Tag Archives: life battery

May 23

Acer Iconia Tab A510 Android tablet (preview)

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the 10.1in Acer Iconia Tab A510 runs the latest Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich operating system, is powered by a quad-core processor and has 32GB of storage along with a microSD card for memory expansion. however, the real attraction here seems to be battery life.

Acer claims the Iconia Tab A510′s huge 9800mAh battery will provide up to 15 hours of standby time. Real life battery use is often less than advertised figures, but this figure remains pretty impressive. if Acer’s quoted figure is close enough to the mark, the Iconia Tab A510 will undoubtedly be the market leader when it comes to tablet battery life.

Battery life aside, there is nothing too flashy about the Acer Iconia Tab A510. the styling appears to differ little from previous models, particularly the Iconia Tab A200. while that isn’t necessarily a bad thing, the A200 retails for $349, significantly cheaper than the A510. Weighing a hefty 680g and measuring 10.2mm thick, the Iconia Tab A510 may be easy to overlook for thinner, lighter and better looking alternatives.

The Acer Iconia Tab A510 has a 5-megapixel rear camera, a 1-megapixel front-facing camera for video calls and a HDMI-out port for connecting the tablet to a high definition television or projector.

Sales of the Iconia Tab A510 in Australia will come with an Iconia Tab Starter Pack, which Acer says is valued at $150. the pack includes access to a range of online tutorials and a dedicated customer support line. Acer will also provide a $100 gift voucher that can be used to purchase eBooks or music downloads.

The Acer Iconia Tab A510 is available now through retailers JB Hi-Fi, the good Guys and Radio Rentals for $549.

• Acer Iconia Tab A200 review • Acer Iconia Tab A500 review • Acer Iconia Tab A100 review

Acer Iconia Tab A510 Android tablet (preview)

Oct 10

Sorry BlackBerry fans, I just can’t stick ...

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Just over a month ago I posted about my new BlackBerry adoption and am now ready to give up on RIM and sell off my BlackBerry Bold 9900 and PlayBook. I have several reasons for giving up on the Bold 9900 and PlayBook with the Windows Phone Mango and Amazon Kindle Fire news just making my decisions so much clearer.

BB Smartphone

I knew that I was giving up some things going from the Droid Charge to the Bold 9930, but the extremely poor Gmail functionality (does RIM really think I should spend time managing email in two places?), lack of native Exchange (I knew this going in, but can’t deal with it in every day life.), battery life about the same as most other current smartphone, minimal real life usage of BBM, and much more exciting happenings on other platforms make my decision to drop my Bold 9930 pretty easy. Application support isn’t a concern as most all apps I have on other platforms are available on BlackBerry smartphones even though the overall number of apps in App World is much less.

The Bold 9930 is a very nice piece of hardware, but the battery life is not stellar like previous BlackBerry smartphones, the camera is just decent and not great, there is still no NFC support for the Verizon model, and it hangs way too often for my tastes (especially when compared to my Mango devices that fly around the interface). Application updates take a long time and almost always require a 5 minute reboot.

BB PlayBook

The BlackBerry PlayBook is a good tablet, but it is very expensive for what you get and the slow rollout of the major update is killing me. With the new Amazon Kindle Fire in the same form factor with a MUCH better ecosystem I don’t see the appeal of a PlayBook unless you are a die hard BlackBerry user. RIM should be releasing the PlayBook 2.0 update soon, but it really should have been before the Amazon Kindle Fire announcement as $199 for a fully functional Android tablet is tough to beat.

I am now looking to sell my Bold 9930 and PlayBook and move on. If Verizon had a new Windows Phone Mango device I would buy it today and I am now considering the iPhone 5 on Verizon too. Mango is my preference, but since I have two Mango devices on T-Mobile I am more open to something else on Verizon.

Sorry BlackBerry fans, I just can’t stick around any longer