Budget tablet advice!

ins0mn1ac

ins0mn1ac

ins0mn1ac

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I'm looking for something for the misses for Xmas, small stocking filler to keep her off my PC browsing random drivel :p

I'm thinking less than £80, it only need be able to browse and be capable of watching stuff over wifi which I imagine is pretty standard stuff. Battery life isn't really a biggy because it'll be close to a socket mostly, I know that OCUK now sell tablets so I won't be getting links for anywhere else but just the advice is appreciated :)
 
Ive been in the same position this year. My partners kids are both getting tablets this year. Your main comprismise here is your gonna get a 800 x 480 screen.

My partner wants a 9 inch screen, so I have the OcUK Nebula 9" 4GB Tablet or order at £90, I beleieve this is made by DGM, so the build quaility should be a step up from no name eastern tablets, it has a capacitive screen and the play store, so will have everything she needs for web brousing and basic tasks. I am well aware that its still a low res screen but for this price I cant really complain.

The reason I said about the screen is some of the lower end ones have a resistive screens.

I think as long as you dont go in expecting the same quality as an Ipad or Nexus you`ll be fine.

My tablet should arrive tommorow so I can let you know how it fairs if you like.
 
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Archos 7 Home Tablet 8 GB is well over £80. If you can go an extra mile to add £40, you should get the 'classic' samsung galaxy which has most features.
 
I was working my way through this decision recently. I wanted a 7" tablet for the gf for Christmas as her phone wasn't cutting it as an Android device, but she didn't want to replace it and her contract isn't up for a year.

I spent ages going through all the options for the cheap tablets, and came to the conclusion that I would end up spending around £100 for one worth having, I decided it had to be Jelly Bean as most of the manufacturers don't seem to release updated firmwares very often (if they even have a web presence), ideally I needed above an 800x480 screen and I also required it to be multi-core as I have used single core android device and they are very frustrating.

I tried to pick one out for £100, went through all the usual brands people recommend (ainol, Hyundai etc.) and then notice the Nexus 7 16GB is now £159... it became a no brainer really. Proper quad core, well built device that will receive good future support (it's already been updated twice from 4.1 to 4.2) with a decent HD IPS screen and a much better battery life than most of the cheaper devices have.

Sure it's £60 more than I was going to spend, but I'd much rather give that as a gift than one I will forever have to be supporting because this thing doesn't work in the Play store, or that thing doesn't work and the only way to update it is with custom firmwares from some forum...

That said, I got mine from a well-known high-street catalogue retailer for Google's price (but not their shipping) and very few other places seem to sell it now with most just stocking the 32GB (still good vfm at £199 imo).

All of that aside, another to look out for is the Sumvision Cyclone Voyager, which has some good specs (dual core, 1gb ram/16gb rom, an actual web presence for support) but still has the 800x480 screen. That said, if you look, it can be had for less than £80 if you get into the pre-order queue.
 
manic_man said:
I was working my way through this decision recently. I wanted a 7" tablet for the gf for Christmas as her phone wasn't cutting it as an Android device, but she didn't want to replace it and her contract isn't up for a year.

I spent ages going through all the options for the cheap tablets, and came to the conclusion that I would end up spending around £100 for one worth having, I decided it had to be Jelly Bean as most of the manufacturers don't seem to release updated firmwares very often (if they even have a web presence), ideally I needed above an 800x480 screen and I also required it to be multi-core as I have used single core android device and they are very frustrating.

I tried to pick one out for £100, went through all the usual brands people recommend (ainol, Hyundai etc.) and then notice the Nexus 7 16GB is now £159... it became a no brainer really. Proper quad core, well built device that will receive good future support (it's already been updated twice from 4.1 to 4.2) with a decent HD IPS screen and a much better battery life than most of the cheaper devices have.

Sure it's £60 more than I was going to spend, but I'd much rather give that as a gift than one I will forever have to be supporting because this thing doesn't work in the Play store, or that thing doesn't work and the only way to update it is with custom firmwares from some forum...

That said, I got mine from a well-known high-street catalogue retailer for Google's price (but not their shipping) and very few other places seem to sell it now with most just stocking the 32GB (still good vfm at £199 imo).

All of that aside, another to look out for is the Sumvision Cyclone Voyager, which has some good specs (dual core, 1gb ram/16gb rom, an actual web presence for support) but still has the 800x480 screen. That said, if you look, it can be had for less than £80 if you get into the pre-order queue.
Click to expand...

I came to the same conclusion about the Sumvision a couple of days ago and am in the pre-order queue :D

But now im wondering if its worth spending a little more and going for a

NATPC M009S X2 almost identical specs only real difference is a 1024 x 600 screen and only £15 more
 
Personally is still be buying the sumvision, at least they have a web presence! I believe natpc market themselves as a uk supplier, however if you can find any good resources that I would turn to should I find a bug in the supplied firmware then you're doing better than me :)

My money would still be in a nexus though, the extra spec, ota updating direct from Google and general quality more than make it worth it's while imo.
 
cool,good info to me, If you can go an extra mile to add £40, you should get the 'classic' samsung galaxy which has most features.
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Personally I would suggest the following:

Whatever you get, make sure it has at least two processor cores. Even at 1.5Ghz+ a single core tablet will be annoying to use, background tasks will slow down the interface, whereas a dual (or quad core in the case of a Nexus 7) device will always have processing resource available for the interface. It just makes the whole thing good to use rather than an annoyance. This comes from experience of single and multi-core Android devices.

Make sure you will be able to update the device, Android moves very quickly and the current iteration is outdated rapidly, not just because it isn't the latest thing, but people actually stop developing for older versions within a year or two. A good device (i.e. a "proper" brand such as Samsung etc.) will be kept relatively up to date for a while, and updating it will be easy to do. The Google Nexus 7 will be up to date before everything else for quite a while of course and it comes over the air direct from Google. Of course if you are happy to start flashing custom firmwares downloaded from forums etc. then it doesn't really matter what you get as long as the hardware (i.e. some of the cheaper Chinese ARM based processors used in the budget tablets can have a few funny quirks that the more mainstream ones don't) is up to the task.

Finally, pay careful attention to the screen. Make sure it is capacitive, some of the cheap tabs use resistive touch screens, effectively useless as a touch device. Ideally make sure the res is above 800x480 for a 7" device, thats hte res my 4" phone has and on a 7" device the pixel density just isn;t high enough for a good viewing experience. Also, many of the budget tabs, even those with a higher resolution, use cheaper screens (the screen makes up much of the cost for them) so viewing angles/quality in glare etc. will be lower.

Ultimately you pay for what you get, I just think that for £159 the Nexus 7 is actually a lot of hardware for the money, backed with top end software support, Google are impressing me with their devices at the moment.
 
Well now ive done it, canceled my pre order for the sumvision and have ordered a Ployner Momo7 instead.

The best part is i found the Momo7 for only £2 more than the sumvision.
 
Ive been looking for reviews of the sumvision and was about to order one, but now ive seen your post re the Momo7 ive checked the specs etc and that looks much better, but after searching for ages i cant see anywhere that has it for £2 more than the sumovision, would you mind pointing me in the right direction, TIA
 
I would do but despite them being a HONGKONG based TABLET seller they would be considered a competitor.

Guess you will just have to GOOGLE till you find them
 
i have been toying with getting a laptop lately but cant go much above £400 tops. but with all these tablets around now i was wondering whether its worth going for one of those instead.

The Laptop wasnt going to be for gaming anyway but a little gaming ability would be nice.
 
I purchased the cheaper tablet from OCUK, it came Ive ended up having to return the product. There was a small defect with the bezel however I was still able to see how it performed.

The major let down with the cheaper units is the screen resolution, and screen bleed as well as the terrible viewing angle.

Anyway, this unit went back anyway, and I replaced this with the Nexus 7, well worth the extra money, the device is a joy to use, I felt like my eyes were gonna bleed looking at the cheaper screens.

Conclusion is well worth the extra money going for the nexus
 
waveydave79 said:
I purchased the cheaper tablet from OCUK, it came Ive ended up having to return the product. There was a small defect with the bezel however I was still able to see how it performed.

The major let down with the cheaper units is the screen resolution, and screen bleed as well as the terrible viewing angle.

Anyway, this unit went back anyway, and I replaced this with the Nexus 7, well worth the extra money, the device is a joy to use, I felt like my eyes were gonna bleed looking at the cheaper screens.

Conclusion is well worth the extra money going for the nexus
Click to expand...


So your major issue with cheap models are cheap TN displays. Not all cheap models have TN displays some even have nice IPS screens with nice viewing angles and resolutions. Still dont understand people moaning about low resolution on these devices, just look at your monitor it will probably have a lower DPI than any of these devices.
 
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