Looking for a Tablet

[BobbyDing]

I'm thinking of letting the wife get me a tablet as a birthday gift this year and I'm looking for suggestions. Apple is out as I'm capping it at $300 (or as close to that as possible). I have zero android experience (is that what the other tablets run now?). I'm thinking a 7" would be best for me. I've looked at Google's Nexus and like what I see, but the lack of a microSD takes it out of the running (no internet access at work,so I'll need the extra storage). I would like to use it for PDF's, video's and occasional music. I'd like the videos to play from the local memory (my own rips) and maybe stream from SageTV if possible.

I've looked at the Nook and Kindle, but I cannot determine if they'll play local video and audio (my own rips) or are you locked to what you buy from their own services.

Any suggestions or experiences that you can share with me on hardware/software that works well would be appreciated!

Thanks,

Bobby

[rgroves]

Check this out. http://gizmodo.com/5935996/now-is-a-...alaxy-tab-2-70

Galaxy Tab 2.0 7" tablets. Wifi Only. 8GB version. And the deal ends by Sept 1 - $250

[tmiranda]

The upcoming Microsoft Surface is getting very good reviews.

[pjpjpjpj]

I'd like to +1 this thread (because I'm thinking about putting one on my birthday wishlist for the wife, too).

And on a tangent, has anyone tried any of the really cheapo tablets? Seems like every Sunday, the ads in the paper for places like Walgreens and Big Lots have "no name" (or Polaroid or Sylvania or Coby and the like) tablets, either 7" or sometimes 10", for like $89. They all advertise "multi-touch", have SD card slots, and many even have the latest Android (jellybean?). What makes them bad? Do they just break? Anyone have one and is actually pleased with it?

[BobbyDing]

I took a look at that Galaxy 2 7.0 and it looks like it meets my needs. My birthday is still a month+ out, so I'm still looking around.

The upcoming Microsoft entry sounds interesting. I hadn't heard of it. I have a built in distrust of Microsoft, but that's my issue. I'll have to see what the final product actually is.

In my initial searches I found info on the ASUS Memo 370T (initially priced at $250) which was exactly what I was looking for (http://best-android-tabletpc.com/asus-memo-370t/). Unfortunately, it appears Google thought so as well and turned it into their Nexus 7, but not before neutering it by removing the microSD, mini HDMI, rear camera and some other goodies.

The lack of a microSD card just cripples the Nexus for me. I get that Google wants to push the cloud format. And I suppose if you live in an urban area where WiFi is freely available most everywhere then the nexus makes sense. However, my car, my job, my doctor, my dentist, my parents home.... Non of these places I would use a tablet most often have WiFi (yet) that I could stream from. Too bad for me.... As I feel the Nexus 7 may have some useful tie-ins to the future Google/SageTV.

Still looking for other options though. Please post'm if you've got them. And like pjpjpjpj, I'd like to hear about cheapo options as well.

Bobby
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[mdnttoker]

I personally love my Asus Transformer w/keyboard.

Two SD slots (one in tablet and one in keyboard), extra battery in keyboard gives it a runtime of over 12 hours. Tegra 3 processor - power when you need it.

And, you have a nice mechanically connected keyboard for those times you need it....

My 2c.

-Dan

[BobbyDing]

Originally Posted by mdnttoker

I personally love my Asus Transformer w/keyboard.

Two SD slots (one in tablet and one in keyboard), extra battery in keyboard gives it a runtime of over 12 hours. Tegra 3 processor - power when you need it.

And, you have a nice mechanically connected keyboard for those times you need it....

My 2c.

-Dan

Putting an SD slot in an external keyboard is pretty clever. I don't imagine it'll be too long till somebody makes one for the Nexus 7. Gives me something to ponder.....

Thanks Dan,

Bobby

[phelme]

I have a Toshiba Thrive 16gb, had it for over a year. This is the bigger one with SD slot and full hosted USB ports which is great for hooking up hard drives. It's rooted and running a custom ROM since Toshiba isn't very good at releasing updated ROMs of its own for this guy.

I'm happy with it and you can find them still new for $200. On the front page of thriveforums.org you can usually find a listing of bargains on all Toshiba Android tablets. I see you can get the extremely thin Excite 10 16gb for $300 at Costco now.

But in the face of a $200 Nexus 7, it might be a tough sell.

[wayner]

Originally Posted by BobbyDing

I'm thinking of letting the wife get me a tablet as a birthday gift this year and I'm looking for suggestions. Apple is out as I'm capping it at $300 (or as close to that as possible). I have zero android experience (is that what the other tablets run now?). I'm thinking a 7" would be best for me.

If you can live without the SD slot and your birthday isn't too soon then you may have the iPad mini in the mix as it is expected to be $300, assuming that cost wasn't the main reason to avoid Apple. We have several iPads in the house and love them, the main thing missing is a native SageTV app.

[IVB]

I have a Nexus 7, many people I know do, I don't know of a single person who doesn't totally love it. The lack of an SD card is a red herring, if you really want more space, don't muck with a 16GB/32gB/64GB card esp as thats then bound to a single machine. Get a 500GB Seagate GoFlex Satellite, then 3 concurrent machines/tablets can stream from it.

I'm going on a 6 hour roadtrip tomorrow. The wife, both kids each have tablets (or iPod touch), they will all stream whatever they want from the hard disk. I have a few HUNDRED movies transcoded to mp4, plus SageTV stuff transcoded, plus every mp3 in my collection.

[reggie14]

Originally Posted by IVB

I have a Nexus 7, many people I know do, I don't know of a single person who doesn't totally love it. The lack of an SD card is a red herring, if you really want more space, don't muck with a 16GB/32gB/64GB card esp as thats then bound to a single machine. Get a 500GB Seagate GoFlex Satellite, then 3 concurrent machines/tablets can stream from it.

I love mine too, but I'd love it even more if it:

1. Had more storage, either built-in or via an SD card. A fair amount of my video watching is on airplanes, where your GoFlex idea doesn't work. I rooted and have StickMount and an USB-OTG cable, but it would be a lot nicer to just have it internal in some way.
2. Didn't have a screen flicker problem in low-light conditions. If my backlight drops pretty low, the screen will start to flicker when the wifi is in use. I can mitigate the problem with Lux utility, but it's not a complete solution.

[IVB]

Originally Posted by reggie14

I love mine too, but I'd love it even more if it:

1. Had more storage, either built-in or via an SD card. A fair amount of my video watching is on airplanes, where your GoFlex idea doesn't work. I rooted and have StickMount and an USB-OTG cable, but it would be a lot nicer to just have it internal in some way.
2. Didn't have a screen flicker problem in low-light conditions. If my backlight drops pretty low, the screen will start to flicker when the wifi is in use. I can mitigate the problem with Lux utility, but it's not a complete solution.

Why won't the goflex work on an airplane? 99% of them now offer in flight WiFi, so its allowed.

I'm currently using my N7 in near darkness , what flicker issue are you talking about?

[reggie14]

Originally Posted by IVB

Why won't the goflex work on an airplane? 99% of them now offer in flight WiFi, so its allowed.

I'm currently using my N7 in near darkness , what flicker issue are you talking about?

99% of airplanes offer in-flight wifi? Certainly not of the ones I fly. It's certainly growing, but no where near 99%. And almost none of the trans-Atlantic fights have it. But, I doubt you're technically allowed to use that on a flight, although you're not likely to actually get in trouble for doing it.

Maybe "doesn't work" was a bit strong, but I still find it pretty annoying. I don't want to lug one more thing in my backpack when I fly, nor do I want to deal with the decreased battery life, and the hassle of turning on/off another device. I'll sometimes bring my Nexus to the gym so I can watch TV or a movie when I'm on an elliptical. I'm not going to want to carry around an external hard drive there. (I keep some stuff stored locally on my Nexus 7, but generally I'll just limit myself to things available on Hulu or Netflix).

As for the screen flicker problem, it's basically the one described in this XDA thread. I have a bit of a hard time getting it to flicker on command, but generally it will do it if I go to a dark room, have it on auto brightness, and I browse. The flickering happens the most when pages are loading, but in general it seems to happen occasionally whenever there's wifi traffic.

My workaround is basically to use Lux to keep the backlight to going too low. I'm not sure if that's masking the problem, or if the problem happens only when the backlight is dim.

Maybe I'll try to RMA it once it looks like there's a second revision to the hardware, but I kind of wanted to see if Google could fix it with a firmware/software patch.

[david1234]

Originally Posted by BobbyDing

I've looked at the Nook and Kindle, but I cannot determine if they'll play local video and audio (my own rips) or are you locked to what you buy from their own service
Bobby

We've got the nook, but i wouldn't recomend it! I havent found any rips it wont play.

BUT...you CAN NOTinstall any apps exept whats sold in the B&N store!

[panteragstk]

Originally Posted by david1234

We've got the nook, but i wouldn't recomend it! I havent found any rips it wont play.

BUT...you CAN NOTinstall any apps exept whats sold in the B&N store!

You can if you root it. Then you can install something like CM9 and have a real android tablet.

[david1234]

Originally Posted by panteragstk

You can if you root it. Then you can install something like CM9 and have a real android tablet.

At this point, the current version of firmware can't be rooted! There was a change early this year, and nobodies gotten around it yet (I've been watching).

It's a shame, because it's mostly a nice device. My wife and I hate it for reading books (we don't like ebooks very much), but my daughter watches movies on it in the car. And I do some light surfing and email with it.

But, it could be better with a handful of apps that aren't in B&N's store. And since they locked it down so you can't sideload anything...

[IVB]

Originally Posted by reggie14

99% of airplanes offer in-flight wifi? Certainly not of the ones I fly. It's certainly growing, but no where near 99%. And almost none of the trans-Atlantic fights have it. But, I doubt you're technically allowed to use that on a flight, although you're not likely to actually get in trouble for doing it.

interesting, southwest, united, virgin do which is all I fly.

Maybe "doesn't work" was a bit strong, but I still find it pretty annoying. I don't want to lug one more thing in my backpack when I fly, nor do I want to deal with the decreased battery life, and the hassle of turning on/off another device. I'll sometimes bring my Nexus to the gym so I can watch TV or a movie when I'm on an elliptical. I'm not going to want to carry around an external hard drive there. (I keep some stuff stored locally on my Nexus 7, but generally I'll just limit myself to things available on Hulu or Netflix).

True, but if you have multiple people in the house, its more annoying to hear complaints about who has which movie or the wife whining about not transcoding the right movie on trips. Now I can transcode a silly amount of stuff. And hear complaints about excessive choice :-)

As for the screen flicker problem, it's basically the one described in this XDA thread. I have a bit of a hard time getting it to flicker on command, but generally it will do it if I go to a dark room, have it on auto brightness, and I browse. The flickering happens the most when pages are loading, but in general it seems to happen occasionally whenever there's wifi traffic.

My workaround is basically to use Lux to keep the backlight to going too low. I'm not sure if that's masking the problem, or if the problem happens only when the backlight is dim.

Maybe I'll try to RMA it once it looks like there's a second revision to the hardware, but I kind of wanted to see if Google could fix it with a firmware/software patch.

Ah I don't use auto brightness. Annoying in too many ways.

I suspect the big difference in go flex vs SD is whether you're the only one in the house or not. For multiple device households, using an SD card is a bigger hassle than its worth.

[MattHelm]

I know this doesn't help the OP, but I'm waiting until the next gen CPUs come out. They'll either use less power at the same speed, or be much faster. I know it's always going to be that way, but the Cortex-A15 is suppose to really help things run better.

[reggie14]

Originally Posted by IVB

interesting, southwest, united, virgin do which is all I fly.

Actually, it's usually the United flights that I fly that don't have wifi. Anyways, I suspect the rules aren't any different for wifi and non-wifi enabled flights (and I suspect your odds of getting in trouble are about the same either way).

Originally Posted by IVB

Ah I don't use auto brightness. Annoying in too many ways.

Well, it's not an auto-brightness issue, it's a low-backlight issue. I have the same problem if I turn off auto brightness (and Lux) and manually turn the backlight all the way down. The lower it is, the more noticeable it is (so, it's easier to see the problem if I use Lux to turn the backlight lower than Android usually lets you set it).

As I said, it's hard to replicate the bug on-demand. For the first week, I just thought my eyes were randomly bugging out on me. Then I found the XDA thread. People in the XDA thread seem to think its tied to wifi strength as well (claiming the problem is worse when you have a weak signal), although I haven't noticed a difference.

Originally Posted by IVB

I suspect the big difference in go flex vs SD is whether you're the only one in the house or not. For multiple device households, using an SD card is a bigger hassle than its worth.

Sure- how and where you use your tablet(s) is going to make a big difference on the best approach.

By the way, if you haven't found it already, Mizuu is a great video library app for Android. The official version isn't available for Jelly Bean devices yet, but the nightly betas have been working pretty well for me. The nightlies work with network shares, and one of the recent nightlies added support for filtering by available locations (so, if you're not connected to your Go Flex, but you have a few movies stored internally, you can pull up just the ones stored locally).

[tvmaster2]

Originally Posted by IVB

I have a Nexus 7, many people I know do, I don't know of a single person who doesn't totally love it. The lack of an SD card is a red herring, if you really want more space, don't muck with a 16GB/32gB/64GB card esp as thats then bound to a single machine. Get a 500GB Seagate GoFlex Satellite, then 3 concurrent machines/tablets can stream from it.

I'm going on a 6 hour roadtrip tomorrow. The wife, both kids each have tablets (or iPod touch), they will all stream whatever they want from the hard disk. I have a few HUNDRED movies transcoded to mp4, plus SageTV stuff transcoded, plus every mp3 in my collection.

is anyone streaming that drive with an iPad? I'd love to be able to do that...what's the secret?