Research In Motion (RIM) has been very quiet about the release date for the BlackBerry Playbook, but a leaked image from the Office Depot database may have ruined their surprise. The image shows that the Playbook will be listed at $499 for the 16GB Wi-Fi Version, while the release date was a little less precise. Office Depot says the Playbook will be in stores by “Week 17” which actually translates to April 24-30th.
The pricing is pretty exciting because it marks the first worthy tablet to be under the $500 mark (other than the iPad). More after the break!The 16GB Wi-Fi only version is the same as the lowest priced iPad but the difference is the Playbook must be tied to a BlackBerry Smartphone to get all of its functionality. This would be easy to sell to current BlackBerry owners, but may be harder to sell to other consumers.