[ale] Tablet PCs

[Sparr]

There are hundreds of $80 to $200 devices on the market right now,
running Android or proprietary ebook or media-center OSes. Most of
them have hardware similar to a PDA in 2003-2005, with a screen
similar to most digital picture frames.

So far, I'd say steer clear of all of them. There are a very few gems,
but they are almost universally bad. Wait for reputable manufacturers
to drive the prices down, so that the good products (like the Samsung
Galaxy Tab) are $200 and the shitty products are $50.

On Sat, Nov 27, 2010 at 9:22 PM, Chris Fowler
<cfowler at outpostsentinel.com> wrote:
> There were a few stores selling Android tablets real cheap over Black
> Friday but I steered away.  My father called and he asked about them.
> He wants to look at the Internet while sitting in his Lazy Boy :)
>
> A week ago I saw a Samsung at Frys but it was $600+.  I was amazed at
> some of the cheap prices duing BF.  KMart was selling one for $130.
>
> I found this on eBay
>
> http://cgi.ebay.com/Android-Tablet-PC-7-MID-wifi-touch-screen-laptop-8GB-/110617119786?pt=Laptops_Nov05
>
> I think that may fit his needs but I'm very interested in knowing if it
> would be a waste of time for me.  I would immediately expect to be able
> to download app-store programs to use with it.
>
> My biggest concern with Android is the same problem I had when I used
> Windows PDA's and phones.  when looking for software I had to also make
> sure that the software I was downloading supported the device processor
> as well as screen resolution.  I had been let down many times by wanting
> to run a program only to find out my device could not run it due to
> incompatibilities.  The thing I love about my iTouch is that I don't
> have to search the net for software and anything I download will run.
>
> I was reading about some of this over the weekend and IMO, it is
> unfortunate that developers are allowed to "hide" apps from devices that
> can not support them.  Maybe I'm wrong but I believe that non-computer
> people are going to share the same frustrations as I did while trying to
> find software for my Windows phone.  I toyed with that phone for 3 days
> and gave it away after downloading countless programs that were not
> supported.
>
> Am I wrong?
>
>
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