Android Tablets for the Kids

Leslie

Leslie

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Leslie
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Hi,

I'm thinking of getting an Android tablet for the kids so that I can get my phone back from them!

Been having a quick look around and found this from Currys, http://www.currys.co.uk/gbuk/product-11434093-pdt.html?srcid=369&xtor=AL-1&cmpid=aff~InvisibleHand~

Does anyone here have any experience of using this tablet? How is the screen? Is it fast enough for light internet browsing and playing Angry Birds? Are there any other tablet I should be considering? £200 is probably the top of my budget at the minute.
 
think the Archos ones don't have official market place, might some root procedure that unlocks it..

I went for 2 Advent Vegas from Currys/PCWorld outlet, £139.99 each and then rooted them and installed Vegacomb 3.2 (very easy to do) and they have been faultless, very impressive for the money.
 
shame that £200 is top of your budget as really you need an iPad. Especially if you are looking for children's apps.

Android market doesn't have anywhere near the amount of education related children's apps that apple do. I think if you are buying something specifically for your kids you should reconsider your budget if possible
 
strumstrum said:
think the Archos ones don't have official market place, might some root procedure that unlocks it..

I went for 2 Advent Vegas from Currys/PCWorld outlet, £139.99 each and then rooted them and installed Vegacomb 3.2 (very easy to do) and they have been faultless, very impressive for the money.
Click to expand...

I just looked at the Cnet review and it says that you can get apps from the Android Market? Not sure I'd want to go down the route of rooting it etc.

I had a look for the Advent Vegas on Currys but can only find an Advent Vega for £199. Not anything around the £139 mark?
 
A ainol-novo7-elf can be had for about £100 in the UK


Has good reviews and you'd not get the urge to sell the kids if they broke it :D
 
A cheap tablet is a cheap tablet.

I use an Asus Transformer which I share with my kids. They have various apps and games they play, they also play some stuff on the web. It is just over £300, but it is the best Android tablet out there.

The Motorola Xoom and Asus Transformer run Android 3.2 (Honeycomb) and are being upgraded (Xoom might be out already) to Android 4 (Ice Cream Sandwich).

There is a huge difference between android 2.2 or 2.3 and 3.x or 4.x. They aren't developing apps for the 2.0 tablets as 2.0 doesn't really support tablets, so there might be apps, but don't expect them to work. IMO Don't touch an android tablet running 2.2 (Froyo) or 2.3 (Gingerbread).

You can buy cheap and suffer, it is the device that is limiting you and not Android. Look at the Asus Transformer.

As said above though the iPad has the best apps for kids (as much as I hate to say it). The Android tablets aren't doing as well as people hoped, but the phone itself is competing with iPhone, so the apps are coming and android is catching up. Sadly there is a lot of ***** in the marketplace and google haven't made it easy to filter through them. There are lots of good apps in there though.

Something else to think about is Windows 8 is being released in beta in the next few weeks. This means it is only a year away from full release. This will have a big impact on tablet sales and may kill android off in the tablet market if they haven't got a big enough chunk of the market by then.
 
Thanks Dale, that's really useful. One of the things attracting me to the Archos tablet is that it runs on Android 3.2.

I really can't go much more than £200 at the minute. I'll be paying for this with money that is sitting in a poker account that i've not used for ages. Might as well do something with it than have it lying doing nothing!
 
Looking at the spec, it looks OK, its running Honeycomb, its got a pretty hi res screen and its got 8Gb storage.

Its got a dual core 1.0Ghz, but not one I've heard of (Asus is 1.2Ghz Tegra2 dual core).
 
The one I linked to is running Android 4.0.........

It is often true that
You can buy cheap and suffer
Click to expand...
but for £100 :shrug:


After all , by the time you've bought the latest greatest tablet it's out of date & lost shed loads in resell value (said while looking at my iPad1)
 
mrgubby said:
The one I linked to is running Android 4.0.........

It is often true that but for £100 :shrug:


After all , by the time you've bought the latest greatest tablet it's out of date & lost shed loads in resell value (said while looking at my iPad1)
Click to expand...

ipad1 lost shed loads in retail value?

you can sell an iPad 1 16gb wifi for £250 second hand and they cost £400 new at the time. £150 drop on a electrical appliance is pretty good if you ask me. You can sell it for more than 60% what it cost almost 2 years on
 
mrgubby said:
The one I linked to is running Android 4.0.........

It is often true that but for £100 :shrug:


After all , by the time you've bought the latest greatest tablet it's out of date & lost shed loads in resell value (said while looking at my iPad1)
Click to expand...

I know that one is running Android 4.0 and it does look tempting, but to be honest I have a couple of issues with it.

1. I've never heard of Ainol.
2. I've never heard of the websites that are selling it in the UK.

Whilst I know that Ainol could be a perfectly good make and the websites selling it could be legit, I'm just not sure I want to take that risk.
 
Do you also want your kids saying the word Ainol? (I can only say it one way and it sounds wrong :lol: )
 
Dale_d3100 said:
Do you also want your kids saying the word Ainol? (I can only say it one way and it sounds wrong :lol: )
Click to expand...

Brilliant!

To be honest i'd been pronouncing it Aye-nol up until now!

That's a third reason added to my list.
 
I've not used that specific one bit I do have the Archos 10.1 tablet running android 2.2 and paid £129 for it new.
Every app I have on it works happily at tablet resolution with no distortion or other problems.
As for putting the official market on it, this can be done without rooting the device.
For internet surfing, game playing and movie watching it is ideal for me so it should be fine for your kids if they do what you as they will I. E. Internet and angry birds etc.
 
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