Any generic Android tablets worth a darn?

[Bateluer]

I respectfully disagree about the app situation on 10" Android tablets, the 7" and 8" stuff isn't so bad, but the 10" iOS apps are simply better right now.

I'm not saying they will never be as good or better, the quality of Android apps in the smaller screen sizes is fine and IMHO, comparable to iOS, but the 10" stuff isn't there yet, I think it's a chicken VS egg thing, there's no hugely successful 10" Android tablet to motivate developers.

I have a 10" Galaxy Tab, a n7, and a 7" LTE Galaxy Tab, along with the Mini Retina and Air, and use all of them on a near daily basis. The 10" Android apps simply aren't there yet, they'll get better, but 10" Android tablets need to be more mainstream before that happens.

Do you have any specific examples to illustrate your point?

 

[Joe1987]

double post, sorry

 

[Joe1987]

Hmm, at that price, how do the win8 tablets compare?
I think I can get the Intel Atom Dell venue 11 pro for the same price, any reason I should take an ipad over that?

I really don't know much about Dell's tablets, but I do try to stay away from first gen products, I think MS's 3rd gen stuff should be pretty good though. I'm honestly not very objective, I was never one to say I needed a Windows tablet. It's flipping great on my desktop, but I really don't have a need for it on a tablet.

 

[makken]

LO

LO? not sure I understand.

 

[makken]

I really don't know much about Dell's tablets, but I do try to stay away from first gen products.

I think my biggest concern based on the video review (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zTqb_tfdqo0) is the storage on that: It's 64GB eMMC flash. I would've preferred an mSATA SSD if I'm running full win8.

 

[Bateluer]

I really don't know much about Dell's tablets, but I do try to stay away from first gen products, I think MS's 3rd gen stuff should be pretty good though. I'm honestly not very objective, I was never one to say I needed a Windows tablet. It's flipping great on my desktop, but I really don't have a need for it on a tablet.

One of my co workers just got a Venue 8 Pro and is very pleased with it so far. After fighting to make W8.1 usable on my notebook, I'm not a W8 fan though. I'll be skipping that revision on my desktop entirely.

The OP has options though, for budget Android tablets that aren't junk. Newegg was selling the LG Version of the G-Pad for 250 earlier this week, which is a great price for that tablet.

 

[s44]

Don't want 10" apps, do want multi-windowed 7" apps on my 10" screen...

Which is why I have a Note. Hope the patent agreement brings this stuff at last to AOSP.

 

[Joe1987]

Do you have any specific examples to illustrate your point?

Yeah, I'm not going there, it's been done over and over and over, a year or two from now, if 10" and larger Android tablets get some traction and developer attention, it's another story.

If you read a few reviews, you'll see the reviewers agree with me. But again, the market is fluid, and things change. That you're belaboring the point that's obvious and well documented is somewhat disconcerting.

 

[Suspicious-Teach8788]

Ugh, seriously? Again? That argument has been discredited, rebutted, and buried so many times now it makes my head hurt.

Once more: There are no widespread problems on Android apps on 7, 8, 9, or 10in screens.

This is absolutely bullshit. Discredited? Rebutted? Buried? That's what you say everytime when you don't like a specific argument.

Fragmentation? Debunked. Bullshit.

10" Tablet not having enough apps? Debunked. Bullshit.

Please. I have a Nexus 10. It's not bad at all, but it's not the same experience in terms of apps that I get compared to an iPad. I can't read Facebook in a tablet interface yet, nor can I read Twitter. The Yelp app is trash and so is Foursquare.

The only thing I actually do on my 10" tablet is to wake up and read some e-mail and hop on Flipboard. That's about it. The only other advantage of Android for me for a 10" tablet seems to be the fact that I can load 720p TV shows onto it and watch them with a nice experience. Other than that, the app world is quite limiting for a 10" experience.

With that said it's been 2+ years since people have been chanting this whole "Android tablets are good enough to compete with the iPad" argument. I feel like besides having decent hardware, we've barely moved since the HP TouchPad days.

 

[kmmatney]

I would not recommend a Nook HD+. I have one, running CM, and it is laggy, and has generally been a pain, with weird hardware issues. If the battery drains all the way, the charger will not work, and you have to follow a certain sequence (plugging it into a computer) to get it working again. I know plenty of others have this same issue. My proprietary charging cable didn't last very long either, before I had to order another one. Overall, I'm disappointed with it - not very fun to use. An iPad 2 is better, even with much lower screen resolution.

I wouldn't waste any money on a cheap tablet - get something that you will want to use. My Nook cost me $179, while my iPad 2 as $449 when I bought it years back. While the iPad is more than twice as expensive, it gets WAY more use. I've regret buying the Nook HD+, but have never regretted buying the iPad. Two months ago, I was able to sell my iPad 2, and buy a used iPad 4, for only $60 more. I'm a cheap bastard, but have a hard time recommending anything other than an iPad for a large tablet. You can get a used (but still in great shape) iPad 3 for less than $300 from Swappa (I picked up my iPad4 for $280 from there).

 

[Roland00Address]

The Dell Venue 8 currently has a coupon where you get it for $129.99 ($50 off) instead of $179.99. The Dell Venue 8 has the clovertrail+ 2.0 ghz dual core intel atom processor and has a similar cpu speed to the nexus fhd 7", the Dell has a slower nand and slower gpu compared to the nexus. The nexus has a better screen resolution (1920x1200) than the dell (1280x800) but both of them have ips screens. The dell is bigger in all dimensions (it is an 8" tablet), but actually weighs less than the nexus 7 fhd due to having a smaller battery which gets about 7 hours insteaad of 10 the nexus gets.

The coupon code expires on tuesday.

J41TT1LGPH2RD2

I just ordered one for a family member. For some reason when I just searched for dell venue 8 and tried to apply the coupon at checkout it did not work, but one I clicked the slickdeals link which has the coupon embedded it worked just fine.

http://slickdeals.net/f/6725218-dell-venue-8-android-tablet-for-129-99-at-dell-live-now

 

[Rdmkr]

Better hope Dell optimized the firmware for that chip better than Lenovo did on my K900. The lag, the standby drain, the heating, everything was just terrible. Granted, things got a lot better by the time they introduced Vibe Rom. But I've been left with the impression that it's a SoC with hit-and-miss performance.

it'd have to be really bad not to justify paying $130, though.

 

[quikah]

Oops, misread