We’ve been playing with the Acer Iconia Tab A500 for over a week now and I must say this is a pretty decent Honeycomb tablet and probably the cheapest dual-core tablet in the Philippines with street prices as low as Php18,500.
The Iconia A500 is actually the first dual-core Honeycomb tablet to be released in the Philippines, sporting an NVidia Tegra 2 chipset. The Asus Transformer and the Samsung Galxy Tab 10.1 have been announced and previewed with the members of the media several months ago but have not yet been sold to the general public.
This 10-inch tablet isn’t the thinnest or lightest we’ve tested in its category but Acer managed to put in a decent effort with their first Honeycomb tablet and at a price point that’s very affordable (currently the cheapest) to most consumers looking for one. And for those who just want a taste of Honeycomb to play with (read: hack) and not put a big dent on the wallet, this could be the appropriate device.
And since the Iconia A500 is powered by an NVidia Tegra 2 chip, expect a slew of really nice HD games on the tablet that’s close to the quality of console games. Of course, that will still depend on how good the display is — and IMO, the Iconia A500 does it well enough (a bit washed out and hard to use outdoors even at brightest settings).
Acer Iconia Tab A500
10.1″ capacitive display @ 1280×800 pixels
NVidia Tegra 2 1GHz dual-core processor
16GB & 32GB internal storage
HDMI port (1080p output)
Android 3.0 Honeycomb
Acer UI 4.5
WiFi 802.11 b/g/n
Bluetooth 2.1,
GPS w/ aGPS support
HDMI with Dual Display
USB Host
microSD slot
micro USB port
5MP rear camera w/ flash
2MP front-facing camera
Android 3.0 Honeycomb
10.1″ capacitive display @ 1280×800 pixels
NVidia Tegra 2 1GHz dual-core processor
16GB & 32GB internal storage
HDMI port (1080p output)
Android 3.0 Honeycomb
Acer UI 4.5
WiFi 802.11 b/g/n
Bluetooth 2.1,
GPS w/ aGPS support
HDMI with Dual Display
USB Host
microSD slot
micro USB port
5MP rear camera w/ flash
2MP front-facing camera
Android 3.0 Honeycomb
I wanted to do a full review of the unit in its stock form but this one that I borrowed was loaded with a custom ROM. If you want to check out the details of the tablet, I’ll just point you to the review over at Gizmo Owl (the nice dude who lent us this unit).
The Acer Iconia Tab A500 has a suggested retail price of Php21,900 for the 16GB and Php23,900 for the 32GB but you can get units for as low as Php18,500 on cash purchases. Until the Asus Transformer and the Galaxy Tab 10.1 finally arrives, looks like the Iconia A500 will be our only choice for a Honeycomb tablet.
This article originally appeared at - yugatech