Last year, Acer entered the tablet frenzy with a few different models, but the flagship of the bunch was the A500, the highest quality tablet the company offered, with a price to match. The Iconia Tab A200 is similar in concept but shaves off some features and perks to drop down to a lower price point.
The A500 wasn’t a bad tablet at all, but it was fairly heavy for a 10.1-inch model, made even more noticeable by the fact the mostly plastic body felt a little cheap. While the front maintains the glass look, the back of the A200 has a rubberized backing that adds an air of elegance to a device that isn’t really meant to be all that elegant.
The screen size remains the same at 10.1-inches with a resolution of 1280 x 800. The 1GHz dual-core nVidia Tegra 2 processor was a solid performer in last year’s tablets, but is likely to fall back to a standard this year as quad-core processors start to take over. Internal storage capacity varies between 8GB and 16GB versions, but they have microSD slots that can handle up to 32GB cards, so at least there are options to expand the memory.
You will get a 2-megapixel front-facing camera, but not a rear one. Just another thing that had to be cut in order to drop down the price a little more. Same goes for an HDMI output — there isn’t one, so you’ll have to use wireless options, like DLNA, to stream from the A200 to a TV. The A200 is also Wi-Fi-only, so no 3G or LTE options here. And, as expected, there’s Bluetooth and assisted GPS.
The A200 runs on Android 3.2.1 Honeycomb, but includes Acer Ring, a pop-up mini-interface that offers four presets, like launching the browser or camera with one tap. Aside from that, you get what Honeycomb typically offers, or more succinctly, what you choose to get out of it.
But it’s important to remember that the A200 was designed to be a mid-range tablet, which explains why it’s missing certain elements. If you like the idea of having a tablet with a bigger screen but don’t want to break the bank in the process, you could consider this tablet as a good fit for you.
Future Shop will be carrying the 8GB model for $329.99 and 16GB for $349.99. At just a $20 difference between the two, the 16GB is definitely the better value, but that will be up to you.
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