Hasta La Gadget!

When Kobo released the Vox, its first tablet, Engadget had just recently abolished review scores. In retrospect, that was a good thing for the company, as we didn’t have very many nice things to say about it. The product suffered from short battery life, for one, along with sluggish performance and WiFi connectivity issues. It’s no wonder, then, that Kobo is loathe to call its new Arc tablet a “follow-up” to the Vox so much as a “re-thinking.” The tablet, which will go on sale in mid-November starting at $199, brings a faster 1.5GHz TI processor, a battery rated for 10 to 12 hours of runtime and a re-tooled software experience built on Ice Cream Sandwich. Is that enough to unseat the new Kindle Fire HD or the Nexus 7? That, friends, is a question best answered in our forthcoming review, but after a few minutes of hands-on time we can at least say that we’re pleasantly surprised. Meet us past the break to find out why.

Continue reading Kobo Arc tablet hands-on (video)

Filed under: Tablets

Kobo Arc tablet hands-on (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 19 Sep 2012 10:50:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |   | Email this | Comments

Electrostatic ink based E-readers aren’t exactly the best devices for moving images, due to their slow refresh rates and black and white screens. But that didn’t stop somebody from porting a SEGA Genesis emulator to the $99 Android-based Nook Simple Touch reader anyhow.

YouTuber ndncnbvcuyuys (try and pronounce that!) posted this video of his rooted Nook Simple Touch running the Genesis emulator, and playing Sonic the Hedgehog 2. It’s clear from the video clip below that the Nook is more than up to the task of emulating the classic 16-bit console.

I’m actually impressed how well the side-scroller plays, given its fast action and movement – though it’s unclear if the emulator supports sound. You can check out detailed pics of the emulator in action over on Imgur, and some other fun emulators running on the Nook Simple Touch here.

[via E-Reader Info]

It was 10 months ago that we had a doppelgänger in our midst. Amazon unleashed the Kindle Fire to the world and we spent much of the beginning of our review comparing and contrasting it to the (even then a bit long-in-the-tooth) BlackBerry PlayBook. Now, finally, we can stop making that comparison — at least for this, Amazon’s current top-shelf tablet.

It’s the Kindle Fire HD and it quite handily addresses nearly every concern that we had with the original Fire. It’s thinner, lighter, faster and, yes, better looking. It’s a huge step forward from that which came before and yet it still follows very much in the footsteps of its predecessor, existing as a physical portal to a digital marketplace with an alluring selection of premium content. Is it enough of an improvement to topple our current king of budget tablets, the Nexus 7? You’ll just have to read on to find out.

Continue reading Amazon Kindle Fire HD review (7-inch)

Filed under: Tablets

Amazon Kindle Fire HD review (7-inch) originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 11 Sep 2012 21:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |   | Email this | Comments

Each week Ross Rubin contributes Switched On, a column about consumer technology.

For many products — TVs and the iPod, for example — the leap to color displays represented an evolutionary change. But color was just part of the big leap that Amazon made with the Kindle Fire, moving from a reading appliance to a converged device. There was no couching it as “a reader’s tablet”, the positioning Barnes & Noble had sought with the Nook, even though Amazon now claims that it has the “best content ecosystem.” Still, as discussed two weeks ago in Switched On, Amazon still managed to fly well under Apple’s radar with an inexpensive, smaller tablet, one that broke a “magic” price point of $200.

Continue reading Switched On: Low flame

Filed under: Tablets

Switched On: Low flame originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 10 Sep 2012 17:01:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |   | Email this | Comments

You’d be forgiven for wondering just what Amazon was up to with Special Offers ads on the Kindle Fire HD: we were given the hope that we could opt out from them, only to watch that dream dashed moments later. Amazon must have been listening to frustrations over the mixed messages, as it just let Engadget and others in the media know that yes, you’ll have the option to drop the ads after all. Pay $15 after picking up the new tablet and those lock screen promos will disappear forever. There’s no sign that there will be a Kindle Fire shipping with ads missing from the get-go, but you know what they say about gift horses. You can find Amazon’s full statement to us after the break.

Continue reading Amazon has change of heart, will allow opt-out of Kindle Fire HD ads for $15

Filed under: Tablets

Amazon has change of heart, will allow opt-out of Kindle Fire HD ads for $15 originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 08 Sep 2012 21:56:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |  TechCrunch  | Email this | Comments