Acer Iconia Tab A200

The Acer Iconia Tab A200 ($349.99 list) won't blow anyone away with its speed or looks. Instead, it's a quiet performer. The real draw here is the software, as it's one of only a handful of devices so far to get Android 4.0?(Ice Cream Sandwich). The A200 may be a thick and heavy slab, but when you consider its bargain price, the A200 is a solid 10-inch tablet that runs Google's latest mobile OS without a hitch.

Pricing, Physical Design, and Connectivity
One of the main draws of the Iconia Tab A200 is its budget-friendly pricing. Acer offers two Wi-Fi-only models of the tablet, an 8GB for $329.99 and a 16GB for $349.99. This is considerably less than the Apple iPad 2?($499, 4 stars) and the current top Android tablet, the Asus Transformer Prime?($499/32GB, 4 stars). However, this low price comes with some sacrifices?most notably in design.?

The A200 is an unassuming, chunky tablet, measuring 10.2 by 6.9 by 0.5 inches (HWD) and weighing in at a rather hefty 1.54 pounds. The Transformer Prime is thinner and lighter, measuring just 0.3 inches at its thickest point and weighing only 1.3 pounds. The Prime also feels sleeker, with thin, tapered edges, as opposed to the flat and squat sides of the A200. A better comparison to the A200 would be the Toshiba Thrive?($399.99/16GB, 3.5 stars), which is 0.6-inches thick and weighs 1.6 pounds. Much like the Thrive, the A200 uses an all-plastic construction, with a soft-touch, rubberized back. Tiny dimples cover the back of the A200, making for a pleasantly grippy and tactile feel, which is crucial given the tablet's heft. There are two color choices include titanium gray or metallic red.

The 10.1-inch LCD features a 1280-by-800-pixel resolution; great for 7-inch tablets, but average on the 10-inch A200. Brightness, colors, and viewing angle are only mediocre, paling in comparison with the brilliant Super IPS+ display of the Transformer Prime.

With great girth comes great connectivity. The left side (when held in landscape mode) houses the Power button, 3.5mm headphone jack, microUSB port, full-sized USB 2.0 port, and, behind a rather flimsy plastic flap, a microSD card slot. Full-sized USB ports are rare in the tablet world, but I find them very useful for transferring files via USB thumb drives. Along the top edge are the volume rocker and orientation lock switch. The A200 does not charge via micro USB like most other tablets; instead, it uses an AC adapter, with the power input on the right edge. The A200 connects with computers via microUSB cable, but doesn't charge when connected. A 2-megapixel, front-facing camera sits centered above the screen, but there is no rear-facing camera. This is a Wi-Fi only tablet, supporting 802.11b/g/n, and also Bluetooth 2.1+ EDR.

Hardware, Performance, and OS
Another big draw here is Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich). ICS is a major step forward for Android devices, with a much-improved browser, smoother UI, and harmonious ecosystem between phones and tablets. So how does it work on a middle-of-the-road tablet like the A200? Quite well, actually.

The A200 is powered by a dual-core 1GHz Nvidia Tegra 2 processor with 1GB of RAM and performs on par with other similarly equipped tablets, such as the Toshiba Thrive. Compared with the blazing fast, quad-core Tegra 3 powered Transformer Prime (another ICS tablet), the A200 gets blown out of the water in our benchmarks. However, in real world usage, the A200 runs ICS smoothly and without any hiccups. Apps work flawlessly, with no delay when switching between multiple running apps. Web pages load very quickly and the A200 successfully ran through our multimedia test files, playing?3GP,?DivX,?H.264,?M4V, MP4, and WMV at resolutions up to 1080p.

Acer also added some of its own tweaks. The most notable OS changes are the addition of the Acer Ring to both the lock screen and the menu bar within ICS. The lock screen features four customizable shortcuts, with the defaults set to Browser, Gallery, Google Search, and Gmail. The Acer Ring is slightly more comprehensive within the actual OS, featuring four more customizable shortcuts, a dedicated search button, volume control, and browser bookmarks.? I grew to like the Ring, as it eliminated a step for getting to my most-used apps, but really, it's just a standard app launcher; similar options are available from other manufacturers, such as the Lenovo Launcher.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/ziffdavis/pcmag/~3/zljTVsI7Avs/0,2817,2401208,00.asp

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