If i’ve been a little
absent the last few days, this might have been due to the fact that I
started a new job last week. So getting into the new swing of things
does wreak havoc with ones usual routine. Especially when you are
“working abroad” (outside the coverage of ones trusty 3G connection,
inside the “horrible roaming charge zone”) you need to ‘adapt’ your
cyber-social life.
On
the other hand you’ll be pleased to know i’m working on a little
project for the website/podcast : namely : reviewing some of that new
tablet technology that everyone is talking about. Over the course of the
last few days i’ve been playing around with an Android tablet pc and
comparing it to the Apple Iphone / Ipod / Ipad environment. In the next
few articles i’ll try to give you guyz an impression of what I think of
those touch-tablet-like devices I have been using without going down the
zealot road where one bashes the other. So i’ll forgo the ritual
sacrifice of my Visa card upon the altar of Steve Jobs, and try not to
become the deadlock wearing Android geek just yet. I’ll try to take a
look at all the devices and answer the ONE question that is important
here at Knightwise.com : How does this technology work for us.
Chapter one : The
Irobot Apad.
Lets face it people : The apple Ipad costs
about the same as a kidney transplant, well perhaps not THAT much , but
for those unaffected by Steve Jobs reality distortion field .. it might
still be a lot of money. But what are you going to do ? Major
competitors like for example Microsoft and Dell are still rushing to get
“their version” of the Ipad out of the asses of their developers and
onto the production line. So thank god for the Chinese. These masters of
KIRF (keeping it real fake) dont have fancy CEO’s who refuse to wear a
tie and speak about “magic” like its a bloody business model. The Chinese dudes just do what they do best : Knock off whatever is popular
and throw it out there at a fraction of the price. And you know what ?
Sometimes it just works. Sometimes they actually make a product that is a
decent, cheap and functional approximation of whatever is popular on
the market these days. Sometimes.. Other times they just make crap that
LOOKS like whatever is popular. With the Irobot Apad .. its a little bit
of both. Lets start off with the price. I payed about 200 euro’s for
this little toy. If you Google/ebay around you’ll probably find them for
less. So for the price of one Ipad you’ll have 2 or even three of
these. The question is : Does it show ?
Packaging : hardware : They
guyz who did the box, took a good hard look at the IPAD box and made a
sensible clone. The “android” logo on the side does notifies you that
its NOT going to be an Apple product .. but hey .. Packaging is nice ,
the Apad is nicely ‘displayed’ in its foam casing with all the
accessories underneath. For a cheap knockoff device its pretty well
presented.
Hardware : The Irobot Apad is a
7 inch touchscreen tablet that “looks” like and undersized version of
the Apad. It has a Rockchip processor and comes with 1 gig of built in
storage. There is room for a micro SD slot at the bottom, along with two
micro usb connectors. Along with a power switch, a power connector (5v)
there are 2 more buttons on the device , one on top ( to access the menu
functions) one at the front , to go back to the home screen.
The resistive touch
screen is fairly responsive and the built-in motion sensor lets you flip
the image on the 800*480 display on its side just like an ipod. The
screen is ok , but in no way comparable to the (three times more
expensive) display of the Ipad, but it does the trick quite nicely
indoors. The device comes bith B/G wifi and a built in speakers. The
latter sucks monkey balls , rendering the Apad worthless as a stand
alone media player. You need to hook up external speakers or headphones
to enjoy the music. The casing is well done, ok , its made to “look’
like an Ipad ( my version came with a cheesy apple knockoff logo on the
back), which is something they should not have done cause the device
stands up very well by itsself without trying to ‘impersonate’ its
competitor.
Software : The Apad comes with
android 1.6 and a fair share of apps. Although I changed the settings
to “English” some dialog boxes are still displayed in Japanese /
Chinese. There are quite a few applications installed like for example
the Facebook app, a Gmail client, An audio and video player and even a
few games. The home screen has a built in Google search bar that lets you
hit the web with the OS provided browser. Once you configure the Wifi
you are good to go. The Apad does not come with built in 3G capability
but should support tethering of a 3g dongle or Cellphone. ( HOW this is
to be achieved i’m not really clear on).
Performance: The Apad is a very
promising device. Low cost, Well built, A pretty decent screen and a
great operating system. The downside is it just feels a little ...
Sluggish. Sometimes the device is just a tad slow to respond. whether
this is because of an underpowered processor ( I don't think so cause
things like video’s run fine) or that the reason might be a poor
touch-screen hardware choice .. is unclear to me When you run too many
applications on the device at once ( yes this baby does multitasking)
the Apad gets a little slow , but quitting some apps and clearing up
memory makes it “go” again. And as the Pakleds said : We look for things
to make us go. So be a little bit careful when multitasking the crap
out of the apad. Its a 200 dollar tablet , not a I7 quad core gaming
machine.
Freedom baby: But the one thing that
makes this tablet rock, is the Abundance of Android applications. Since
the Android OS is a lot more ‘open’ then the Iphone OS, you will find a
lot more applications with a high geek factor. Sure, there is the
occasional ‘fart app’ but compared to a lot of the free stuff in the
Itunes App Store, the android market is a geeks Walhalla. SSH clients,
irc clients, podcatching applications, Google integration .. you name it
, they have it. Apple zealots MIGHT argue that there is no “gatekeeper’
function to add an application to the marketplace, resulting in
applications that might be unstable or badly built .. but hey , at least
you have the right to Choose !. I was so pleasantly surprised by the
Android Ecosphere that i”ll probably ditch my Blackberry in favor of an
Android device pretty soon.
Overal: The Apad is NOT an Ipad. And by that i don't
mean its “not as good”. There are points where this little tablet device
ranks far below the impossible parameters set by its Cupertinian
overlord. This is mostly true where the Apad “tries” to be an Ipad.
Quality of build is fine .. just not compared to an Ipad. The screen
quality is good. just not compared to an Ipad. But compared to an Ipad
it is about one third of the price. And for that you get a slightly
smaller (more portable ? ) device that gives you a lot of joy for a fragment of the price. People who say that “a good device ” has to be
“expensive” , are wrong. The best device is not the 600 euro tablet that
lets you surf the web, It might be the 200 euro device that lets you do
(almost) the same thing for a lot less. Sure an Iphone is a great
phone, but sometimes you get more value-for-money from a cheaper phone.
Its not because the pricetag and perhaps the quality of a device exceeds
that of another device, that the latter ends up as the loser. The
winner is the device that gets you the most bang for the buck. This
makes the Irobot Apad worth looking at.
2010-06-21 07:32:03|
|92.1.70.xxx|
Ronnie
- Sluggishness
I think the sluggishness is just down to most aPads using Android 1.5, even though some sellers say they have 1.6, you might want to check your firmware settings Knightwise . The hardware in the aPad is pretty much the same as what was in the Archos 5 (Internet Tablet) and roughly the same as the G1 phone (which I used to have).
Android is now at 2.1 (soon to be 2.2) which I have in my Milestone phone and massive speed improvements have been made along the way, so I reckon the aPad will fly when it gets 2.1 which, according to the manufacturer of the units, should come this/next month. Failing that I'd install one of the custom Android firmwares that are doing the rounds on various forums.
My dad had the Archos 5 and now has the aPad and he much prefers the aPad, he reckons the touch screen on it is superior to the Archos 5 screen.
Excellent review there Knightwise and I agree with pretty much all of it!
2010-09-02 20:09:57
|86.31.27.xxx|
Richard
- Thank you
Good to read an 'honest' review from someone who has actually had one in their hands to try. If you could give some info on the exact processor speed and ram that it was running on, it would be useful, but I can kind of guess judging by the price you mention.
Blog 
I think the sluggishness is just down to most aPads using Android 1.5, even though some sellers say they have 1.6, you might want to check your firmware settings Knightwise
. The hardware in the aPad is pretty much the same as what was in the Archos 5 (Internet Tablet) and roughly the same as the G1 phone (which I used to have).
Android is now at 2.1 (soon to be 2.2) which I have in my Milestone phone and massive speed improvements have been made along the way, so I reckon the aPad will fly when it gets 2.1 which, according to the manufacturer of the units, should come this/next month. Failing that I'd install one of the custom Android firmwares that are doing the rounds on various forums.
My dad had the Archos 5 and now has the aPad and he much prefers the aPad, he reckons the touch screen on it is superior to the Archos 5 screen.
Excellent review there Knightwise and I agree with pretty much all of it!