Barnes & Noble NOOK Tablet officially announced

After being leaked in a bunch of slides last week, the new Barnes & Noble NOOK Tablet has finally been given its official unveiling. It looks like the most of the details were on the dot, as the official specs match up with what we learnt last week. The NOOK Tablet will feature: a 7″ VividView display, a 1GHz dual-core processor, 1GB of RAM, 16GB of storage, a microSD card slot, and WiFi.

The NOOK Tablet is said to have 11.5 hours of reading time or 9 hours of video viewing, and comes preloaded with a whole bunch of entertainment apps – Netflix, Hulu Plus, Pandora, Rhapsody, Grooveshark, and MOG. The tablet will weigh 14.1 oz (one-third lighter than the NOOK Color). The NOOK Tablet is up for pre-order now with a price tag of $249 and will start shipping on November 17^th.

In addition to the tablet’s unveiling, the price cuts for the NOOK Color and NOOK Simple Touch have been confirmed with the tablet and reader priced at $199 and $99 respectively. Stay tuned to our hands-on first impression of the NOOK Tablet later today.

[Pre-order the NOOK Tablet | Press Release (PDF)]