4-inch, 2K IPS display, 4GB of RAM, 64GB of storage, LTE connectivity, an 8MP rear camera, a 5MP selfie camera and a 8,200mAh battery. The Nokia T20 originally launched at RM1,099, but can be found online for below RM1,000 these days.
You also have a bunch of other tablets that aren’t officially available in Malaysia for purchase, such as the Motorola Moto Tab G70, TCL 10s and the Ulefone Tab A7. If you stretch the release date back to 2020, there would be some tablets in Malaysia that could still fit the minimum required specs. One example here is the Lenovo M10 HD Gen 2, which is still listed for RM909 on the Lenovo Malaysia website. It has a pretty weak MediaTek Helio P22T processor with 4GB of RAM and 64GB of eMMC storage, and a 10.1-inch HD+ LCD display. There is LTE support too along with a 5,000mAh battery, while being a tablet from 2020 means it comes with Android 10 out of the box which just about meets the requirements.
As a reminder, the PerantiSiswa tablet program is going to offer students tablets on a loan basis, having originally supposed to be a deal where students could apply for tablets from a partnering telco. With a RM450 million budget set aside for this program, and roughly 350,000 students expected to benefit from it, the government is looking at potentially forking out around RM1,285 per tablet. This figure will have to include the tablet as well as the aforementioned Bluetooth keyboard and stylus of course. Interestingly, that 350,000 figure that was announced today is also lower than the 400,000 and 600,000 Annuar Musa and Tengku Zafrul had mentioned before this. You can read more here for more information on the ongoing PerantiSiswa program.
