Apr 19

Hands On With Acer’s Android Honeycomb Tablet

Posted in: Android, honeycomb, tablet, Tablets and E-Readers, Today's Chili

Acer’s Iconia Tab A500 is one of the latest Android 3.0 (Honeycomb) tablets to hit the market. Photo: Jon Snyder/Wired.com

After Google’s tablet-optimized version of its Android OS debuted on the Xoom in February, manufacturers have been scrambling to bring their tablets to market. Next up on the list is Acer’s offering, the Iconia Tab A500.

If you haven’t used Android 3.0 (Honeycomb) before — and unless you own a Xoom, odds are you probably haven’t — it takes a bit of getting used to. Eliminating the four buttons that anchored so many Android phone faces means re-training yourself to handle a new UI. Instead of physical buttons, the system bar that lines the bottom of the screen holds three “soft” navigation buttons.

The Iconia Tab’s form takes advantage of the new UI, as the large amount of screen real estate allows for lots of room to customize the five different home screen menus.

Like a number of its Android brethren, the Iconia Tab is running on Nvidia’s dual-core, 1 GHz Tegra 2 processor. Playing one of the HD games that came loaded on the tablet showed solid performance, and the integrated GeForce GPU handled the graphics well.

The tablet also supports Adobe Flash (unlike the iPad 2), though as of now the Flash player release for Honeycomb tablets is only a beta version. And believe me, it shows. YouTube test videos were unreliable, running smooth at some points, and choppily at others. Some Flash games ran well enough (Bejeweled), while others were nearly unplayable. In a recent interview, Adobe told us the delay in producing a final version for Honeycomb-based tablets had to do with “fundamental changes in the browser implementation,” which held up the plug-in’s release even for the launch of the Xoom.

At 1.69 pounds it’s only slightly heftier than the comparable Xoom (1.6 pounds), though its metal exterior would fool you into thinking otherwise. The 10.1-inch display runs 720p HD video quite well, though don’t expect to be watching any 1080p until a software update coming later this summer.

It has two cameras — a 5-megapixel back-facing camera and a 2-megapixel front-facing one for video chat. Nothing really new here, except for the interface on which you take your photos. Shooting pictures on a Honeycomb tablet for the first time is, frankly, a little weird. Holding the tablet in both hands and pointing feels like trying to deflect debris with a cafeteria lunch tray.

Acer’s tablet has a 5-megapixel back-facing camera for photos. Be forewarned — taking pictures with a tablet takes getting used to. Photo: Jon Snyder/Wired.com

Much like the Xoom, Acer’s tablet is seriously lacking in the sound department. The speakers are located on the back side of the device, projecting audio away from the viewer. Even if you were to flip the tablet around while listening, speaker quality just isn’t there. Tinny, distorted highs and crunchy lows makes for an awful aural experience.

Acer has decided to price the Iconia Tab at $450, cheaper than most of the premium tablet releases we’re going to see released over the next few months. Since the tablet seems a bit like plain vanilla to us, the relatively low price is probably Acer’s best bet to steal customers away from choosing Apple, Motorola or RIM’s recent BlackBerry PlayBook tablet.

The Iconia Tab A500 is currently up for pre-order on Bestbuy.com, and will be available exclusively at Best Buy retail stores and online April 24.

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