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Archos 101 G9

2012-03-07T23:57:00.000-08:00

Archos 101 G9

Archos waves its magic media wand yet again, this time producing a full Honeycomb tablet

What do you want from a tablet? It's a question that many reviews want you to ask yourself before invariably buying an iPad 2, but it's a question that's particularly relevant to the Archos 101 G9.

That's because Archos has focused on media playback for its latest machine, and it's done a pretty decent job of it. The Archos 101 G9 also happens to be a fully fledged Android 3.2 Honeycomb tablet at the same time. Plus there's the little point of cash - at £270 for 8GB, this is one of the most affordable Android 3.2 tablets that money can buy.

The obvious fear with any tablet focused on the budget market is that too many corners have been cut in order to bring it in at an iPad-destroying price point. But on paper, at least, there are no obvious miscarriages of silicon justice.

You get a 1GHz OMAP 4 dual-core processor courtesy of Texas Instruments, with a view to upgrading this to a faster 1.5GHz model in early 2012.

There are plenty of connection options - including a mini HDMI port, microSD slot and a standard micro USB port. And when it comes to the all-important display, you can rest assured that the 10.1-inch screen is capacitive (and responsive), and boasts a healthy native resolution of 1280 x 800 pixels.

The Archos 101 G9 comes in two different flavours, each defined by the storage options available. The basic unit packs 8GB of storage and has a list price of £270 (although you should be able to pick this up for around £250), while a 16GB model, the Archos 101 G9 Turbo, is going to be available at the start of 2012.

Potentially more interesting is the 250GB additional memory on the Archos 101 G9, which uses a traditional hard drive. This will obviously make the unit a little more fragile than your standard tablet, but for a media machine, that's plenty of space for hours and hours of movies.

Connection options for the base unit are limited to Wi-Fi and Bluetooth only, but Archos is keen to promote its 3G USB dongle that can be plugged into a special slot on the machine's underside. This doesn't make much sense if you're thinking of tethering this to your television, but it does enable you to extend the usefulness of the machine to compete against much more expensive options.

The dongle can be used with your PC as well, which ticks the versatility box nicely.

Archos has employed Android 3.2 on its 101 G9 tablet. Unlike previous tablets from Archos, this isn't a limited installation, and finally boasts full access to the Android Market.

This means you can install the swathes of applications, utilities and 3D games that appear on there - currently standing at some 300,000 apps, although the list of tablet-focused ones is still frustratingly low.

This isn't a Tegra 2 machine, but it doesn't seem to hold the Archos 101 G9 back too much when it comes to games - the likes of Dungeon Defendersworks fine, while the ubiquitous Angry Birds Rio is smooth.

The Archos 101 G9 ships with a suite of tools pre-installed that focus on the machine's main strength, media playback.

The Music tool replaces the standard Android offering, making for a far more visually appealing interface for handling your favourite tunes.

The Video utility is more impressive though, pulling metadata and posters down to make for a great way of viewing information about your films and TV shows.

You're not limited to simply playing your movies off the tablet either, as you can connect it to your Windows shares to stream movies. It will handle 1080p content without breaking into a sweat, and will handle plenty of the main formats.

You'll need a mini HMDI to HDMI cable to get the most from this machine, and while we would have liked one to be included in the package, it's probably asking a bit much at this price point.

Playing back movies on the machine itself is smooth, but we're not entirely sold on the screen. While most expensive tablets tend to use IPS panels, such screens are expensive, and so in order to hit that low price point, Archos has instead gone for a more traditional LCD TFT panel.

Cheaper tablets, such as the Hannspree Hannspad, tend to use budget TN panels, which suffer from appalling viewing angles. But there's none of that apparent here, even from extreme angles.

What there is, however, is a coarseness to the pixel pitch that doesn't sit quite so well with a tablet aimed at enjoying media. There's an underlying grid on the screen that, once seen, is really hard to ignore.

It knocks out the vibrant areas a little, but is most apparent in darker areas, where muddy greens and browns seem to win out if the source image is much more intense. Even if you're watching the machine at a relative distance (using the flimsy stand to hold the tablet at a comfortable viewing angle), it's still apparent.

If we're being picky, it would have been good to have a standard-sized USB port too, so that you could plug USB flash drives filled with media into it.

You can of course connect to your shared devices wirelessly, if you've been forward-thinking enough to set such things up. Plus, the micro USB charging cable enables you to transfer straight from a host PC, so it's not a great loss. Even so, given how most media players, Blu-ray players and even TVs boast USB ports these days, it is notable for its absence here.

This model is somewhat limited in the storage stakes, as well. Sure you can slide a microSD card in the waiting slot for an easy boost, but install a few applications on there (especially the larger 3D games, such as the aforementioned Dungeon Defenders), and you'll eat through what's left of the 8GB of storage.

There's a reason why most tablets boast at least 16GB, and that's before you start looking at the huge storage-gobbling media.

Sound on the whole is passable, if not particularly amazing. Long movie watching is better experienced through headphones, and the same goes for playing back music. If all you want to do is watch the odd YouTube video or listen to a bit of internet radio, though, it's adequate enough.

Battery life is good, managing five hours of use when playing back movies. Playing games will reduce this, while simple surfing should see this extended to as long as seven hours.

Asus Eee Slate EP121

2012-03-07T23:54:00.000-08:00

Asus Eee Slate EP121

Can this Windows tablet get Microsoft back in the touchscreen game?

These tablets are designed for watching movies, playing games, browsing websites, creating music, taking photos and generally doing a lot of the more entertaining things laptops can do, but in a more-natural way.

They're tactile, fun, light, affordable and thanks to the challenge offered by their limited input method, far more intriguing devices than their laptop brethren.

Anyone that hasn't had chance to play with the likes of the iPad is missing out. A quick few moments with a copy of GarageBand should have most wondering how they can squeeze such a device into their lives.

The Asus Eee Slate EP121 is not one of these machines. It belongs to another group. An older, smaller group.

The other type of tablet isn't aimed at consumers. It's been tried, but ultimately it failed to make an impact with the general masses. The last big push to get such machines in the hands of users was back when Windows XP was all the rage, and while some swore by their versatility and natural inputs, most simply swore at them and walked away.

THICKNESS: The Eee Slate is enormous compared with the iPad 2

This traditional Windows tablet is still alive, although only as a niche for those industries that need the machine's compatibility and also require the tablets natural input methods. These machines are used for showing PowerPoint presentations, for using in the field where a keyboard wouldn't be practical.

They're also used by artists and designers, where the combination of a stylus and a touchscreen combine to make for a far more intuitive working experience.

Can the Eee Slate EP121 bridge the gap between these two usage types, or is it simply a new version for this existing tight niche? Time to find out..

Features

The most obvious distinction of the Asus Slate EP121 is its size; at 12.1-inch visible diagonal, it's notably larger than the vast majority of consumer tablets available. The native resolution of 1,280 x 800 works well, and the IPS panel makes for great viewing angles and excellent colour representation too.

Its sober styling and chunky dimensions may not appeal to those won over by the likes of the iPad 2, but there's a good reason for the relatively large 312 x 207 x 17mm chassis, and that's the specification of the machine's core components.

While manufacturers may be fighting over what kind of low-power ARM processor to squeeze inside their machines, for the Slate EP121, Asus has gone straight for the big guns and picked Intel's dual-core Core i5-470 processor clocked at 1.3GHz.

This processor, paired up with 4GB of DDR3 RAM, makes for an impressive core that can handle everything most desktop machines can. Combined with the installation of Windows 7 Home Premium, it means that you can run the applications you know and love with the minimum of fuss.

The 32GB SSD gives enough space for a few applications, and more storage can be easily added in the form of a MMC/SD card.

A stylus is stored in top right-hand corner of the machine, which affords more accurate input and drawing, but this isn't needed since the capacitive screen is accurate enough for normal tasks without it.

Stereo speakers can be found in the lower bezel of the machine, and are surprisingly capable when it comes watching movies. There is of course a headphone socket if you'd prefer a slightly more personal experience.

You'll find a pair of USB ports on the edges of the machine, as well as a mini-HDMI port for watching back HD video on the big screen.

There's only a front facing camera on the EP121, and at 2MP it isn't going to set the world alight, but it does mean you can partake in a little video conferencing.

The main pack also includes a protective sleeve, which doubles as a stand that can be used in portrait and landscape modes, and a wonderfully designed power brick that boasts a USB port so you can recharge other devices at the same time. Asus has also included a Microsoft Bluetooth Mobile Keyboard 6000, which makes typing a lot easier and looks great, too..

Performance

In use, the Slate EP121 is something of a mixed bag. The raw performance offered by the powerful core pulls no punches. Normal tasks finish quickly, and for the vast majority of the time the machine is responsive and multitasks with ease.

Even so, there are times when painting in the bundled ArtRage III, or when watching HD movies, that the performance stutters, or proceedings grind to a halt. This could be due to the operating system performing house-keeping tasks, and it's never for long, but it does still frustrate.

The biggest problem with sluggishness, though, is when changing the orientation of the Slate EP121. Switching from portrait to landscape results in at least a five second delay where the screen blanks, and then slowly redraws. It's frustrating to wait for, and the orientation lock will probably mean this machine is used one way round only.

We've commented on this before in the Acer W500 review, where the lowly specification of that system may have been to blame, but there's no such excuse here. This is clearly a problem with Windows.

The main problem with Windows on a tablet, though, is that it hasn't been designed to make the most of a touch interface. Window resizing is frustrating, closing windows surprisingly tricky and common tasks that are straightforward with a mouse and keyboard can suddenly take on Herculean proportions.

The larger 12.1-inch screen does make this an easier machine to use than the aforementioned W500, but only just. Compare the experience with a more consumer-focused tablet, and it really does feel like Microsoft has its work cut out to get Windows 8 up to speed.

On the positive side of things, the screen is a delight to use; and using the stylus to draw with is particularly rewarding, and designers for one will be eager to explore the potential offered by the Wacom digitizer.

Unfortunately, the high-powered components conspire to stop this being a designer's dream machine though, as the hefty 1.2kg machine boasts a mere two-and-a-half hours of battery life under normal use.

There's no question of whether this machine handles Flash, or a certain kind of plugin. To all intents and purposes, this is a Windows laptop, and as such everything can be made to run on it. Asus has bundled advertisement-heavy versions of Word and Excel with the machine, as if to prove this.

We did find gaming a little on the sluggish side, with the Unity-powered Tiger Woods PGA Tour Online pretty much unplayable. There are plenty of Flash-based games available that work without problem, though.

Sony Ericsson Xperia Neo

2012-03-07T23:51:00.000-08:00

Sony Ericsson Xperia Neo

Mid-range Sony Ericsson Android phone packs a photographic punch

Sitting pretty in the hand, the small Sony Ericsson Xperia Neo smartphone and its 8.1-megapixel camera offer photographic skills far beyond what you'd expect for its 125g weight.

The 3.7-inch screen with multi-touch Reality display is nice and sharp, and benefits colour-wise from Mobile Bravia technology. However it fares poorly in direct sunlight, with us having to pull the ol' hand-as-a-sun-blocker move.

The phone is small enough to use comfortably with one hand, so it's not a huge problem, but essentially, with smartphones such as the Samsung Galaxy S2 carrying AMOLED and the Apple iPhone 4 with its Retina display technology, should we really be having problems with direct sunlight any more?

You can check out our Sony Ericsson Xperia Neo video review too - it's like a written review but with moving pictures:

But, moving on, the (blue for us) semi-anodised finish, curved posterior and well-distributed weighting means it sits nicely in the hand at least.

The lock/power key, volume rocker, and – score! – a soft camera key all live on the silver right side of the 13mm-thick chassis. It's not the thinnest of phones, but the depth gives it a nice solid feel in the palm, and it's short enough (4.7 inches, or 116mm) to slip easily into pockets.

On the front we have the Home, Menu and Back buttons, plus up top the Xperia Neo squeezes in a front-facing camera, and proximity and light sensors.

On the back, of course, we have aforementioned 8.1-megapixel camera and a beast of a flash, with which we may have blinded some unsuspecting band members at gigs. Whoops.

Placed at the top are the mini-USB port, 3.5mm audio jack and – in keeping with the high megapixel camera – a mini-HDMI port.

All in, we're not faced with yet another black slab of a smartphone, which is good, we suppose. It's neat and ergonomic, but it's not the sexiest design ever and doesn't really push our aesthetics buttons.

Coming in SIM-free at around £369, it's a mid-range smartphone that fits a lot into its small frame. Running on Gingerbread 2.3, there's also the 8MP camera, mini-HDMI out should you enjoy seeing your videos on a big screen, and a multi-touch 3.7-inch screen.

The Xperia Neo definitely leans on its media offering, but for what it's worth, that's some pretty good stuff, and great if your smartphone is more for play than it is for work.

Sony Ericsson Xperia Neo: Interface

The Sony Ericsson Xperia Neo runs on Android Gingerbread 2.3, neatly aligning it with the Samsung Galaxy S2 and earmarking it as one of the few handsets to be launched with the updated OS.

It offers a smooth navigation experience, with little-to-no juddering – in fact, the only stuttering we found was with internet browsing, but we'll get to that in a little while.

For customisation fans, the little Xperia Neo offers a plethora of possibilities, with five Home screens, moveable widgets and shortcuts, and – hello to Apple's iOS – the ability to organise all of them into folders.

Diving into the menu delivers the apps, the ordering of which is easy. Click on the right-hand squares icon and it floats the apps, making it easy to sort into content panels. Or, click on the left-hand arrow icon and sort them alphabetically, by most used or by most recently installed.

The Android pull-down notifications tab is still around, something we like as a handy way of viewing your most recent messages/notifications.

And for your four key, most-used apps, there's a dock across the bottom of each screen to pin them on. By default these sit as media, messaging, contacts and phone dialer, but they too can be customised and changed around.

Plus, holding the Home button momentarily will bring up a multitasking screen, which allows you to pick from the most recent apps you've had open.

Altogether, a good operating system overlaid with a Sony Ericsson skin, making for an easy to navigate UI that you can make your own in many ways.

Apple iPad 3 specs review

2012-03-07T23:43:00.000-08:00

Apple iPad 3 specs review

It's time to leave aside the educated guesses and round up what Apple actually revealed today. Well, a 9.7" tablet with 2048x1356 pixels on the display, a 5 MP rear camera and a combo radio that has 4G LTE and HSPA+ connectivity, among numerous other bands.

The big deal here is undoubtedly the display. While some may argue it is not truly a Retina Display, since it sports a 264ppi pixel density, as opposed to the 326ppi on the last two iPhones, let's not forget that one variable to call it Retina is set to be the distance from your eyes, and your tablet is usually further away than your phone.

Anyway, with the new distance measurement it likely fits the name, but semantics walk when the resolution talks. It is no coincidence that Apple is calling the new iPad's display "Resolutionary". It is a nice wordplay which highlights that we have the highest screen resolution we've ever seen on a tablet, including the new Full HD slates that were just announced last week, like the Asus Transformer Pad Infinity 700 Series or the Huawei Media Pad 10 FHD.

Not only will text and images definition look much better than on the iPad 2 with 4x more pixels, but the display also has 40% better color saturation, which will make everything pop and look gorgeous. Now it will be interesting to see after the first disassembly operation on the iPad 3 which of the usual suspects LG, Samsung and Sharp has made the screen for the particular unit, but the uniform saturation also hints at a pretty coordinated effort between those companies and Apple for achieving the same quality across the board.

The screen makers introduced a new production technology for the tablet's Retina Display - with 3.1 million pixels crammed into the new iPad, a million more than in an HDTV, the signal wiring that tells the pixels when to light up or go down can get interference and deteriorate image quality.

That's why the LCD screen engineers elevated only the pixels on a different plane, leaving the wiring below them, for the crispest image possible, which is apparently a major breakthrough in display making. Oh, and let's not forget that we have a regular RGB matrix here, no PenTile shenanigans, which makes the 2048x1536 resolution even more stunning.

Now comes the A5X chip. The A5 silicon in the iPad 2 and iPhone 4S is plenty powerful for any app you throw at it, with its dual-core CPU based on ARM's Cortex-A9 architecture. Cortex-A15 gadgets are yet to arrive at some point this year, but the "X" mark after A5 still must denote some sort of an improvement, right? The move from the A4 system-on-a-chip (SoC) in the iPhone 4 to the A5 SOC was denoted by a bump in the processor codes used by Apple. The A4 is S5L8930X, while the A5 is S5L8940X. Now the A5X label goes 5 digits further to S5L8945X, indicating only a partial upgrade over the A5.

Well, those 3 million pixels are not going to light themselves if we don't have more graphics prowess in the chipset, so Apple has bumped the GPU to a quad-core one now. Before you smile condescendingly knowing that Tegra 3 has a 12-core GPU, and even Tegra 2 has an 8-core one, let's remember that we are talking PowerVR when it comes to the iPad.

The A5 has a dual-core PowerVR SGX543MP2 graphics subsystem, which wipes the floor with the Tegras, so a quad-core in the A5X probably means a PowerVR SGX543/544 MP4 GPU, coming at about four times the Tegra 3 performance when graphics are concerned, if we look at the synthetic measurements. This will make gaming, image and video editing, drawing or any other graphics intensive task on the new iPad go with the PowerVR flow.

5-element camera lens

Next in line we have the new 5MP iSight rear camera module, just the resolution on the iPhone 4. It features a 5-elements lens, like the camera on the iPhone 4S, back-side illumination (BSI) for better low-light performance, and image stabilization. The jury is still out on the camera quality, but it should be on par with the iPhone 4 at least.

New iPad camera sample shot

This time Apple is in possession of a dual-core chip to process all the 30 frames per second coming through the iSight's optics, so the new iPad is capable of capturing Full HD 1080p video, whether you need it on a tablet or not.

It's nice to know the ability is there, though, and Apple has updated its iPhoto and iMovie apps with numerous editing capabilities made possible by the powerful graphics subsystem and the hi-res display.

You can sign up for PAYG LTE service straight from the new iPad

And here comes the last hardware achievement of Apple's new iPad - the baseband radio. Considering we have both AT&T and Verizon's 4G LTE frequencies supported, the connectivity chip in the iPad 3 is probably of Qualcomm's newest Gobi variety. Apple claims no mobile device is supporting so many basebands as the new iPad, and it has a reason to do so.

The fifth generation chip supports TD-SCDMA, TD-LTE, LTE on FDD and TDD networks worldwide and embedded GPS capability, plus 42Mbps DC-HSDPA, 21Mbps HSPA+ and EV-DO, thus providing thewidest baseband radio support in the market yet.

The new iPad is guaranteed to work on networks from Vancouver to Vladivostok, and Qualcomm has apparently managed to slim down its LTE radios significantly compared to the first generation, allowing Apple to still achieve a very thin, 9.4mm tablet. This connectivity radio we are probably going to see in this year's iPhone as well.

The Wi-Fi + 4G model will come with different shell featuring a plastic strip at the top that helps signal penetration. Moreover, while you have to pick a version configured specifically for AT&T or Verizon's LTE networks, you can also sign up for service straight from the iPad, and buy data usage as you go, without the need for long-term commitments with a carrier.

Last but not least, a quick word about the battery - Apple equipped the iPad 3 with a 45 watt-hour battery, while we have a 25 watt-hour one in the iPad 2. The new iPad's Retina Display and the LTE connectivity apparently are a huge drain on the juicer, since they are quoted to provide around 10 hours of work and play with both iPads.

Nokia 808 PureView

2012-03-07T23:39:00.001-08:00

Nokia 808 PureView

Alright, so here it is, probably the last (or one of the very last) Symbian smartphones ever – the Nokia 808 PureView. And boy is this an epic way for Symbian to exit the industry!

What do we mean here? Well, first of all, the Nokia 808 PureView comes to succeed the N8 – the smartphone that kind of set the new benchmark for camera phones when it came out. Well, interestingly, the still largest handset manufacturer by volume seems to be aiming even higher this time by introducing a handset with a camera which has not 12, not 16... but an enormous 41 megapixels! Sounds pretty wicked, we know.

First of all, we should note that the handset looks like a typical Nokia, which isn't a bad thing, of course. It has a large 4" screen on the front, however, it still has Symbian's usual nHD resolution, which is 360x640 pixels. The display uses the AMOLED technology, and overall it looks cool, despite the relatively low resolution. Touch sensitivity is also pretty good.

Do not expect wonders from this device on the build quality front. Is's actually quite light, and doesn't feel as premium as the N8. Still, it's not bad either.



Nokia 808 PureView does't feel as premium as the N8

As we said, this is one of the last Symbian smartphones, and the exact version running on it is Belle. To tell you the truth, we feel that Nokia has made some pretty good advancements in the way of the UI with these latest Symbian iterations, so it's kind of sad to know that its lifetime is coming to an end. Overall, the software runs great, it's very fluid, although we can't really say that it's as streamlined as it should be yet.

Since this is mainly a camera-centric handset, Nokia has put some effort into improving the camera application. Indeed, we were fascinated to find how simple to use it was. All of the options are easily accessible on the left side of the screen, without unnecessary taking too much space.


The Camera app is very simple to use

The Nokia 808 PureView's 41MP camera can actually shoot still at a maximum of 38MP resolution. Theaperture is set at f/2.4, while a Xenon flash is there to assist you while shooting in low-light conditions. In addition, there's an LED light to help the handset focus better. Probably the coolest thing about this high-resolution sensor, is that when you shoot in a standard 8MP or 5MP mode, you can actually zoom in without loosing much quality. And for those worrying about the size of these giant pics- the guys from Nokia said that the 808 PureView is doing a lot to compress the pics so a giant 38MP image, for example, shouldn't take more than 12MB, which does sound like a lot of compression. Here's for hoping this won't be at the expense of the quality.

As far as video recording is concerned, you can shoot with a maximum of 1080p resolution, 30fps. Again, thanks to the giant sensor, this new Nokia allows you to zoom in up to 4 times without loosing quality. Sounds great to us!

Obviously, we have a new king on the camera phone scene on its way. When is it going to arrive? The Nokia 808 PureView should become available in May for about $600 (EUR 450), before carrier subsidies.

Motorola Xoom 2

2012-03-07T06:21:00.000-08:00

Motorola Xoom 2

Can the new Xoom keep up with the pace of Android tablets?

Though the original Motorola Xoomstood out as the first big tablet push with backing from Google, it didn't turn out quite to be pinnacle of Android tablets.

It was soon surpassed by the likes of the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1as a straight-up iPad 2 competitor, while the Asus Eee Pad Slider andAsus Eee Pad Transformershowed that Android tablets could really excel when they did something different.

Still, there's no doubt the Xoom was a good device in its own right, so Motorola's been tweaking and trimming, and has now released the Xoom 2.

Though there have been some internal changes, it's the outside where the difference is most notable. Motorola seems determined to take the iPad 2 head-on here, because the Xoom 2 has the same thin profile as the iPad 2 (both measure just 8.8mm thick), and at 599g is actually lighter a whole 2g lighter than Apple's tablet.

Inside, the 1GHz dual-core processor of the original has been bumped up to 1.2GHz, all the better to smoothly run Android 3.2. Sadly, there's no Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich here at launch, which inevitably means any Xoom 2 owners will always be looking over the horizon at the rosy unified future.

The screen is the same size and resolution as the original Xoom: 1280 x 800 pixels in a 10.1-inch display. It's an IPS panel, and so offers excellent viewing angles, which is what we expect from a good tablet.

There's 1GB of RAM on offer, to ensure that multitasking runs as smoothly as possible, and there's 16GB of on-board storage.

Surprisingly, this can't be increased with a microSD card, despite there being a flap on the side of the Xoom 2 that you would think would cover a microSD card slot. Instead, it covers… some plastic.

Motorola seems to think that its included MotoCast software will cover the need for more media storage, enabling you to access the media on your computer from your device, anywhere. Well, nearly anywhere – there's no 3G in the Xoom 2, though there is a GPS chip.

There's a rear-facing camera on the Xoom 2 that can take five-megapixel snaps and record video at 720p, while the front-facing camera has a 1.3-megapixel sensor.

Despite the thickness and weight similarities between the Xoom 2 and the iPad 2, they end up feeling quite different in the hand because of their different shapes. The Xoom 2 has a 16:10 widescreen display, while the iPad is 4:3.

This means that, in portrait, the Xoom 2 actually feels slightly more comfortable to hold in one hand, because it isn't as wide. Conversely, the iPad 2 is slightly more comfortable in landscape, because the Xoom 2 stretches further.

Like the iPad 2, the Xoom 2 has edges that curve and taper back from the screen, hiding the buttons when viewed straight on. Held in landscape, with the camera at the top, on the right-hand side you've got a Sleep/Wake button and volume controls, and on top is the 3.5mm headphone jack.

On the bottom is a micro-USB port and micro-HDMI port, along with the mystery flap that goes nowhere.

The back of the Xoom 2 features matte plastic around the edge, with a shinier, more metallic plastic in the middle. The matte plastic is superbly grippy, and really helps you keep a firm hold on the slender frame, while the metallic look lend a bit of class to proceedings. It's a great balance of looks and ergonomics.

The only problem is that build quality is a little disappointing. We're not saying it feels like the Xoom 2 is going to fall apart or anything, but there's give in the middle of the back in particular that really grated on us. You can feel it shifting whenever pressure is applied, including most times you pick it up.

It's not something that affects operation, and you may not notice it as much depending on how you hold it (it's far less noticeable in landscape), but it feels unpleasant beneath your fingers.

The screen is also suspect, not for it's quality, but for being a dirt and grease magnet – even more so than most tablets. It very quickly starts to feel different, and nasty, under your fingers, and it doesn't have any kind of easy-clean oleophobic coating, so you'll want to make sure it gets a proper polish regularly.

Despite those criticisms, the Xoom 2 is a fairly handsome and mostly well-made tablet. Though it clearly took a few design cues from the iPad, the different shape and materials give it a look that's different to Apple's tablet, and most of the other Android tablets out there.

But we did find the design somewhat familiar, as will many Nokia fans. With the curving, cut corners and big widescreen, we have to say the Nokia N8came strongly to mind.

The Xoom 2 looks set to go on sale for just less than £400, with Clove selling it for £390.

Features

Though some Android manufacturers have tweaked the tablet formula with success – notably Asus' Eee Pad Sliderand Eee Pad Transformer – Motorola is sticking with the classics when it comes to the Xoom 2.

This is just a slim, light slate when it comes to hardware, without even a microSD port, so it's down to the software to make it stand out.

Well, almost. There is one unusual hardware feature worth mentioning – Motorola says the tablet has a "splash-guard coating" both outside the Xoom 2 and inside, on the circuit boards. It's designed to offer a bit of protection against accidental spills and getting surprised by rain when you're using the Xoom outside.

We're not talking about any serious waterproofing here, but it's clear that Motorola sees the Xoom 2 as a kind of roaming companion device, and giving it an extra layer of protection will no doubt help people to feel more comfortable using somewhere like the kitchen.

The two big software additions to Android 3.2 reinforce this idea of a handy portable screen: the Floating Notes app and MotoCast.

The Floating Notes app sits permanently in the bottom bar, where notifications come up. You can tap it at any time to bring up the options to create a new Floating Note, view your notes in a window where you can sort them by date create, title, and so on, or you can open the built-in Evernote app.

The Floating Notes app itself is a fairly simple drawing and typing app – you can scrawl things down in the main part, adjust the brush size and colour, add some typed text at the top, and even send a note to the Tasks app so you can action something on it later. You can also share notes by Bluetooth, email, Dropbox and, probably most usefully, Evernote syncing.

There's a couple of Floating notes widgets to make it easy to get straight into a note, while a notes carousel lets you browse through your notes as a widget, much like the Android Honeycomb YouTube app.

MotoCast is the other big software feature for the Xoom 2. It's a media streaming app, essentially, but a custom one designed to make the process as easy as possible.

You install the MotoCast software on your computer, decide which folders to allow it to see, and then open the app on your Xoom to connect to those folders and stream music, videos and movies.

The reason for having a dedicated server app, and not just using DLNA streaming over a local network, is that it provides a simple way to get remote access to your media wherever you are – in another room in the house, or hundreds of miles away.

Moto is so convinced that this is the way forward, as it explained to us, that it's part of the reason why there's no SD card slot, and only 16GB of storage.

We'l give our verdict on MotoCast on the next page, but it's definitely a big part of Motorola's plans for the mobile market.

One of the Xoom 2's other party tricks, and yet more evidence of Motorola's designs on the living room, is the built-in infrared receiver and bundled Dijit app. Essentially, the Xoom 2 can become a universal remote control for your TV setup. We had no problems getting it to work with our kit just by searching the database for the right models, though it has to be said that the on-screen remotes are a little light on features compared to the real thing.

Don't assume that it's all play and no work when it comes to the Xoom 2, though. There's a Citrix app included, for you enterprisey types, and Quickoffice HD is also bundled, with cloud integration for Google Docs, Dropbox, Box, SugarSync and more.

Performance

The Motorola Xoom 2's most noticeable upgrade might be in the chassis, but it's also had an upgrade to a 1.2GHz CPU, along with Android 3.2.

This has produced a tablet that's quite snappy overall, though it does still suffer from the odd moment where swipes take a moment to register. The only real disappointment when it comes to performance in the operating system is switching orientation.

It almost always takes a couple of seconds to switch, no matter if you're just on the Home screen or if you're in a resource-intensive app. It doesn't spoil the tablet or anything, but it's an annoyance that most its competitors don't have (save for the HP TouchPad, which was much, much worse).

But, overall, the Xoom 2 is as smooth to use as the likes of the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1, and isn't far off the Asus Eee Pad Slider's slick operation at all.

We found the keyboard on the Xoom 2 to be one of its weaker points, with lots of taps going astray. It just doesn't sit as comfortably under the fingers as theiPad 2's or the HP TouchPad's (and obviously the physical keyboard option for the Asus Eee Pad Slider and Transformer are better), possibly due to the difference in screen shape.

The screen itself is nice and clear, with natural colours that look great for video. The 1280 x 800 resolution means that text is nice and clear, too. The brightness is our only small concern – it just isn't that bright, and the auto-brightness doesn't help by being really quite aggressive.

We had to keep the brightness up at maximum pretty much always, even just in regular household lighting (as opposed to harsh tungsten office lights, for example). Certainly, the screen is bright enough for almost any use, but there's really no margin for boosting it further in really bright artificial light, or sunlight.

Alas, there's another small problem with the screen: the backlight. There are a few spots where it bleeds through quite noticeably, particularly when on a screen with a dark background, including the Settings screen. You won't notice it all the time, but it's disappointing.

Despite that, we do think the screen on the Xoom 2 is pretty good overall, and it needs to be, because there's no doubt this is a media-focussed tablet. Instead of dragging and dropping media to it when plugged in over USB, you use MotoCast USB to bring over things like iTunes playlists, or select media from folders.

Like Windows Phone Connector, it'll automatically convert videos if they're in a format the Xoom 2 can't play natively (though Motorola's software is better than Microsoft's, because it doesn't insist on also converting the stuff that was fine to begin with).

The MotoCast USB software was a bit hit-and-miss, though; it crashed on us a lot, making it impossible to get anything on the device. But when it worked, it worked fine.

Everything's easy to access on the device, with music in the Music app and photos and videos in the Gallery app. The Music is a bit slow in landscape when you've got a decent collection, but is faster to flick through in portrait.

1080p video plays back smoothly, except not over the HDMI port – everything mirrors smoothly when you connect to an HDTV, except for all video that plays back in the main Android player. You just get the controls with a black screen behind them. Not ideal.

The wireless MotoCast app works quite well on a local network, except for one significant flaw. Though it connects seamlessly to the folders you set it up with, it often misreported the contents of video folders for us. It listed everything fine, but when we tapped on what we wanted, it sometimes opened something else. It was like a shuffle function for our videos that we couldn't turn off. Superb.

Actually streaming something is the part that works. We had occasional stutters, but it was mostly fine. Go outside your local network and you'll encounter more struggles, though.

Because it's not actually coming from the cloud, but from your PC, you'll need a really good upload speed to get anything out of it. More than that, though, your computer must be up and running for it to work. If it goes on standby, you'll find that you'll get an 'offline' message when you try to access it.

MotoCast is a nice idea, and could be a great addition to make Motorola's tablet stand out, but it needs more work.

The loudspeakers on the Xoom 2 can go loud enough for most situations, but they make the whole back of the tablet vibrate when they're loud, and the sound gets much more distorted at high volumes than it does on, say, the iPad.

The browser on the Xoom 2 proved to be fairly snappy, though Opera Mobile is also included, should you want to go that route. Adobe Flash is preinstalled, so consider that box ticked.

As we said, the browser is fairly fast, with pages loading quickly for the most part, but loading Flash content does hold many pages back compared those without Flash.

And the old spectre of Flash causing the responsiveness of the browser to slow is also present, but even with a video on the page, zooming and panning is pretty good. And you can pinch to zoom and pan around the page at the same time! (It's something a surprising number of Android devices lack the ability to do.)

In real life, we're not looking at the fastest tablet browser around in the Xoom 2, but it's fast enough that it won't make much difference day to day.

Battery life

For battery life, the Xoom 2 made a good account of itself, though it was slightly up and down. Whereas some Android tablets have problems keeping power use to a minimum on standby, the Xoom 2 was very good, and we're sure it'd be able to last you for days on end (rather than misplacing a fifth of its battery overnight, as some do).

That said, it's surprising just how much power certain aspects of the Xoom 2 use. At one point, we managed to use 20% of the battery during about an hour of internet testing.

Granted, we were loading sites over and over, and testing Flash performance a lot, but it seemed a little much. We did have the screen's brightness turned all the way up, but it has to be in a well-lit room, or it's a little hard to see what you're doing.

But, there have been plenty of other times we've been using the Xoom 2 more sporadically, and the battery use hasn't gone down far at all.

Ultimately, the iPad 2 is still the tablet battery life king, but the Xoom 2 does quite well for itself. Just mind the Flash content.

The built-in GPS chip worked quite well for us, narrowing us down quickly. With no 3G to stream maps, it's a slightly odd addition, but we can't knock it for functionality.

The camera on the Xoom 2 is decent enough, capturing accurate colours and crisp lines, and letting in a good amount of light even in low light. The detail can be a little soft, but overall they're good snaps.

Similarly, the 720p HD video is passable, if not spectacular. It's not up to par with better dedicated cameras, or the best phones, but you can make out what's happening easily, though fast motion can become quite blurred.

Novatech nTablet

2012-03-07T06:11:00.001-08:00

Novatech nTablet

A Windows 7 tablet that's well constructed but ultimately flawed

Apple's iPad was the only tablet on store shelves for the bulk of the year, but now it faces genuine competition from the likes ofSamsung's Galaxy Tab. However, most of the contenders we've seen have proved to be cheap imitations, such as the Elonex eTouch 1000ET and the Disgo Tablet 6000.

British manufacturer Novatech is the latest company to release its own touch-based device, and first impressions of the Novatech nTablet are favourable. The body feels suitably sturdy, with none of the troublesome flex we saw in the Disgo. An aluminium back resists scratching when the tablet is laid flat and the screen is firm, proving resistive when vigorously prodded.

We did notice a little flex along the left edge of the device when it's gripped, which unfortunately cheapens the build, but it's nothing major.

Almost all of the tablets we've seen bear more than a passing resemblance to the iPad, and the Novatech nTablet is no exception. The same black border is in place, although the nTablet features a grey appendage on the right edge with three buttons. Bizarrely, this is the exact same design already used by the Viewsonic View Pad.

At 890g, the Novatech nTablet is heavier than the iPad, Galaxy Tab and many of the other tablets we've seen lately. The difference is instantly noticeable when holding the nTablet one-handed, and our (admittedly weak) wrists caved in after just a few minutes.

Holding the Novatech nTablet two-handed is more comfortable, thanks to that thick black border. The tablet never overheated, even after constant prolonged use, thanks to the vents on the top and bottom of the device.

The Novatech nTablet is also quite chunky, with a thickness of 15mm. However, at least the back is flat unlike the curved rear of the iPad, which means the device won't rock when it's laid on a desk and prodded.

The £350 asking price (£439 with Windows 7 Home Premium pre-installed) is less than an iPad will set you back, and cheaper than the likes of the Galaxy Tab. The question is, does the nTablet provide as satisfying a user experience, or is it worth throwing down extra cash for Apple or Samsung's tablets?

The Novatech nTablet's 10.1-inch capacitive screen is a definite highlight. With a 1,024 x 600-pixel resolution, it's perfectly crisp, which quickly becomes apparent when watching video or working on highly detailed spreadsheets.

Contrast levels are excellent, with perfectly deep blacks, and it's a bright display too. Of course, it's also highly reflective, so using the Novatech nTablet outdoors or in a brightly lit room results in the swift onset of a migraine.

When browsing our photo collection or relaxing with a movie, we were impressed by what we saw. Images are colourful with realistic tones, and there was no hint of motion blur or other warning signs. The Novatech nTablet's screen is certainly large enough to comfortably watch full-length films, and beats squinting at a tiny phone screen when you need entertaining on those dreary commutes.

However, the screen picks up fingerprints and scuff marks ridiculously easily, and requires regular cleaning. This is a bit of a problem considering it's a touchscreen, so there's no avoiding swiping your grimy fingers all over it.

Although there are two tiny speakers built into the back of the Novatech nTablet, they're understandably weak. We'd recommend using some good-quality headphones.

The Novatech nTablet has a built-in accelerometer that automatically re-aligns the desktop when you rotate the device. Sensitivity levels are perfect, shifting the display around only when needed as opposed to every time you accidentally tilt the nTablet. However, rotation takes a couple of seconds instead of the smooth, instant action we'd have liked.

Three face buttons are lined up along the right edge. The power button is self-explanatory and also puts the Novatech nTablet into hibernation. However, the Back and Home buttons do nothing except switch the Wi-Fi on and off when using Windows 7. Apparently they will function as expected with Google Android installed on the nTablet, or so claims a leaflet that came with the device.

The only other feature on the face of the device is a 1.3-mgeapixel webcam, which functions as expected during web chats. Quality is fine for a mobile device, certainly strong enough to wave to friends and family over Skype.

On the edges you'll find a generous number of ports, including two USB 2.0 connections for attaching peripherals such as a keyboard, and a mini-VGA port that can be used to hook the Novatech nTablet up to a compatible monitor.

A microSD slot can be used to expand the 32GB of storage provided by the solid state drive. You can therefore have a maximum of 64GB of space, although a chunk of this is taken up by Windows, leaving you less room for your media.

Networking is strong, with 802.11n Wi-Fi available for connecting to wireless networks and Bluetooth built in. There's a SIM-card slot on one edge but you'll need to provide your own card to make use of 3G networks.

Although the Novatech nTablet also comes in an Android version, the model we tested only had Windows 7 Home Premium pre-installed. Windows 7 may be more touch-friendly than previous versions of Microsoft's operating system, but it certainly doesn't do the job half as well as Android or the Apple's iOS.

Many of Windows' menu options are far too small to hit accurately, while simple actions such as minimising a document or browser window can take a couple of prods. We were never enraged by this usability issue, but it detracts from the user experience and makes you long for the slick interface of the iPad.

However, at least we can't fault the Novatech nTablet's touchscreen for these issues, because it proved highly responsive at all times, whether we were playing games or browsing the web. Scrolling through eBooks or web pages is a smooth experience, and multi-touch is supported so you can zoom to your heart's content.

The only issue we had was when we attempted to scroll left and right on some web pages, because the usual finger-flick simply selects a body of text instead. We had to use the scroll bar at the bottom of the window, which proved fiddly.

Entering text is a fairly painless experience, since the Novatech nTablet's on-screen keyboard can be brought up at any time by flicking it from the edge of the desktop. If you encounter a text box in a web page simply tap on it and a keyboard icon will appear, and a swift prod of that will also bring up the keyboard.

We found our every keystroke was recorded accurately, even when typing at speed, and the keys flash as you poke them to show you what you've hit. The only exception is when you type in passwords, which confused us for a moment – we thought the whole lot had frozen on us.

However, you don't get any of the autocorrect options that the likes of the Google Android keyboard provides, and we still much prefer typing on a physical board.

Novatech hasn't given Flash the two-fingered salute like Apple has, so the nTablet lets you stream video from the likes of BBC News, YouTube and 4OD. We had mixed results, unfortunately, with occasional pauses and glitches during playback of high-definition video that interrupted our viewing. It's bearable, but once again detracts from the overall experience.

This stuttering is also a problem when running too many applications at once. The Intel Atom N455 processor does an admirable job of handling Windows 7, but crumples into a sweaty heap when you try anything resembling multi-tasking. Browsing the web while other programs chug away in the background is a stilted affair and not recommended.

Thankfully we had no trouble running simple games such as Plants Vs Zombies, which worked well thanks to the Novatech nTablet's responsive touchscreen. However, the integrated graphics are limiting and you won't be able to run anything more complex.

A battery life of 165 minutes is just about enough for the daily commute but we really expect a lot more from a portable device such as the nTablet. You'll have to pack the charger on trips and pray your chosen mode of transport has a mains socket, or you'll soon be carting around a very expensive paperweight.

Motorola Milestone XT720

2012-03-07T02:00:00.001-08:00

Motorola Milestone XT720

Is there more to the Motorola Milestone XT720 than 720p video recording?

We've been waiting for the Motorola Milestone XT720 for absolutely ages. When we looked at the Motoroi back in February, we said it was launching in Korea and destined to come to Europe.

Well, with a change of name, the loss of its digital video tuner and a few other tweaks to make it UK-friendly, the Motoroi has made it to the UK as the Motorola Milestone XT720.

If your favourite Android handset so far has been the HTC Desire, with its top of the range specs, we really can't blame you. But the Motorola Milestone XT720 could be the handset to give theDesire a run for its money.

We say that because of things like its 8-megapixel camera with xenon flash, 720p video recording, HDMI-out – with cable provided – and vast high-resolution screen.

Of course there's no Sense UI as you'll find on the Desire, but you might be able to live with that, and the rest of the expected goodies are here too, such as Wi-Fi, GPS and 3G.

The Milestone isn't cheap, though. SIM free it'll set you back around £350 (The Desire is currently going for around £390).

The Motorola Milestone XT720 is a chunky beast of a phone. It has to be to contain its 3.7-inch screen, but there's quite a lot of framing around the screen so that overall it measures 115.95 x 60.9 x 10.9mm and it isn't light, either at 160g.

It feels a bit brickish in the hands, partly because it lacks the rounded edges of the Desire, or indeed the iPhone. And then there's the odd 'hump' on the right hand edge which makes the Motorola Milestone XT720 even wider at the bottom than it is at the top.

The upshot is that anyone with smaller hands might struggle to hold the Motorola Milestone XT720 and will almost certainly find it a challenge to reach right across the screen one-handed.

This is a handset that is peppered with buttons and connectors. There's nothing on the bottom edge, but on the top you'll find a 3.5mm headset slot and the main on/off/hold button. Oh, and under a hinged cover, that mini-HDMI port for getting video onto your TV.

On the left there's a micro-USB port protected by a hinged cover. The right edge houses the volume rocker, camera key and a toggle button which moves you between stills camera, video camera and gallery.

With Android 2.1 at its heart the Motorola Milestone XT720 is well equipped with modern smartphone goodness. Motorola adds its own touch user interface elements on top to give you some nice tweaks, such as a scrolling menu for viewing pictures which is accessible direct from the camera.

Motorola has also done its own thing with the main screens selection. The Home screen has room for nine application shortcuts and, along the bottom of the screen there are shortcuts to the dialler, messaging and, in between these two, an icon you sweep upwards to get to the main apps menu.

There are five Home screens in all, and, as usual, you get to these with horizontal finger sweeps and can fill them with widgets.

The front chassis is not without its buttons, too. There are four, beneath the display. They offer the usual Home, Menu, Back and Search functions.

On that little hump on the right of the chassis there are three tiny teeny icons that look as though they might be touch buttons too. In fact they just light up to remind you what camera mode you're in – video, camera or gallery. Yeah, thanks Moto.

The screen is an absolute wonder. We've already said that it measures 3.7 inches, which puts it on a par with the HTC Desire, and makes it .2 inches larger than that of the iPhone.

But there's more to it than size alone. The screen delivers 480 x 854 pixels. Now, the HTC Desire manages 480 x 800 and the iPhone 4 has its well-documented 960 x 640.

The screen is a standard TFT and it isn't as bright or resoundingly clear as super AMOLED screens such as that on the Samsung Wave. In fact, we had trouble viewing it in bright outdoor sunshine.

The screen is capacitive, which means it responds to pinch to zoom requests, though we found this a little hit and miss at times. And, in general, we found the screen less responsive to taps than we'd like.

Mostly it wasn't a problem, but it's not up there with the best. Another negative on the screen is that it is a real fingerprint magnet.

Motorola has implemented a clever little feature called My Sign. You can use this to get quickly to an app or service by designating an on-screen gesture as a link to it. You need to actually run the My Sign app for gestures to be recognised, though, so this is best put on the main screen if you want to use it.

In general we like the UI tweaks that Motorola has thought of, but it has to be said that things aren't as slick as they are on HTC's Sense user interface.

Acer Stream

2012-03-07T01:57:00.000-08:00

Acer Stream

The Stream is Acer's best smartphone ever. But is it even in the same league as rest?

We've seen a number of smartphones launched this year from Acer including beTouch models running Android andneoTouch models running Windows Mobile.

There has also been the Liquid E, an Android 2.1 upgrade of an earlier handset which we thought had potential but which failed to live up to its billing.

Acer keeps forging ahead with new launches, and the latest, the Stream, looks on paper to be a stunner.

Alongside the essentials of 3G, Wi-Fi and GPS, we have a nice large 3.7-inch AMOLED screen with an 800 x 480 pixel resolution, 1GHz processor, 720p video recording, HDMI out, a 5-megapixel camera and really nice-looking build quality.

And while Acer barely touched the Android user interface on the Liquid E, the Acer Stream is fully skinned. This is potentially a worry because Acer has not been wonderful at skinning operating systems in the past.

But we were hoping from the outset that the Stream might be able to rival HTC's super Sense user interface.

In the end the reality lies between the two. HTC Sense is still the one to beat, but Acer has made a pretty good job with skinning on the Stream.

As you'd expect from those specs, the Acer Stream doesn't come cheap. At £399 SIM free, it's actually a shade more expensive than the HTC Desire.

Of course, it's brand new, so its price may fall and come into line with theDesire over the next few weeks.

Even before getting to the software, there are things to like about the Acer Stream. The physical design is streets ahead of what we've seen on recent Acer smartphones.

There is a metal-look finish to the border of the front, with a black screen-surround that houses four touch buttons.

However, it's got a very 'industrial' feel to it - like the phone is bigger than it needs to be all round, with a very chunky chassis.

These buttons perform the usual Android functions – Home, Search, Back and Menu. The Home button, in a circular surround, glows red when the Stream is charging and green when the charge is complete.

All the buttons have a white backlight when one is pressed, and there's a teeny bit of haptic feedback at that point too.

Where the Acer Stream differs from other Android handsets is in the presence of three further, physical buttons at the very bottom of the front chassis. Marked with arrows these are media controls and provide previous/rewind, play/pause, and next/forward functions.

They work when you're listening to music, so you can control playback while in another app, which is very useful.

They also work while you're watching video over the HDMI output, but not when viewing still images.

The edges of the Acer Stream are only very lightly peppered with buttons. The bottom is completely clear, the top has a 3.5mm headset jack.

On the left, there's the main power button and a volume rocker, both of which are extremely thin.

The right edge houses an equally thin camera button and, under a rubber hinge with a central pivot, the micro-USB power/PC connect cable and mini-HDMI port.

One slight grumble about the side buttons it is that the micro-USB and HDMI ports are a little fiddly to get to, because the rubber cover gets in the way.

Acer has given the Stream a skin that sits on top of Android, and it's done a pretty good job.

When you switch the handset on there's a main screen that offers you access to further home screens by horizontal sweeping. This is actually the lock screen, but it has five discrete screens onto which you can put the standard array of Android widgets.

However, you can't tap and hold on any of these screens to add widgets as you do with, say, the HTC Desire.

To add widgets, you have to move into the main screen by pulling at a tab in the bottom left corner of the display.

Then you can either hold down the Home button or tap the apps button and run the Widgets app.

With either method, you can then scroll through the Home screens and put whatever widgets you like onto whichever screens you like.

It's very convoluted and, frankly, a little unintuitive.

The main screen that you get to when you lift that aforementioned tab has an array of eight shortcuts on it.

Stroke upwards to reveal the full apps list and you'll find these eight shortcuts are the first two lines of the full apps list, and they remain static. The four rows below that scroll horizontally, giving access to the full array of apps.

Above these four shortcuts is a bar offering the time, signal strength and battery status.

Tapping this bar enables you to make changes to the settings and see more info. Depending on where you tap, you'll either see clock/alarm info or connection settings and battery status info. Sweep left or right to see what's missing, tap to change the settings.

And there's still more. Tap and hold on the portion of the main screen above these shortcuts and you can set wallpapers and sounds.

Sweep left and you can see a usage history enabling you to switch to apps you've recently used. Sweep right and you're into Acer's media widget, which gives access to photos, music and video.

As you can tell by our discombobulated explanation, the way of interacting with the main Home screen is a little complex – miles away from the simplicity of the Samsung Galaxy S or the iPhone 4.

It isn't as fast or intuitive as sweeping through just one set of home screens, and we think maybe Acer could have simply upped the number of Home screens from five to seven. That way, it could have forced its History and Media screens into two of them, rather than having two separate arrangements.

As you get further inside the Acer Stream you see more detail in terms of customisation. For example the Gallery app, which provides access to your photos and videos, has a rather nice visual menu that leads to a thumbnail display.

Dell Streak (Android 2.2)

2012-03-07T01:52:00.000-08:00

Dell Streak (Android 2.2)

Dell's five-inch Android offering now comes with Froyo

Just over eight months have passed since we first looked at the Dell Streak. An impressive five-inch device with 2GB of built-in memory, powered by a Qualcomm SnapDragon 8250 1GHz processor, the Dell Streak ticks all the boxes as far as specs are concerned.

When it hit the scene, one of the glaring drawbacks we noticed was that it was only running Android 1.6. Even back in June, this was a puzzling decision by Dell.

The Nexus One had led the way with Android 2.1 (Eclair) almost four months beforehand, and the HTC Desire had exploded on the scene, also touting Eclair, shortly afterwards.

Priced at £399 direct from Dell (unlocked), and found at only £20 a month on contract, the Streak is now in the ring with the Nexus S and the HTC Desire HD, so Dell has given it a fighting chance by giving the Streak an upgrade to Android 2.2. Not only has the base layer of the Android OS been upgraded, but the UI provided by Dell has been overhauled with Dell's own Stage Launcher interface.

So how big is it really? As mentioned, the screen is five inches from corner to corner, but this fills the front of the device pretty well – not a great deal of space is used for a bezel. The device is 153mm in width, 79mm high, only 9.98mm thick and weighs in at 220g.

You might think that sounds hefty, but when in your hands, it feels lighter than you expect it to, and the design is far from clunky. It has curved edges either side, and backlit touch-sensitive Back, Menu and Home buttons. The Dell Streak certainly is an attractive device.

The Dell Streak comes with it's own, unique user interface called Stage Launcher. One great improvement this brings is that the Streak can now be used landscape or portrait, which wasn't previously possible with the 1.6 version.

As custom launchers go, Stage Launcher looks quite nice. It comes with a selection of Stage widgets that appear to sit on a large metallic shelf. These widgets resize well as you move the phone from landscape to portrait, which is more than can be said for most standard Android widgets.

Most of those look a little odd when using the Streak in landscape mode (which is how we believe the Streak should be used), such as the YouTube widget being cut off three quarters of the way down.

One feature of the launcher is that you can tap slightly above or below the app drawer button and seven icons will pop up. They only sit there for a second before retreating from whence they came, so if you're quick, you can press one to jump to that particular Home screen.

Home screens with Stage widgets on are represented as such with a relevant icon. Screens with third-party widgets on are simple a little Android icon.This is Dell's way of compensating for the lack of a similar feature to HTC's Leap View.

However, we actually found this quite annoying. Quite often we wanted to open the app drawer and found ourselves repeatedly bringing these seven icons to the bottom of the screen. Even when we wanted to use these icons, they drop down again so quickly that it took longer than just swiping to the screen we wanted.

Motorola Defy

2012-03-07T01:48:00.000-08:00

Motorola Defy

Social networking shares centre stage with a rugged build and clever music features

If you thought that new twists on Android handsets were getting a bit thin on the ground, take a look at the Motorola Defy. Sporting Moto's love-it-or-hate-it MotoBlur social networking system as seen first on the Dext, the Defy adds an extra we've not seen with Android before: ruggedness.

If you're in the market for a new smartphone, you can check out our quick video guide to what to look out for:

Motorola says the Defy is dustproof, water resistant and scratch resistant. A tough little cookie then.

We got our review sample from Vodafone but we also found it online SIM free for £299.63 inc VAT.

The Defy certainly looks a bit on the tough side. The long edges each sport three screws holding the shiny front plate to the matte rubberised back. There's another screw on the bottom edge.

The top mounted 3.5mm headset connector and left side mounted micro-USB port have rubberised covers to help prevent dust and dirt getting in to the Defy's innards. We reckon you'll throw dust protection to the wind and rip the headset jack cover off after a few days because it's a real pain, though the micro-USB cover is less of a nuisance.

The backplate is held down by a lock slider that helps ensure a snug fit. Both SIM and microSD card slots are under the battery. The latter is here, we suppose, so that there doesn't have to be a side mounted slot, but getting to it is a pain.

Meanwhile the Gorilla Glass screen is designed to resist scratching. While we avoided attacking the Defy with a mallet, a few attempts to scratch the screen with a pen and some keys were impressively well-handled. We scraped with some gusto, but the screen remained unscratched.

We even ran the phone under a tap for a few minutes and it seemed to deal with that well, too. While the phone survived this water treatment, the capacitive screen loses responsiveness when wet, so don't expect to take the Defy into the bath and use the touchscreen under water. No, we can't think why you'd want to do that either, to be honest.

We also had a go at dropping the Defy deliberately in a few situations. We threw it down some stairs, flung it onto the pavement, and it survived these things unscathed, too.

The bottom line is that you certainly could destroy this phone. Drive over it, put the corner of your chair on it when you sit down, drop it into a fire — these things would kill it dead. But it certainly seems to us to be more robust than almost all other handsets, which have screens and chassis that are easy to ding.

None of this shock-proofing has had a negative effect on the general design of the Motorola Defy. It isn't the prettiest handset out there, but its black chassis is no real surprise, and the curved edges are nice enough.

It fits nicely in the hand and pocket, with dimensions on a par with many other handsets at 118g in weight and 107 x 59 x 13.4mm.

With GPS, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi including 802.11n, and 2GB of built-in storage, the story thus far is good.

With Android 2.1 on-board, the Defy is a little bit behind the times. Really, we can't see why a handset that's being pushed like this one is can't carry Android 2.2, and its absence is a big point against the Defy.

Motorola has skinned the basic Android experience and, while the skinning isn't overpowering, it certainly makes its presence felt. So, when you're looking at the main apps list, there's a certain familiarity to things but also some customisation.

The seven Android main screens have an oddity about them, too. At the bottom of each of them are three shortcuts: to the dialler, contacts and the apps menu.

But immediately after you flick to a new screen, this is replaced by an icon that stays in place for just milliseconds and shows which screen you're on. We think it's over the top.

Motorola has added a lot of its own widgets. These give a real fillip to Android's own offerings, and enables you to do all kinds of things. For example: Sticky Notes let you, well, add a sticky note to a Home screen.

Weather gives you HTC Sense-a-like current weather info and forecasting data from AccuWeather.

And the photo widget gives you quick access to your gallery.

None of these blew our socks off, but it is nice to see the Android basics augmented.

The screen itself measures a reasonable 3.7 inches. Anything around the 3.7 and 3.8 mark is a good compromise between needing overly large hardware and not being big enough to deliver the detail needed for media-rich activities such as web browsing.

A pixel resolution of 480 x 854 puts it just slightly above the 480 x 800 of many of the leading edge smartphones of the day such as the HTC Desire, HTC Desire HD, HTC Desire Z and the new Windows Phone 7 devices such as the HTC 7 Trophy and LG Optimus 7 — though it's still bested by the iPhone 4.

Crammed into a small space, the pixels make for a sharp and bright display. The viewing angles are good too, and the capacitive screen was highly responsive to finger sweeps and presses.

If we have any complaints about the screen, it's that the Gorilla Glass is a bit of a fingerprint magnet.

Under the screen, there are four touch-sensitive buttons for the very familiar Android functions of Home, Menu, Back and Search. These are a bit close to the bottom edge of the chassis for absolute comfort, but they are responsive.

Motorola Flipout

2012-03-07T01:44:00.000-08:00

Motorola Flipout

Can a lower price tag flip this phone up the popularity charts ?

The Motorola Flipout has had another price drop, this time to less than £150 (with a £10 top up on Orange).

Motorola has also recently refused to comment on a possible FroYo (Android 2.2 update) for the budget handset, so we're assuming that it's going to be stuck on Eclair for the rest of its natural life.

After some time in the doldrums Motorola appears to be resurrecting its reputation. Motoblur, the social networking user interface is helping, as is some nifty device design to present it in, such as the recently reviewed Motorola Defy.

Things don't always go Moto's way, though. The Milestone was a bit of a mixed bag, with its keyboard-located navipad not receiving a warm reception in all quarters - which has at least been updated now (see our Milestone 2 review).

Moto has a reputation for going off piste when it comes to handset design. Remember the Aura, anyone?

Sadly, the Android-toting Flipout is not Motorola's greatest moment, design wise. We understand what Moto is trying to achieve: nifty, different design that appeals to a younger market interested in text creation. The price is certainly aimed at that market, with a £181 SIM-free price online at launch.

But the execution is flawed, and that's in no small part due to trying to cram a pint into a half pint glass – Android and Motoblur just don't fit into a small screen.

There's a keyboard hidden away underneath the screen, and you flick the upper section around a hinge located in the bottom-right corner of the chassis to reveal it. This works well if you're right handed, not so well if you're a lefty, and is easiest if you use both hands.

The plasticky materials one our review unit weren't that great, though the hinge feels solid enough.

The Motorola Flipout is square – it measures 67mm square to be precise, and 17mm thick. Even the huge HTC Desire HD is only 1mm wider and that, plus the thickness, makes the Flipout bulky for the hand. Younger people, who form much of the target for this phone, might have trouble reaching across the screen for one-handed use.

There are three touch buttons under the screen for Home, Back and Menu functions. If you want Android search you'll need to, er, flip out the keyboard and use the dedicated button there.

Three of the sides have a connector or input on offer. The left edge is blank, but on the bottom is the micro-USB slot, the right side houses the power/screen lock button and headset connector and the volume rocker is on top.

Android fans might prefer version 2.2 to the 2.1 provided, but there's plenty of other plus points. HSDPA 3G mobile broadband is here, as well as Wi-Fi with 802.11n support, GPS and Bluetooth. There's 2GB of built-in storage and a microSD card slot under the backplate. All very similar to the Motorola Defy, in fact.

Motorola seems quite keen on Android 2.1 having opted for that with the Defyas well as the Flipout. Really, we think Moto should bite the bullet and get with version 2.2 - but sadly it now looks like that won't happen.

In fact the Defy and the Flipout share a lot in terms of user interface look and feel, it's just that the Flipout screen measures a squished 2.8 inches and offers 320 x 240 pixels while the Defy is a more conventional 3.7 inches and 480 x 854 pixels.

What a difference the size variation makes.

Motorola's Android's skin has been tweaked a little to fit the screen size. For example each of the seven Home screens has its Menu, Call and Contacts buttons on the right edge instead of along the bottom.

And when it comes to the dialler the call, recent calls and add contact buttons are on the left of the number pad.

But you can still populate the seven Home screens with widgets. The smaller screen space means you can't get as many as you might like on a single screen, and those that take up a full screen can feel squished. Take the AccuWeather weather widget for example.

Where you notice the screen squeeze the most, though, is in lists and suchlike. The menu screen shows a smaller array than usual of apps, and menus show fewer choices than usual. All this means you need to do more scrolling.

Lenovo IdeaPad K1

2012-03-07T01:39:00.000-08:00

Lenovo IdeaPad K1

Can this Android tablet impress like some of Lenovo's laptop offerings?

Lenovo is going on an all-out assault on the world of tablets,creating a new division specifically for them and announcing a new range.

The Lenovo lineup includes the Windows 7-running IdeaPad Tablet P1 and two Android 3.1-powered tablets, including the business-focussed ThinkPad Tablet, and the consumer-focussed IdeaPad K1 which we have here.

As Android tablets go, it's fairly typical when it comes to specs. The screen is 10.1 inches, with a resolution of 1280 x 800, while the processing and graphics power is provided by a Nvidia Tegra 2 chip, running at the usual 1GHz. There's also a nice 1GB of RAM to provide plenty of memory for multitasking.

There's 32GB of built-in storage, with a microSD card reader for adding more, and a micro-HDMI port for playing video on your HDTV. There's also a five-megapixel rear camera, complete with LED flash, and a two-megapixel front camera.

As we mentioned, Android 3.1 is the OS of choice here, and Lenovo has jam-packed the IdeaPad K1 with additional software, which we'll cover on the next page.

Unusually for Android 3.0 tablets, there's actually a physical Home button, which even has gesture recognition in order to act as a Back button, too.

The front of the IdeaPad K1 is nothing special - shiny and black. There's a massively chunky bezel around the 10.1-inch, 16:10 touchscreen, which house the Home button and the front-facing camera. The camera is designed to be used in landscape orientation, while the Home button seems meant to be used in portrait.

Around the edge of the K1 is a silver rim, which is where you'll find the Lock/On/Off button, the volume control and an orientation lock.

On another side, you'll find the microSD card slot, the HDMI port, a headphone jack and a docking connector, which you also use for charging and connecting to a USB port.

The back of the IdeaPad K1 is mostly plastic, with a honeycomb effect that makes it nice and grippy. The plastic isn't very sturdy, flexing easily under even a light grip. It sounds hollow and loose when tapped, but we doubt it would actually be much of a liability in use – it just feels cheap.

There are stereo speakers on the back, too, and that rear-facing camera with flash. At 13.3mm thick and 750g, it certainly feels chunkier and heavier in the hand than the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 or the iPad 2.

It's actually a good deal larger than the iPad 2 – it's slightly wider, and a few centimetres longer. This is pretty much totally attributable to the size of the bezel.

The IdeaPad K1 comes in black and silver, white and silver, or a funky red and silver. You can expect to pay £369 for it.

The main way the Lenovo IdeaPad K1 stands out from the Android competition is with its range of apps. You like apps? Lenovo's got 'em! More than 30 of them, in fact, all included on the K1 out of the box, and that's before you get to the standard Android Market apps.

There's a range of games, including 3D action titles and card games, a radio app, a movie store, several music apps, a drawing app, ereading apps, instant messaging, video calling, printing, mobile security, the full version of Documents to Go, and… ah, you get the idea.

On top of that, you've got the Android Market and Lenovo's own App Shop (though the K1 is restricted to Android Market installations only initially, so you'll need to change that to use Lenovo's store.

In many cases, all of this means that there's a doubling up of apps. There are two gallery apps (both called Gallery, helpfully), two apps named Music (and third for accessing cloud music storage), two places to buy apps, two movie editing apps (Movie Story and the Android Movie Studio), two photo editing apps, two email apps and several ebook apps.

When you're first trying to explore what's on offer, it's ridiculously confusing and overwhelming. Don't get us wrong – we're all for a wide choice of apps, but having so many preloaded, and with identical names to the built-in ones, is a bit much.

A more elegant solution to do something like this is to have an appealing app that offers you the option of downloading them – specifically, the way HTC does on Windows Phone 7 handsets, such as the HTC HD7.

You could argue that the Lenovo App Shop is the IdeaPad's version of this, but the HTC Hub in Windows Phone 7 is a nice, appealing place to explore. The App Shop is an assault of adverts and low-res graphics.

Screengrabs take forever to appear, and are usually dull when they do arrive. Different content tabs can be frustratingly slow to load. On top of that, the selection doesn't really seem to be exhaustive.

But lets be clear, many of the apps added by Lenovo do add some value. It's nice to have a few games to play out of the box (including Angry Birds, so there's one box ticked), and the card games in particular are good, even if performance when loading is a bit iffy.

The mSpot Movies app is included for renting films when on the go, which fills a gap in Google tablet offering.

Speaking of media, we popped a microSD card in the provided slot that was filled with music and movies, and they appeared without issue. Both Music apps found all our music and album art where possible, and the galleries apps had no problem playing back 1080p videos (we saw a few stutters here and there, but it was perfectly acceptable overall).

There are several video formats accepted, but MKV files are out, so you may find it easier to stick with MP4 and H.264.

There's a USB cable in the box that provides a way to transfer files onto the 32GB of storage. It worked fine on Windows 7, but wouldn't mount on any Macs we tried it on.

The web browser is the standard Android 3.1 version, complete with Adobe Flash 10.2. This means tabbed browsing, the single search/URL bar, pinch to zoom, text reflow, incognito tabs, bookmarking and all of that. We'll go into how well it works on the next page.

Toshiba AT100

2012-03-07T01:37:00.000-08:00

Toshiba AT100

Fast Android 3.1 tablet has full-size USB and HDMI ports and Tegra 2, but also extra bulk

The Toshiba AT100 (sold as the Toshiba Thrive in the US) is the latest Tegra 2 Android tablet to come from one of the world's big tech companies.

In the world of iOS and Android tablets, it's often not a question of having all of the best features.

Sometimes, having a few unique and well-targeted offerings can help you carve out a niche.

That's especially true of the Toshiba AT100. While it seems like yet another Android 3.1 tablet that might suffer the same fate as the ill-conceived HP TouchPad – which has now been discontinued – the AT100 does offer some appeal for more advanced, technically-minded users after customisation options and high benchmark scores.

Both the HP TouchPad and the Toshiba AT100 are a bit bulky and heavy. Yet, the AT100 differentiates itself from the Apple iPad 2.

It has full-size ports for HDMI, USB and SD cards – no adapters required, and no "micro" anything. The rear camera snaps photos at 5MP.

The rear cover snaps off – there are optional back covers available in five colours – so you can gain access to remove the battery.

Most importantly, enterprising individuals who snap the back cover off will find there are actual screws you can remove and... well, let's just say the Toshiba AT100 is friendlier to potential customisation.

Weighing 725g, the Toshiba AT100 is a bulky monster. That's 160g heavier than the lightest of the light Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1. Some users might appreciate the heft though, and the back cover has a snake-skin pattern that's easy to grip.

You can imagine pulling out the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1, at 8.6mm thick, and seeing everyone squint to see it in profile. The Toshiba AT100 is big and bold at 15.7mm – a hair thinner than the Apple MacBook Air.

The Toshiba AT100's 10.1-inch screen has a 16:10 aspect ratio at 1280 x 800 pixels resolution. Toshiba touts its Resolution+ technology, designed to make videos snap. Yet, the screen is not nearly as bright or colourful as theSamsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 and looks a bit washed out compared to the iPad 2.

The Toshiba AT100 8GB version costs $400 in the US, which is the same as the Asus Eee Pad Transformer. We tested the 16GB version of the tablet, which costs $430. Toshiba hasn't yet announced a UK launch price, though the UK release date is 1 September 2011.

We started this review by saying the Toshiba AT100 stands out because of some unique features.

Unfortunately, some of the basic hardware specs betray that claim, which we'll go into a bit further down this page.

The tablet runs on the same processor as most Android tabs – the 1GHz Nvidia Tegra 2 dual-core CPU with GeForce graphics.

The tab has 16GB of internal storage and one external SD card slot, 1GB of RAM, Wi-Fi 802.11b/g/n and Bluetooth 3.0.

The full-size ports on the Toshiba AT100 were a surprise. There's a standard HDMI port for connecting to your HD TV. You can use a standard HDMI cable instead of the more common mini-HDMI.

The full-size USB port is very handy too. We were able to quickly add movies form a USB flash drive to the device. When you insert a mouse, a cursor magically appears (even though it runs a bit too fast). Attach a USB cable for your keyboard, and you can type up longer documents much faster.

Other ports include a 3.5mm headphone jack, a micro-USB port for connecting to your computer, two speakers below the screen on the edge of the tablet, buttons along the top for power, volume and screen lock, a front-facing 2MP camera and dock connector.

The full-size SD card slot is particularly appealing. You can insert an SD, SDHC or SDXC card up to 128GB, adding a colossal amount of space for movies and other media without a lot of hassle.

The major bonus here is that, if your digital camera uses an SD card, you can pop out the card and insert it into the Toshiba AT100 for a quick back-up or for viewing images on the tablet's 10.1-inch screen.

The 1GHz Tegra 2 processor didn't feel faster or weaker than any other Android tablet.

Our only complaint here is that the video processing felt weak. Compared to the Samsung Galaxy S2, which is a fast smartphone, the Toshiba AT100 felt sluggish at times. We played several YouTube videos in HD, loaded the movie Priest from a USB flash drive, and found videos would pause every so often.

We also ran extra benchmarks to test the processor and video. The BrowserMark score was 83584, compared to the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1score of only 76876. The Toshiba AT100's Linpack score was 41.46 compared to the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1's measly 34.06. And, the Toshiba AT100 scored a 994 on the Vellamo test. The Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 only scored 890.

In terms of bulk, it's not all bad news. The Toshiba AT100 is twice the thickness of the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 and the Apple iPad 2, but it's also easier to grip and has full-size ports. That means it'll stay put next to your HD TV when you connect to watch a video.

Unlike the Asus Eee Pad Transformer, we felt the bulk wasn't a major irritant, but the extra weight is disappointing. For comparison, that 160g of extra weight compared to the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 is the same as an ebook reader such as the BeBook.

In terms of the size and weight, it's important to decide whether the full-size ports are worth having less mobility. We generally prefer the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1.

The Toshiba AT100 tablet runs on the Android 3.1 operating system, also called Honeycomb, making it a pixel-for-pixel interface match with theSamsung Galaxy Tab 10.1, Asus Eee Pad Transformer, and Acer Iconia A500. However, there are some differences.

You can connect a USB hard drive or flash drive that contains movies and play them that way. When you do, it's also easier to connect the Toshiba AT100 to your HD TV.

The other major difference is that Toshiba includes three first-party apps. One is called App Place, and it's essentially just another app store to compete with Android Market. Unfortunately, during our testing, the app didn't work and a message said the app was experiencing technical difficulties.

Start Place shows news headlines and has a few categories for world and sports news, a search and a timeline dial that you drag to the right to see older clippings and news photos. Many news magazine apps, including the one for USA Today, do a better job of presenting this info.

The Book Place app is another somewhat negligible addition, in that it shows you yet another book rack in addition to Google Books and the Amazon Kindle app, with a way to buy books through a Toshiba ebook portal. Book prices looked reasonable, though – about $10 for several books. The store was running quite a few specials, including some bestsellers for just $1.99 each.

Otherwise, the Toshiba AT100 sticks to the typical formula for Android tablets in its interface: widgets you can drop onto one of five panels that include Google Search, a Gmail summary widget, a clock, contacts and a picture viewer.

Toshiba also includes a music player widget, but it works just like the one included on all Android tabs.

ViewSonic ViewPad 10Pro

2012-03-07T01:34:00.000-08:00

ViewSonic ViewPad 10Pro

Dual-boot Android 2.2 and Windows 7 on a slate tablet sounds clever, but does it work?

The ViewSonic ViewPad 10Pro has a confusing name, operates much like a Microsoft Tablet PCfrom years ago and, while the concept of a "dual boot" tablet sounds appealing, it actually just runs Android 2.2 in Windows 7.

However, the ViewPad 10Pro has a few interesting perks that could line up well with the needs of some users, especially those in a corporate setting. The most important one is battery life. The 10Pro lasts for over eight hours, which is twice as long as the first ViewPad model, the ViewPad 10s. That means, for mobile pros who need to run Windows apps and switch over to Android, the 10Pro will last all day.

The 10Pro weighs a rather jaw-dropping 893.5g and is 14.73mm thin. For those keeping track, that's nearly twice as heavy as the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1, and almost twice as thin.

Still, this is a full Windows 7 tablet running the Intel Oak Trail platform – essentially an Atom Z670 processor that's fine-tuned for 1.5GHz performance and long battery life. With this chipset, you can install any operating system you want, including Ubuntu 11.04 with touch support.

There's one USB port that works with just about anything you can think of: external disks, keyboards and mice, a USB hub or even other tablets you connect to swap out files.

ViewSonic also offers a mini HDMI port for connecting the ViewPad 10Pro to an external monitor or to your HD TV.

With Oak Trail, you can expect to play full 1080p feature films without any stuttering or degradation in colour quality. More on that later, because it does seem to depend on which movie and where it is stored.

Unfortunately, the ViewSonic ViewPad 10Pro is extremely hard to recommend for most users. We live in a different age to 2004, when the Tablet PC tried to capture our attention.

Tablets must be thin and bright, designed for spontaneous movie watching and quick app downloads. The touchscreen must be highly responsive.

We have no patience for tablets that screw up screen resolution with elongated icons and videos. But even the login screen for the ViewPad 10Pro stretched the ViewSonic icon in portrait mode – it's butt ugly.

Apps in Windows 7 aren't designed for tablets at all, so there are constant operating system irritations. This, and the Android virtual app, is incredibly slow and barely even works correctly most of the time.

That puts the ViewSonic ViewPad 10Pro somewhere at the bottom of the pack – not even more useful than the Toshiba AT100, which is a low-end Android tablet in terms of overall quality.

Pit head-to-head against the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 or the Apple iPad 2, or even the 10-inch Acer Iconia Tab A500 and Asus Eee Pad Transformer, the 10Pro seems like a hybrid model with only one major trick up its sleeve – namely, running Android 2.2 as an app.

Worse yet, the ViewSonic ViewPad 10Pro is expensive. We tested a 16GB SSD version with 2GB RAM that costs $599 in the US, which is more than the base version of the Apple iPad 2 or the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1. There's also a $699 32GB version in that comes with Windows 7 Professional instead of Home Premium. Both versions come with Wi-Fi connectivity.

In Europe, however, there are two versions, which both come with 32GB SSD. One version has 1GB RAM and on has 2GB, and while one has standard Wi-Fi internet, one also offers 3G connections. They look set to be priced around £550 for Wi-Fi and around £600 for 3G in the UK.

The ViewSonic ViewPad 10Pro is a puzzling slate tablet right from the start. When you turn it on, if you're holding it in portrait mode, you'll see an elongated ViewSonic logo stretch on half the screen, along with the familiar Windows login button.

Once you log in, you'll see the familiar Windows start button, a few app icons (which you have to double-tap with your finger) and the taskbar.

The ViewSonic ViewPad 10Pro is also confusing because it doesn't really act like a tablet at all.

Like a Tablet PC (and that's really what this is), the apps are all designed for a computer with a keyboard and mouse. The touchscreen is quite poor – you'll find yourself pressing several times to minimise a window. You can press and drag a window, but good luck making that process work reliably.

The ViewSonic ViewPad 10Pro has a 1.3MP front-facing webchat camera, but there are no built-in camera apps or any way to capture video – not in Windows, and not in the Android virtual app.

The backlit 10.1-inch LCD screen looks like something from a few years ago. It's not that bright compared to the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1, and the contrast ratio of just 500:1 means movies look washed out.

The 1024 x 600 resolution is just not clear enough for the modern age of touchscreen tabs.

The ViewSonic ViewPad 10Pro has a few typical tablet features: 802.11n Wi-Fi, 3G on the premium 3G version (in Europe), Bluetooth 2.1, a sensor for auto-tilt and ambient lighting, but no GPS for navigation or mapping.

The tablet is 14.8mm thick, which is just not going to work for most uses – it feels too much like a notebook computer.

There's also one full-size USB port, one mini HDMI port (we wish it was the more common micro HDMI), and a Micro SD slot. To use the HDMI-out, you need a mini-to-full HDMI cable. When we connected the tablet to a 20-inch LCD screen, the second display had a poor refresh rate and odd sizing.

You can use SD cards up to 32GB, and you'll need them: the 16 or 32GB of internal memory fills up fast with Windows itself, the junk apps you won't ever use and the Android data.

The ViewSonic ViewPad 10Pro also has a 3.5mm headphone jack, two speakers on the back and a two-cell 5000mAh battery.

There's a germ of an idea on the ViewSonic ViewPad 10Pro that makes sense. Why not use Windows 7 Home Premium for business apps (say, a CRM tool that requires Internet Explorer) with an Android overlay for the fine touchscreen control and Angry Birds series?

The Android 2.2 operating system runs in a window using the Blue StacksOEM software, that enables you to switch between the Android and Windows interfaces.

This isn't an app you can just download and start using – it runs only on specific tablets such as the ViewSonic ViewPad 10Pro. As such, it's a compelling feature for those who need Windows and Android on a touchscreen tablet.

Unfortunately, this concept doesn't play out well. Android runs too slowly, for one thing.

The Linpack benchmark test scored it only 8.02 – far below every other Android tab. The Antutu app, which we normally use to test benchmarks on most Android tabs, wasn't available on the Amazon store.

That's another "feature" on the ViewSonic ViewPad 10Pro, too. There's an app for downloading Android APK files, with a handful of good apps such as Pulse.

There's no way to search for apps, though. Once you actually select an app, you're redirected to download the Amazon app store app. Then, you can search for one of many thousands of apps and install them, although Android seems blissfully unaware of the process.

Confusing? Yes. Switching back and forth between Windows 7 and Android 2.2 is fairly slick, though. The Android 2.2 virtual window loads quickly even if it runs apps extremely slowly.

And, because of how Windows memory management works, once you load the Android window and close it again, if you re-open the window later it loads even faster – in our tests, almost instantly.

ViewSonic also includes a full-screen interface that runs on top of Windows 7. The idea is sound: in Windows 7, you can touch large buttons to start apps. There's even a touch browser that worked well for touching large buttons that refresh the URL or move you forward and back.

The icons included with the Windows UI are all just links to Windows functions and the web browser. So, there isn't a Facebook app for the interface, the button just loads Facebook.com in the touch browser. Still, it's a novel attempt.

The user interface would be much more useful if there were apps you can download and use for it. 

Sony Xperia P

2012-03-05T21:05:00.001-08:00

Sony Xperia P

The mid-range majesty strolls into view

We've spent some time at MWC 2012 playing around with a few phones, but the one that's caught the eye so far is the Sony Xperia P.

We're looking at a phone that might be designed for the middle-of-the-road when it comes to pricing, but there's a whole lot more under the hood when you look at the specs.

See the Xperia P in action in our hands on video at MWC 2012:

The design of the phone is light years away from the sleek lines of the Sony Ericsson Xperia Arc, as while there's an aluminium unibody on offer, the chunkiness in the hand is palpable.

It also feels slightly plastic-like too, which is a bit odd for something hewn in the way it is, but it's not the end of the world and the Xperia P isn't without a premium feel to it.

The transparent plastic section at the bottom, which also house antenna tech, gives a nice touch to proceedings, but more importantly the screen is really what got our engines revving.

The White Magic screen is Sony's attempt at taking the Bravia Reality Display one step further, by intelligently backlighting the screen in bright light to make it visible in practically any situation.

It looks the part too, with the 540x960 resolution screen cramming the pixels into the 4-inch offering – to say we were impressed with what we saw would be an understatement.

There's more to the phone as well, with the dual core 1GHz processor cutting a few fancy shapes when swiping through the screens, despite not quite having the clout of some of its rivals.

It's also only having to power Android 2.3, with the likes of Ice Cream Sandwich not appearing until a little later in the year.

The camera start up time was also fantastic, with a very quick boot from start and the addition of a dedicated camera button never goes amiss in our book either.

NFC is also included to make use of those fancy Smart Tags Sony has been banging on about of late, although they are pretty cool and should you take the time to set them up in the way you want, it will be worth it in the long run when you simply tap your phone when you walk through the door to enter 'home mode'.

The internet browser was pretty hard to assess when trying it out on the Sony stand, as it was basically fighting for signal from a thousand other data users – it wasn't terrible but working out how good the speed is was nigh on impossible.

It should be noted the internet browser is as bog standard as they come, with very little in the way of customisation from the original Android explorer.

The texting ability of the phone isn't up to much either when we were trying it out – it was perfectly reasonable when it came to correcting our mistakes, and as you can see there are multiple ways the phone can assess your cack-handed mashings, but it's not the most intuitive on the market.

Early verdict

Overall, the Sony Xperia P is a fine phone that impresses even without the svelte line of its predecessor.

The price shouldn't be too bad, and with the speedy snappers, clear display and solid build, we'll be keeping a close eye on how our Sony Xperia P review pans out.

Samsung Galaxy Note LTE

2012-03-05T20:58:00.000-08:00

Samsung Galaxy Note LTE

Introduction:

Taking a trip back to memory lane, it was hard to imagine smartphones packing displays anything larger than 3.5-inches a few years ago, but as reality has proven time after time, it seems that we have an insatiable desire to keep moving forward. In fact, our jaws all dropped in unison when the HTC HD2 came romping onto the scene flaunting a then larger than life 4.3” display. Soon afterwards, we’ve all come together as a society to regard devices with these sized displays to be the norm.

Well, the Samsung Galaxy Note came to fruition back last fall pushing the limits of how big is too big for today’s modern smartphone. The insanely large device is finally making its way to AT&T’s lineup with 4G LTE connectivity in tow to match its prestigious status as being a formidable Android powered smartphone. Interestingly enough, this isn’t the first time we’re seeing a device on AT&T’s lineup breaking the barriers with a 5-inch display of some sort – as the Dell Streak from 2010 brought BIG to the masses. Having spent an astronomical amount for a fancy Super Bowl commercial, Samsung clearly has high expectations for theGalaxy Note, so let’s see how this version fares!

The package contains:

microUSB cable
Wall Charger
Quick Start Guide
Health & Safety and Warranty Guide

Design:

Let’s get the obvious out of the way – again! This isn’t a handset fit for those with small hands, because honestly, it’ll inevitably prove to be too much, as frustration to hold and operate the device settles in. Wide figured and all, we find it necessary to have a two-handed operation approach when handling the Samsung Galaxy Note, especially when our thumb is unable to encompass every corner of its display. In all fairness, the handset’s sheer size is conveniently its most prized feature, since people take notice of it more than anything else. Actually, it’s the kind of fresh device that’ll circumvent conversation from random strangers who are intrigued by simply looking at it from afar.

Overlooking its beastly figure, the Samsung Galaxy Note bears many of the same design characteristics that have been established by the Galaxy S II family. Sporting that typical Samsung construction, with its all-plastic casing and all, it’s hardly anything that stands out, but we’re grateful to find it retaining the same streamlined (0.38” thin) appearance of the international GSM version – especially when it’s packing an LTE radio. With its accompanying weight (6.45 oz), it’s minutely heavier than the original version, but warranted in giving it a solid sense of durability.


The Samsung Galaxy Note LTE bears many of the same design characteristics that have been established by the Galaxy S II family

You can compare the Samsung Galaxy Note LTE with many other phones using our Size Visualization Tool.

Overall, there isn’t a whole lot different with the handset’s design, but it now features the usual set ofAndroid capacitive buttons beneath its display, as opposed to finding the physical home button like before. Additionally, it bears AT&T’s name below its earpiece, with its front-facing 2-megapixel camerapositioned nearby.


	Android capacitive buttons	Front-facing camera

There’s nothing out of place with the rest of the handset, since we find its volume rocker, power button, 3.5mm headset jack, noise cancellation microphone, and microUSB port around its sides. With the latter, we gain video-out functionality with the aid of an optional MHL adapter.


microUSB port (bottom)	Volume rocker (left)	3.5mm jack (top)	Power key (right)

In the rear, its 8-megapixel auto-focus camera with LED flash is perched in its usual spot, while yanking apart its plastic rear cover grants us access to its SIM card slot, microSD card slot, and generous 2,500 mAh battery. Inconspicuously hidden away, the included S Pen (don’t call it a stylus, says Samsung) is firmly held in place within its slot, which is located in the bottom right corner of the device.


Back	Rear camera	Battery compartment


The included S Pen

Display:

Equally as eye-catching as its ginormous size, the 5.3” WXGA (800 x 1280) Super AMOLED display of the Samsung Galaxy Note is undoubtedly blessed with so much real estate. Magnificent in so many ways, some might be bummed to know that it utilizes the less favorable PenTile matrix arrangement, but nevertheless, we’re impressed by its immaculate detail (285 ppi). Furthermore, it exhibits all of the qualities we adore with Super AMOLED displays in general – like its overly saturated color tones, deep contrast, wide-viewing angles, and a noticeably bluish tinge. Combining all of those elements, it removes the shock factor of being so large in size for a smartphone, but rather, it culminates all together to reel in prying eyes from afar to take notice of its polarizing beauty.

Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1

2012-03-05T20:54:00.000-08:00

Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1

One of the most interesting devices announced by Samsung at this year's MWC 2012 is the Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1. So, what's common between the original Note (5.3) and this new Note 10.1? Well, basically, we can say that the Note 10.1 is the tablet version of the Note 5.3 phone. The general concept behind the device is pretty much the same – to incorporate a special S-pen stylus that will let the user take handwritten notes and draw on the screen.

As you can imagine, 5.3" are not really plenty of real estate to write on, so it's somewhat understandable that Samsung is now trying to take the same idea and see how it works in a tablet device. And, what do you know – after our first few minutes with the device, we were convinced that a tablet is much more suitable for handwritten note-taking than a phone, be it a 5.3" behemoth of a phone.

The Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1 is an appealing device. The front is, of course, occupied by the large 10.1 screen, but there are also to speaker grills on the left and right front edges, which give a really cool look to the device. The back is made of glossy plastic. It's nothing special, and attracts quite a lot of fingerprints.

Under the hood, the Galaxy Note 10.1 uses a 1.4 GHz dual-core processor, which basically guarantees its outstanding system performance. However, we should note that probably the biggest thing going for the Note 10.1 is the software that comes pre-loaded on the device. First of all, Samsung says that the Note 10.1 is designed to appeal mostly to business professionals, creative designers, students and kids/youth, so it has to deliver adequate tools for all of those demographics. And, judging by what we were told by Samsung, the Note 10.1 should actually do pretty well, as it will come with the usual specialized apps that we saw on the original Note, but will also come pre-loaded with the full versions of some Adobe apps like Photoshop Touch and Adobe Ideas, which is really wonderful, in our opinion.

The S Pen itself has also went through some improvements. Thankfully, the company has worked to fix any accuracy issues that were present with the Pen of the Note 5.3, and has also improved its pressure sensitivity. The end result is that we can now easily take notes, which are much readable (we tried it, and there's a noticeable improvement indeed). What's even cooler is that some Adobe apps have been optimized specifically for the Galaxy Note 10.1's S Pen, like Photoshop Touch, for example, which now features pressure sensitivity, and basically works great with the S Pen.

Unfortuantely, pricing and availability information is currently unavailable, but we hope that Samsung is going to launch its new tablet sooner rather than later. Until then, why don't you tell us what's your opinion of the Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1? What do you like/dislike about the device?