Relatively more affordable than its most famous competitor, the Acer Iconia Tab A500 is worth a good, long look if one is deciding which Android 3.0 tablet to buy. At 10.1 inches, it is the biggest Acer tablet. Wide release units will have Wi-Fi and will be 3G-enabled.
It is stylish, even while it is still bulkier than most tablets in the market today. For a portable device, however, it feels easy to carry around because it seemed more balanced and lighter than counterparts of comparable size. However, this gadget’s weight can be a bit of burden if only one hand supports it for extended periods of time.
The over-all design of the body is solid, with easy-to-access buttons and slots. Everything felt like they are where they should be: the volume controls and rotation lock on the edges are ergonomically shaped and logically placed, the power button is easily seen while still being unobtrusive. 
The Acer Iconia Tab, however, strongly gives out a Motorola Xoom vibe since its specifications are mostly the same. They both have a 1GHz Nvidia Tegra 250 dual-core processor with a RAM of 1GB. The display has 1280 x 800 resolution with an aspect ration of 16:10. Its 16GB internal memory, supplemented by a 32GB microSDHC, is adequate. However, there are some glitches with the configuration of the internal memory. Sometimes the memory registers as a card storage for some file managers. The battery, meanwhile, can last up to eight hours of full multimedia use or ten hours web browsing.
The display is bright, but the grid that is part of the touchscreen mechanism is visible most of the time and this can be quite distracting. Photo quality is inconsistent, depending on the application used to open the pictures. The overall display quality is better than Xoom’s but still has a way to go before being at par with that of the Apple iPad 2.
The Acer Iconia Tab A500 has some very cool features such as a gyroscope, GPS, a compass, accelerometer, Bluetooth and Wi-Fi capability. Acer also threw in its own Clear.fi branding for the Iconia Tab’s media server support as well as the Clear.fi application for communication between the tablet and DLNA sources. There are some difficulties with using this app, though, for sharing and downloading content.
The Iconia Tab also has two built-in standard cameras: a five-megapixel camera at the rear and a two-megapixel one at the front. The performance of both cameras, however, are less than satisfactory. The images they produce are blurry and dull. Other Android 3.0 tablets also seem to have the same problem. Aside from this, Android 3.0 tablets seem to be crash with a surprising frequency and some does not seem compatible with some applications. Compounding its camera concerns is the Iconia Tab’s application for the photo Gallery, which shows digital images with poor rendering—many of them pixelated and do not show any sharpness or detail. An improvement over the Google-powered Gallery app are the choices of Nemo Player and the Acer Photo Browser 3D. Both of these alternatives cannot produce the vividness and clarity of the apps in other tablets.
The audio hardware is interesting: the first built-in Dolby Mobile. The placement of the stereo speakers is a bit off because hands can blocj them in upside down landscape position. The audio is very clear and quite defined when properly adjusted on the settings menu. The Acer Iconia Tab A500′s stereo speakers are superior to the other tablets now in the market.
Acer’s latest tablet supports Adobe Flash, with options to install the newest version to be found on the Apps Menu, which also contains links to Facebook. However, there are no tablet-optimized applications, which limits the experience .
The Iconia Tab A500 performs well but there are still some issues with its operating system. Acer exerted an effort into customizing the Android 3.0 interface in this gadget, which is a definite advantage over other tablets. The downside, though, is that the Iconia Tab A500 ended up with a bookshelf-style screen for eReading, Games, and Multimedia. Mostly, it features links to other sources. While Acer threw in a lot of apps options, the service to support these can still use a lot of improvement.
Conclusion
Acer Iconia Tabs A500 is still far from perfect but it certainly trumps other tablets in the market in fulfilling its potential to replace the laptop.
Price:The Iconia A500 is currently only sale for $449.99 at Amazon.com but we would expect it to drop in price over the next few weeks.
It’s also $449.99 at BestBuy.com
June 1, 2011
Android Tablet Reviews