Android Tablets (was Galaxy Tab)

[Klaus]

My quick review of the Nook Color:

Pros:
Price - $250 or less for a 7in tablet is awesome.
Ease of use - rooting takes 10 min and you can't brick it due to a built in recovery.
Screen - Awesome screen - great viewing angles.

Cons:
Speed - it's got a 800Mhz processor and lags a bit. OC to 1.2 and its pretty smooth.
No GPS - sucks but with a Android app you can have your phone send the Nook GPS position.
Volume buttons are kinda sticky and cheap.

Overall - I think I will hang on to this through the summer and give it to Michelle for reading to pick up a 10 in Honeycomb tablet. I really enjoy reading on it so far - I still think E ink like the Kindle is better but you need natural light.

[Klaus]

In stock

Walmart now has ASUS Eee Pad Transformer units in stock and ready to go. I probably shouldn’t type anything else because you guys have probably already clicked away from this page. For the few of you who haven’t, though, they have 32GB and 16GB versions on sale for $500 and $400, respectively. Yes, you’ll want to buy this tablet if a cost-efficient Honeycomb tablet is something you’ve been desiring. Hurry, though – I have a feeling these won’t last the entire evening. [Walmart via Droid-Life]

[MnWilly]

Unless I'm mistaken the Asus one looks like the best deal around. Any imput Scott.

[Klaus]

It's received great reviews so far. It's one of the only Wifi Tablets with GPS and I really like the keyboard option. I find typing on the 7in Nook Color "ok" but for long emails it's a pain. The screen on the Asus is the higher quality IPS panel and it HD widescreen. Higher resolution than IPAD 2 (1280x800 vs 1024x768). HDMI out is a must for media playback and it's got one. Only negative is no USB on the tablet... but if you have the dock there is a USB port.



The main problem with this tablet is it is extremely hard to find in stock. At the $400 pricepoint compared to the Xoom at $550 -$700 its easy to understand why. Also, google just released Honeycomb 3.1 last week that addresses a few of the bugs with the OS - reports are it makes the OS way better.

[Klaus]

Quick hurry they are in stock at Best Buy.

[Klaus]

$250 for the Viewsonic G tab...... not android 3.0 but a nice dual core tablet.

http://cgi.ebay.com/Viewsonic-gTable...d=238510725345

[Naya]

That ASUS Eee Pad Transformer looks amazing. I'm much more inclined to buy that at the "less expensive" price than an iPad 2 or the Motorola Xoom.

Edit: Scott, have you seen details about the Acer Iconia Tab? I'm reading many reviews about the ASUS tablet and a LOT of people are reporting hardware failures within 48 hours of ownership. I can attest to ASUS hardware failure; I recently bought a motherboard that had faulty RAM slots and wouldn't even post after installing. I ended up returning it to Newegg for a refund and bought a Gigabyte from Best Buy. Same exact board, different company and it was cheaper.

It's sad, I always heard good things about ASUS until just recently. I'm not sure about this Acer tab though, looking in to it now. (It does have a full sized USB port, something the Xoom and Transformer lack ... but from what I've read so far, it only supports fat32 formated USB sticks. That's not very useful).

[Klaus]

I would hold off buying a Android Tablet for the next month as tons come out but here is a good deal on the Nook Color if you only want to spend $200.... good reader IMO

Barnes & Noble Nook Color E-Reader/Tablet w/ Wifi (REFURB) $199
Overstock has the Refurbished Barnes and Noble Nook Color Wifi Digital E-Reader/Tablet for $199.00 Free Shipping. Tax in CO, NC, UT. [Compare Prices]
Update: Barnes & Noble just released the 1.2 firmware update which adds lots of new features to the Nook Color. These include popular apps, full featured email & fun social features, and enhanced web with Flash video.

7" 1024x600 color touchscreen LCD
Exclusive LendMe app lets you lend and borrow books from friends, all with just a few taps
Surf the web, check your email, read a favorite blog or search Google
8hr battery life
Magazines and newspapers in rich color
8GB built-in memory w/ MicroSD expansion slot
Supports PDF, Word, and ePub; MP3, JPG files
Be sure to check out our review of the Nook Color here.

http://www.techbargains.com/jump.cfm...2Fproduct.html

[Hauser]

I picked up an acer iconia. After doing tons of searching on all the current tablets, it seems like the best android 10.1 at the lower pricepoint and here is why.

It has full sized usb and HDMI ports. You need to buy a dock for the asus transformer for these things. This pretty much sold me. No adapters or docks. Just plug in that keyboard or jump drive or hard drive. You can also plug in a USB 3g card from your wireless carrier!

Solid construction. Aluminum back instead of the flimsy plastic one the asus has. the asus flexes also. This one doesnt at all.

it has gorilla glass. this is a big one for me. I dont like scratches on my screen and its just more durable.

All of the "issues" people complain about on it are software issues and not hardware issues. The other tablets are already on 3.1 while this one is just getting it released in the next week (from 3.0). Most of the issues are already resolved and the little bugs I have seen are not deal breakers.

[Naya]

After several hours of testing an Acer Iconia, an Asus Transformer, and a Samsung Galaxy 10.1, I went with the Samsung for the following reasons:

1.) Screen/video quality was superior. Very clear, clean, and vivid colors. Very clear whites and a deep non-particle/pixel black.

2.) Housing is solid. No flex in the screen, back panel doesn't feel cheap, buttons don't feel cheap either (some reviewers on some websites complained about these things; I don't see what they're talking about.)

3.) Operates fine on the 1Ghz processor, and Android 3.1 rocks.

4.) No USB port? No Problem. The power charger IS a USB cable. Just like with most android phones, all you have to do is enable USB Debugging and you can transfer data from a desktop without issue.

5.) Speakers are actually quite nice. The sound quality for two tiny speakers is great.

Cons (so far):

1.) No HDMI out. Eh, not a big deal for me. Wasn't planning on hooking it up to a monitor or t.v. anyway. I knew this before I bought it and still got it.

2.) There's no compatible Facebook app at this time. Might be a 3.1 issue. Again, not a big deal because the screen is big enough, I can just use the browser to go to the full website. (Did not know this when I bought it, but I'm pretty sure that might be the same case for the Acer Iconia and most other Android tablets at this time).

3.) It notifies you when the battery is fully charged. The notification ringtone goes off, and the screen lights up even if it was sleeping before. This is EXTREMELY ANNOYING AT 2:30AM. I need to find a way to turn it off except there isn't a Notifications section in the Settings area.


That's it so far. I got an InvisiShield installed on it as well, a Belkin case/cover, and a keyboard dock. I really like the keyboard dock for editing word docs. Dropbox app is the best.