What Droid Tablet should I get?

[Dizz88]

So, here is the deal everyone.....my wife wants/wanted a tablet but just like her I didn't want to and WON'T pay $600 or more for an Ipad. Now with that being said I found the Archos 7 home tablet at Best Buy for under $200 so I jumped on it for Christmas. Now I read a lot about it and thought that everything I read was true and that she would be able to do apps from the droid market and such. Turns out once we started playing with it on Christmas morning that it doesn't have flash and basically is a big waste of money, time, and is a glorified cell phone without the phone. At least that's my opinion anyways. So, I have been re-researching Archos tablets and have found that the Archos 70 internet tablet is the best choice. It can do everything that the Ipad can for the most part anyways that is. I just want to know for sure if this is correct? Also, with the Archos 7 it was supposed to have 8gig of memory and in doing some memory tests on it, it had nowhere near that much and there was nothing download on it. Basically we took it back the day after Christmas. So, should I put up the extra money to get the 250gig Archos 70 or just stay with the 8gig? I have read all that I have found on the Archos tablets and in that process found this forum. Anyways this post as it is my first is already way to long. I will just await the answers of everyone on here so that I may learn the answers that I seriously need. Thanks to everyone in advance. I hope to share more on this forum.

PS) Just a little rundown on what we are trying to get out of this tablet. Ebooks, Internet, Apps, Games, Music, and possibly some movies.

 

[ecargoonline]

hello, here we have a apad 8 inch for you, the best seller in our site, run with android 2.2 OS, maybe you can take your time to have a look, here's the link for that product: Android 2.2 OS 512 RAM with Freescale iMX515 Cortex A8 Processor Tablet PC M8003
hope you'll like it.

 

[Dizz88]

Thank you very much for the help so far and for the link. I will do some further research to determine if the Apad is the right one to go with. Myself and others close to me have yet to have good dealings with things being shipped from China. And I mean no offense by that. It's just personal experience.

 

[Dizz88]

I'd still love some more feedback on what I'm asking. At this point I'm pretty close to getting the Archos 70. It would be awesome for someone that has one to give some feedback on it. I just don't want to waste the money if it's not good. Thanks.

 

[Pete_S]

Just a few thoughts in random order. I've had Archos devices in the past and the old ones were great, but they apparently made a decision a few years ago to "lock up" their firmware and hardware to prevent tampering and at the same time released some very flaky products which they "tested" on customers. They are IMHO no better then generic Chinese devices and I wouldn't buy or recommend them over unbranded devices. I have, in fairness, no experience of the current generation, maybe they have improved.

Bearing in mind you can't usually upgrade firmware on generic tablets, you should ensure you get at least Android 2.1 as I believe it's a lot better for multimedia, especially HD quality, than earlier versions. If you want the full web experience including flash you will need Android 2.2. Some suppliers, in the UK at least, seem to be still selling 1.5 and 1.6 tablets which are well out of date now.

The best bet overall is to buy from a reputable source that you know has good aftersales support and a decent returns policy rather than worry too much about the ultimate specs of the tablet, as long as it has the Android version, the connectivity and the features you need.

 

[Dizz88]

Thank you for your help. I have had no dealings with Archos in the past and so therefor that is why I am asking questions. I have read and read all the reviews and information about Archos in general as well as about the products. That probably brings up the question as to why I'm asking for everyone to help, well because I can't touch and feel and play with the tablet that I want to get and would very much like to but no one here sells it in a store. Thanks again for the help and please keep it coming as I am giving it until the end of today.

 

[lumd27]

Thank you for your help. I have had no dealings with Archos in the past and so therefor that is why I am asking questions. I have read and read all the reviews and information about Archos in general as well as about the products. That probably brings up the question as to why I'm asking for everyone to help, well because I can't touch and feel and play with the tablet that I want to get and would very much like to but no one here sells it in a store. Thanks again for the help and please keep it coming as I am giving it until the end of today.

from your post it appears you brought the archos 7ht i dont know whethetr it is v1 or v2 but both are crippled and no where as useful as the archos 70 by the way you can only buy it online it is not at bestbuy stores. I have the archos 5it which I gave to my older son ,two archos 32 both of which are updated to 2.2 with flash added and an archos 70 updated to 2.2 all of the 2.2 work well,they are fast and play almost all media files. they are able to get on the internet and my son has his 32 tethered to his phone . I enjoy the archos and use it at work everyday. It has some quirps it can freeze at times but overall I Think it is the best 7 inch tablet its relatively cheap and does not require a data plan . if you want to use it as a phone you cant but then your choices are the hawei s7 or samsung galaxy . Overall I think the archos is a great choice for the money

 

[Dizz88]

Yes I did buy it and it has since been returned. I wish that the 70 was available in stores even as just a demo model but oh well, it should just be an upgrade from the 7 and such. Now as far as I have read the 70 comes with 2.1 but it can be updated to 2.2 pretty easily correct? Now my other question is, we (my wife and I) would rather use the actual android market place rather than the apps lib. Not sure if that's possible or not and I don't believe that I have seen anywhere that it can't be done. We both have phones that can access the internet so using it as a phone is not anything we want it to be able to do. I have been thinking about buying myself like the 32 or 28 so that I can have one of my own just to play around with. Curious question though, how does the Archos 5 compare to all of these other than the fact that it's a 5" screen I haven't heard any bad things about it. Thanks!

 

[Dizz88]

So the Archos 70 internet tablet is on it's way. There's a chance it will be here today but more than likely it will be tomorrow. Even though it is the wife's I'm hoping that I get to play with it almost as much as she does. I'm very tempted to buy one of the smaller ones for myself just so she can totally enjoy the 70 without my wanting to have it all the time. Although if I had an android phone this wouldn't be a problem. Hmmm...!

 

[Pete_S]

So the Archos 70 internet tablet is on it's way. There's a chance it will be here today but more than likely it will be tomorrow. Even though it is the wife's I'm hoping that I get to play with it almost as much as she does. I'm very tempted to buy one of the smaller ones for myself just so she can totally enjoy the 70 without my wanting to have it all the time. Although if I had an android phone this wouldn't be a problem. Hmmm...!

Well done! Let us know your experience of it. My partner has an iPad and I'm not tempted in the least to borrow it. I'm, er, violently anti apple

 

[Bilgediver]

I have the 250 gb version. I'm probably seeing ablut 6-7 hours of battery life with extremely heavy use (course I also had brightness on 30 to 50 percent, too). I plan on having brightness on minimum to see how long I can run it.

By the way you can use the archos to make calls, over wifi at least. I've patched it with google apps, and when I synced it actually synced some of my contacts from my phone.

I installed fring, and while the latest update seems to have broken voice call functionality, at least I can make audio calls with fring or skype ovee wifi.

It has a front facing camera so it SHOULD be able to video call, but when I loaded fring it claimed I didn't have the hardware capability.

Sent from my DROID2 GLOBAL using Android Tablet Forum App

 

[Dizz88]

So the tablet got here today and the wife hasn't really stopped playing angry birds on it since she took it out of the box other than for us to go to the hockey game tonight. Anyways here's my issue and while I have searched a little bit on this forum for the answer, as well as some other websites I haven't been able to get what I need so I'll ask. I connected the tablet to my desktop so I can do a couple of updates and installs so that we can access the true android market, have swype text, and to make sure that it's running 2.2. Well when I plug it in my desktop doesn't install it properly and says that something is up with the driver. From what I have figured out, basically windows 7 doesn't have the correct driver pre-installed to automatically set up the device so that I can move files back and forth between the 2. Now the Archos 7 that I had bought worked great the first time I plugged it in. Windows had no issues, so this is kind of making me scratch my head just a bit. Any help given is really appreciated! Hopefully there will be answer tonight. Thanks again.

 

[Dizz88]

OK, so an update....for some reason or another after waiting a few hours because of going to the Coyotes hockey game I came home and attempted to plug in the tablet to the computer and this time everything worked without a hitch. Honestly I don't know if my computer was just being touchy or what but hey it works now. If any admins want to move this whole topic or parts of it over to a new thread I will be starting to document our experience with this tablet please do so if it warrents it.

 

[limulus]

I have this on my short list to buy within a couple of weeks. I'll be watching for updates.