Vizio Tablet VTAB1008 Review: A Pleasant Surprise at a Value Price

Tv maker Vizio has usually adopted its individual course, and its very first foray into your growing tablet market isn't any exception. The company's awkwardly named Vizio 8?¡À Tablet with Wi-Fi (VTAB1008, $330 as of 9/23/2011) is the scarce tablet using an 8-inch exhibit, and it's on the list of number of to market place to eschew Google's Android 3.x Honeycomb operating technique for your older Android two.3. That said, this bulky tablet could possibly be a superb value alternative for all those who want to get yourself a taste of existence which has a tablet, but that have no grandiose expectations for high functionality or high design and style.

In certain methods, the Vizio tablet can be a refreshing surprise. The organization gives its own overlay on top of Android two.three which tends to make the interface feel refreshing and friendly?aand far more tablet acceptable. The business failed to do wholesale revisions of core applications, though, and so the Google Mail app feels clunky in contrast towards the multi-pane approach in Honeycomb, by way of example. Ditto to the Audio app. Oh, and also the Internet browser, whilst we're grousing. However the Applications Menu is much better presented than on stock Android 2.three, and overall, I liked what Vizio did far better than what I've witnessed using the HTC Sensation UI overlay about the HTC Flyer.

Vizio's unique sauce involves its rework of Android's notification technique to simplify their presentation; the widget board for aggregating all widgets in a single area (as an alternative of putting them on separate home screens, as will be the situation on other Android tablets); and providing a cleaner App Menu layout, with persistent tabs at the bottom for browser, market, e-mail, gallery, and songs.

The company states its interface customizations, noticed here because the software launcher (with all app and subsets of applications according to groups), notifications, along with the tab dock on the bottom, will be consistent with how its interface will search about the company's new Vizio World wide web Applications Plus platform HDTVs and Blu-ray people coming later in 2011 and outside of. The V.I.A Additionally platform will bring Android apps to your Television; the company states it will have long term solutions and merchandise that will tie in to the tablet and other V.I.A. In addition platform units together.

All round, though, I found the Vizio interface refresh satisfying. From your transforming orientation from the 3 capacitive touch buttons that run along the bottom in the screen?aregardless of no matter whether you maintain the tablet in portrait or landscape modes, for the well-designed lock screen and well-defined electricity button up best, the Vizio wasn't just one more value tablet.

Vizio's attention to interface prolonged towards the firm swapping the stock keyboard with the SwiftKey X keyboard. This extremely responsive keyboard helps make typing far more normal than together with the normal Android presenting, and customizations like two functions assigned to some crucial, as well as a split thumb-keyboard layout for use in landscape mode are convenient touches.
Inside the Vizio Tablet

Physically, the Vizio tablet looks chunky, and it feels that way, also. The tablet measures 6.six inches by 8.1 inches, and it can be 0.48 inches thick. It can be large offered its dimensions, too: 1.2-pounds, which feels as well heavy for one-handed-holding, and is also equivalent to what Samsung's slim Galaxy Tab ten.1, with its, natch, ten.1-inch show, weighs.

At this value, you do not get powerhouse elements. The organization isn't going to specify which processor it makes use of, but it does expose the tablet has a single-core 1GHz Marvell 600 Collection ARM CPU and 512MB of memory. The tablet achieves its comparatively very low $300 price by retaining built-in storage to a bare minimal: It comes with just 4GB of built-in storage. Which is 50 % the storage that includes Lenovo's upcoming IdeaPad A1, a 7-inch, $200 tablet with 8GB of storage. Even worse still, only 2GB of area is offered to end users around the Vizio Tablet, based on the firm. But at least the tablet includes a microSD Card slot for expanding the storage to approximately 32GB. Regrettably, the slot is hidden beneath a challenging plastic flap within the bottom left of the tablet (in portrait mode); you may want fingernails to pull the tight-fitting flap aside.

The front-facing digital camera is low-resolution, just 640 by 480 pixels, however it can capture 30-frame-per-second video. The Wi-Fi radio supports 802.11 b/g/n, and also the tablet has both micro HDMI and micro USB ports in the bottom.

Preloaded applications consist of ones for various Google companies including Android market place, Google Maps, YouTube, and Gmail, along with Barnes & Noble's Nook e-reader.

The tablet's display measures eight inches diagonally, making it an uncommon specimen in a sea of Android sameness. It packs in 1024 by 768-pixel resolution, which made for sharp text, though some fonts were far more prone to showing pixilation than others. Images looked okay, but didn't impress: My test images lacked detail and sharpness, and skin tones lacked normal browns.

1 point of distinction: The tablet includes a 4:three aspect ratio, like the Apple iPad 2 along with the now-discontinued HP TouchPad before it; most all other Android models are going for the 16:nine aspect ratio. Vizio notes that, as in comparison using a 7-inch tablet having a 16:nine aspect ratio, the extra 1 inch combined with the 4:three aspect ratio translates into about 30 percent more surface area for the display. The company also stated that, in its testing, Android two.3 applications optimized for phones can scale up greater into a 4:three aspect ratio than to your 16:nine.

I will say which the random apps, including games and news applications, I downloaded from Android Market place did seem to scale reasonably properly,--certainly far far better than this sort of apps typically fare on Honeycomb tablets with their 16:9 aspect ratio. Even though it really is difficult to recommend a tablet that's running an running system that isn't intended for tablet use, Vizio's implementation is fairly appealing, and at least this way, you are going to have a lot more applications to choose from today. That said, it is unclear how the coming release from the Android working system, dubbed Ice Cream Sandwich, will impact the long-term app story for your Vizio Tablet. At this writing, Vizio could not say regardless of whether the company will offer an update to Ice Cream Sandwich.
A Mixed Entertainer

Thanks to the built-in IR blaster and an included app, you can use that tablet as a universal remote. That's an unusual feature for now; only Sony offers this on its upcoming S1 tablet. It is a novel idea, but I discovered the Vizio remote app poorly designed. I liked that I could have setups for different rooms, but inputting my gear was a pain, the on-screen button positions were awkward(especially offered the measurement and weight with the tablet), and I did not have luck getting the database to cough up critical features for among my elements, a Pioneer DVD recorder (others worked fine, even though). Vizio says its app should cover 95 percent of residence entertainment products, but apparently, mine was not among them. Sony's remote control app, by comparison, was far greater designed in layout and configuration, and it recognized my device without a problem.

The tablet handles Adobe Flash playback. The YouTube videos I played tended to have macroblocking artifacts not seen on other tablets, however.

I liked Vizio's thoughtful use of 3 speakers for the audio; this is so that you get stereo (left/right) sound no matter how you hold the tablet. In landscape mode, the speakers in the upper left and right edges; in portrait, the two speakers are at top rated, porting upwards. This design allows for greater flexibility in how you use the tablet, and proved effective. I wish there were a way to use the third speaker to improve the audio, or even give a surround sound effect, but alas that is not an option. Still, audio sounded greater than it does on most Android three.x tablets; it still had some tinny qualities, nonetheless it was nonetheless tolerable--even enjoyable by comparison to most of what I've heard on tablets before it. Regardless of whether the credit goes to Vizio's use of SRS TruMedia, or to Android 2.3's player codec remains to be noticed.

The bottom line about the Vizio Tablet is that it is neither sleek nor cutting edge, nevertheless it is usable. The universal remote feature may not be the best implementation I've observed of this, however it is even now a compelling extra not identified on most from the competition. If you're constrained by budget, like the idea of a universal remote, and want a tablet yesterday, the Vizio tablet is worth a search. Like many things in daily life, this tablet is a compromise. How long you'll be satisfied will depend in large part on how Google handles Ice Cream Sandwich.