Product Review: Acer Iconia Tablet

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Hi there!  Today, I would like to share with you a review of my new favorite toy!

This is the Acer Iconia Tab A500 10.1-Inch Tablet :




Isn't it a pretty little thing?

Let me start by saying that I bought this to serve as a mobile portfolio and workstation.  Thus far, I am still figuring a few things out that will help me use it to its utmost capability, but overall, I'm happy with what it has given me thus far.

I knew that I wanted an android based device, as I currently have a Droid X as my phone and wanted the compatibility between the two.  I also knew that I wanted it to have a large screen- most tablets come in a 7" or somewhere around a 10" format, and my phone is almost a 5" as it is, so I figured I should just go ahead and go big.

Without any further adieu, here are my specs:

The Good:

• 32GB of storage.  I don't know if I'll ever come close to using it, but it's there if I need it.
• NVIDIA HD graphics, which means watching movies is almost just like the TV
• USB and HDMI ports!  Woo take that iPad!
• The touch screen works great, also rotation works very well, ie very little false rotation; also has a switch to lock the rotation, say if you were reading while laying down
•  You can plug in a keyboard or use one via bluetooth to write things (as I'm doing right now)
• 8 hours of cable free battery use, longer if you aren't using it.  I sometimes will go a day and have forgotten to turn it off and it's barely used any of it's battery power.  Also takes very little for most apps, ie Reading in particular.

The Bad:

• Navigation for beginners almost needs a map.  I was hopelessly lost for the first hour after I got it running.  It's not so bad now that I know what I'm doing, but it was very confusing to start.
• No File Browser- This is an easy enough fix as there are plenty available for free in the Android Market, but for it not to be included with one is just silly.
•  The Android Market for tablets is far behind the Android for phones market.  I hope this catches up soon! (I have faith)
• Every once in a while (and I think this is the fault of the application, not all the tablets fault) while I'm in a program or a game, will have it lock up on me.  Force closing the application usually does the trick.
• Also every once in a while it takes a moment for the touch screen to activate.  This usually happens when the battery is getting low or if I haven't used it in a while.

The Weird:

• I love the Drawers on the home page.  Trouble is, I want to make more but can't.  Also, the drawers seem to negate the need for all the screens that are available to you.  
• It has a 5 MP camera on the back and a 2MP camera on the front.  Now, this seems cool, but unfortunately is one of those things that you might mess around with and probably will never end up using.  The camera on my phone is an 8MP and my dSLR is a 12MP, so why I'd ever use these, I'm not sure.  Might be good for children, but meh, to me it's just wasted space.

 Overall:
I LOVE it.   The minor bad things don't effect the use of the tablet for 99% of the time and it's a great toy to have with me to work on documents, show off pictures and work on my blog for all of you!  I would highly recommend this tablet to anyone who asked!