Hands-On With Acer's New 10-Inch Android Tablet 159
adeelarshad82 writes "Earlier this week Acer unveiled three new tablets, two for Android and one for Windows. Unfortunately details on the devices were slim, including their names. According to a hands-on with the 10-inch Android tablet, the device is about half-inch thick and weighs slightly more than an iPad. It's currently running an unknown Android version but according to the Acer executives the tablets will be running Google's tablet version of Android, Honeycomb. The tablet has no front-facing buttons. The side includes a power button, lock button, an SD slot and a docking port for full-sized keyboard dock. The device also includes two cameras, front and back, resolutions details of which are still unknown. There's also a mini HDMI port for playing content on HDTVs. The tablets are powered by Nvidia Tegra 2 CPU which gives it the edge when it comes to graphics."
Re:It's the apps, stupid (Score:5, Informative)
http://www.tuaw.com/2010/04/12/tuaw-faceoff-streaming-video-on-the-ipad-with-air-video-and-str/ [tuaw.com]
The iPad has had video streaming apps since the damn thing was released. Maybe you should actually try one (or spend five seconds googling) before you proclaim its shortcomings?
making up for some bad karma (Score:2, Informative)
General Information:
Launch time: APR 2011
Positioning: Provide a complete Android tabel with full HD media and web anywhere
Features:
Dual coe 1.0 Ghz processor with Flash 10.1 support for the fasted HD web experience and multimedia playback anywhere
The latest and the highly intuitive good android tablet os and acer UI 4.5 to reach a whole new level of interactivity
SMP rear-facing camera + HD front-facing camera for vide, video chat, quickly snapping a picture and uploading it to Facebook, YoTube, Picasa, and also for barcode scanning.
HDMI output to playback HD content on DFTV or Hi_Def montor for HD extensibility.
Industrial Design:
36[?] design ensure optimal on-screen experience for every angle.
Aluminum...provide a
Re:It's the apps, stupid (Score:3, Informative)
There's a great app called AirVideo which streams everything I've thrown at it. It's a measly $2.99 IIRC.
Server runs on your Windows/Mac/Linux box and you connect to it with the iDevice.
The real story? (Score:4, Informative)
I don't know that Acer rules any roost, so I think the point of this story is that tablets are getting bigger, more powerful and hopefully, as implied by the Acer name - cheaper.
So far as I can tell, the big winner here is the 10" screen - using tired old LCD tech.
Personally, I think where tablets lose is the display (not e-ink) and for those that may be interested, there's an Android tablet on the horizon with Pixel Qi tech and Qualcomm's Mirasol is also something to know about:
http://www.gottabemobile.com/2010/11/05/pixel-qi-powered-notion-ink-adam-android-tablet-in-time-for-the-holidays/ [gottabemobile.com]
For some other tablet alternatives - http://www.anythingbutipad.com/ [anythingbutipad.com]
(I got nothing against the iPad, that's just a halfway decent site for a tablet alternative.)
My 2 cents on tablet ownership would be - match your OS to your cell phone if you can because it makes your transition from one device to another smoother and tablets should be all about ease of use. In that sense, Acer's move to offer these things in Androids and Windows shows real insight on their part (and no sad surprise - no Linux out of the box, again).
I'm OS agnostic and believe in the right OS for the job, fwiw.
If you want to be an early adopter (Score:4, Informative)
Buy the Viewsonic G Tablet now. The software sucks, but there are already several custom ROMs available - a port of CyanogenMod 6.1 (beta), ZPad, and TnT Lite - just check out the XDA Developers forums for all your ROM needs. It has a Tegra 2, 10" capacitive touch screen and has home/search/back/menu buttons like a proper Android device.
It runs Market and gets almost every app after applying the Market fix, all the Android games I've tried run great, YouTube is great for dumb video content in a pinch, my K-9mail push IMAP mail is there, contact sync and calendar sync with Google works, and it plays downloaded video content just fine (I haven't experimented with HD content yet - I don't really see the point on a tablet device). I like the Aldiko and Kindle e-readers and I read PDF ebooks with RepliGo Reader (better than the free Adobe Reader, IMO).
If, on the other hand, you want a tablet that works great out-of-the-box, without installing custom ROMs and recovery images, get an iPad. That's what my wife has. There aren't any Android tablets that are there yet, and most likely won't be until Android officially supports them and will let the official Market ship with the device.
But for the Slashdot early adopter set, the G Tablet is a pretty cool option that you can pick up right now for under $400 at Sears or Staples.
Re:Why android? (Score:3, Informative)
Why is everyone pushing android for tablets when even the original author [engadget.com] says it's not designed for that purpose.
that article refers to android 2.2. android 3.0 is specifically designed with tablets in mind and is targeted for early next year. most vendors are waiting for 3.0 before joining the tablet race.
Maemo & Meego are opensource and free, and they are designed to be used on tablets.
maybe because nobody knows what the heck maemo / meego / moblin are therefore wouldn't buy a tablet based on something they've never heard of. i'm just saying ...
Re:Why android? (Score:4, Informative)
Well, if Acer is going to supply their own store then they're supplying the infrastructure. MeeGo is a middleware platform that resembles a standard Linux distro that pulls heavily from upstream, instead of a massive NIH effort designed around pushing Google's services out to the world.
Most of the anti-MeeGo comments I see stem mostly from not understanding what, exactly, MeeGo is supposed to be.