First Impressions: Nook Tablet Is the Value Tablet to Beat

At a Glance

Adept's Rating

Pros

Interface focuses on customization and reading
Great show minimizes limelight
Many apps are tailored for the 7-inch screen out

Cons

Navigation is locked into portrait mode only
Gray bezel is distracting

Our Verdict

Corner Tablet excels at reading, and offers a smattering of solid cyclosis media services, but it lacks the tractability of a full-featured pill.

The $249 Barnes &adenylic acid; Rarified Nook Tablet announced Monday may look like its predecessor, the Nook Color, just that's where the comparisons stop. When I picked up the Nook Tab, it was perspicuous that this tablet leaps ahead of B&N's front-gen effort–because information technology behaved more like a tablet. That aforementioned, the Nook Tablet's briny impuissance is that it's non a stuffed-featured tablet like some of its competitor; it lacks features like improved-in Bluetooth, stereo speakers, GPS, and front- and rear-cladding cameras, most of which are common finds on tablets today.

Still, the Nook Tablet's low price bequeath make it appealing to both e-lector and tablet shoppers. In point of fact, information technology is priced low enough to potentially sway consumers World Health Organization might have been considering an iPad 2, which has a larger display, but also costs twice the price. With its competitive price and beefy specs, some other so-called "measure" tablet makers (that includes Virago and its Kindle Fire tablet) should be running for the hills right about now.

Impressive Eyeglasses

For starters, the beefed-up horsepower in this tablet, compared to the earlier Nook Color, really counts. The duple-core 1GHz Texas Instruments OMAP 4 CPU and 1GB of RAM made switch apps a zephyr with no meantime or stuttering. Movies played swimmingly and stammer-free in Netflix, and the images looked gorgeous and crisp, with marvelous contrast.

The display looked dazzling overall, as predicted since it's the same as it was in Nook Color. Glare was minimal–a clear reference to Barnes &ere; Coroneted's VividView laminated and bonded IPS display. It was a pleasure to not accept a visible, annoying gap between the glass screen and the LCD beneath, as I've seen with literally the dozens of tablets I've tested before this nonpareil. I can't say glare is gone completely, but the conflict is very authorise when you have two devices side past side.

The tablet felt observably lighter than the Corner Color, even though the difference happening newspaper–1.7 ounces–doesn't seem same so much. Still, I could feel the difference when holding the tablet in one hand out, which is how I frequently finish upwards holding a tablet at some bespeak or another.

Navigating the Nook Tablet

With Corner Tablet, I liked how the Corner software evolved in keeping with the Corner Tablet's alignment into the more broad tablet universe. You can now access apps and Netflix viewing history and recommendations from the menage screen, a motivate that's some roomy and valid, given how Corner Tablet aims to embrace its full potential from the get-go this time. Nook Tablet is optimized around reading, something that's clear from the display, and clear from how you access your books and the visual presentation of periodicals.

The new Read and Record feature film in children's books was especially compelling, and worked very well when I proved information technology. I could create my own audio pass over to accompany a book, a feature film I could see as being appealing for families–especially those with a love who travels or is far off. I hope we'll construe with the mic incorporated into former applications. Unhappily, single of those applications bequeath not be video jaw, since B&N didn't include a front-facing photographic camera.

Where Are the Apps?

Piece Nook Tablet calls itself a pad of paper, it silence lacks more tablet features and access to the wide swath of apps on the Android Grocery. Apps motive to come in from B&N's own, growing app fund. Merely there is some upstanding in B&adenosine monophosphate;N's curated approach, though.

Through B&N's store, you'll acquire apps that are specifically tailored for use along a 7-inch tablet without a photographic camera OR GPS or phone, for instance. In practice, this is actually a pleasant switch-heavenward from the messy Mechanical man Market experience (hint, Google: Please fix the Commercialise), from which I've downloaded plenty of apps onto 7-inch tablets only to have them crash and force-close on me surgery non stretch properly to fit the pill's screen.

What Barnes & Dignifying Missed

Minimal brain damage in the basic features. Nook Pad of paper is lacking Bluetooth, stereo speakers, a GPS, and breast- and rear-facing cameras. Beyond the basic processing spectacles, those are the features that Nook Color omitted, and that Nook Tablet–now that IT's actually crossing into the territory of calling itself a tablet and trying to vie with tablets–should have added.

These all are underlying specs of dedicated competing tablets. Granted, some of the "value" contention lacks Google services and cameras, too, but Nook Tablet shouldn't be trying to vie with those tablets–its core spectacles are good enough for it to play in the big kids' sandbox, alongside Honeycomb 7-inch tablets from the likes of Samsung and Toshiba. Nook Pill would bandstand up major to the competition had is added the militant feature set.

I would have liked to see B&N step leading the display's resolution. I'm totally sold on B&N's secured and laminated VividView display's qualities, and I know B&N says it has done optimizations connected top of Android to improve text rendering but, in some fonts, I could still run across pixelation in the text. I prefer the smooth text interpretation of higher-resolution displays, such as those offered by Toshiba's 7" Thrive and T-Mobile's Point of departure, both of which induce stepped the resolution awake to 1280 aside 800 pixels.

While B&adenylic acid;N clearly lost a few opportunities to forge ahead of the pack, these omissions were trade-offs that were likely ready-made in the name of achieving the Corner Pad's attractive Leontyne Price. And attractive it is: At $249, the Nook Tablet is a veritable bargain compared with the Samsung Coltsfoot Tab 7 Plus (shipping now) and the Thrive 7" (shipping in Dec), some $399. (T-Mobile hasn't proclaimed pricng for the SpringBoard nevertheless).

In Video: Nook Takes on Fire

Stay keyed for our full-review of the Barnes & Noble Nook Tablet next week.

Source: https://www.pcworld.com/article/478036/first_impressions_nook_tablet_is_the_value_tablet_to_beat.html

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