As many of you know, I picked up a Motorola Xoom from Verizon last Thursday. It runs the latest version of Google’s Android Operating system, version 3.0, known as “Honeycomb”. The timing worked out well, because I had my wisdom teeth taken out Friday morning and was laid up in the recliner all day with the Xoom at my side. A netbook or phone would have worked in that case as well, but a tablet works so much better.
So what do I think?
For starters, I love it, but it’s not perfect. There are a few missing pieces that will be fixed in future updates — sd card, Flash, 4G support — and a variety of minor bugs. The biggest problem at this point is a lack of tablet-focused apps. It handles the Android phone apps quite well, but there’s a big difference between a scaled up phone app and a native tablet app. The Xoom handles phone apps better than the iPad does, but the iPad has about zillion iPad-specific apps, making it the clear winner in that category.
Video Review
Here’s a quick video to show you around the system:
Battery Life
While I’m sure there will be some official tests, but Friday gave me a chance to give it a good run for its money. Laying in the recliner all day, the Xoom was on my lap about 90% of the time, and running about 75% of the time. After 10 hours of email, browsing, various apps, watching some videos and doing some video chat, the battery was down to 36%. That seems pretty good to me!
Compared to the iPad?
The Xoom is better than the existing iPad in almost every way — larger screen, higher resolution, faster processor, dual cameras, more memory, etc. However, the iPad 2 is set to be unveiled on Wednesday and will probably knock down a few of those, though they don’t have a release date set for it. I’m thinking it’ll probably be a few months before it comes out, but we’ll find out soon. At that point, the Xoom should have sd card and Flash support, and many more apps will have been written to take advantage of the tablet format. The battle between the iPad and the various Honeycomb tablets should be fun to watch, and we’ll all benefit from the added features that both sides develop.
Should I buy one?
For most people I’d at least wait two more days to see what the iPad 2 has to offer. I’m expecting that I’ll continue to suggest Honeycomb/Xoom as the tablet to get, but you never know what Apple might come up with. Much like my initial reasons for switching from the iPhone to the Nexus One, email is one of the top criteria. The iPad email is certainly solid, but if you use Gmail it’s a much better experience in Honeycomb.
Do you have a tablet yet? Looking to buy one soon? Leave a comment and share your thoughts!
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Mickey,
I liked the candid review. Its nice to hear an actual customer review that is using it in a real world application. I am looking forward to getting mine soon also.
Hope you are feeling better after taking the wisdom teeth out.
Thanks — I’m feeling pretty good, as long as I don’t try to eat much.
Looking forward to some good food later in the week.
Are you getting a Xoom soon?
I would really like a good 7″ tablet with a good spec. and reasonable (!?) cost. Good review though.
Geoff — I expect we’ll see some coming out pretty soon. The Samsung Tab was a great form factor, but Android 2.2 just wasn’t made for tablets. An updated version of those with Honeycomb and a bit more power could be pretty sweet.
how does this tablet work for presentations (PP and Adobe), seriel port for interface?
Bryan — I haven’t tried yet. While it can’t run Powerpoint, Google Docs should be able to push a decent presentation through it. Not sure what you mean by “Adobe”, though — PDF, Photoshop, something else?
For interface, it has HDMI out. Virtually any newer TV or projector could handle that, so that aspect would work well.
Mickey:
thanks. Looking for a tablet that does work apps well, as well “phone” apps. Curious on what programs are available (or will be) for the Android system on the new tablets (yet to be released). What about the HP tablet that was announced? Hard to determine what will be the best “all ’round” tablet for work/play? or am i expecting to much?
The best tablet for “play”, at least for the next few years, is likely the iPad simply due to the vast number of games available on it.
I was more interested in this one because of the tight integration with Google applications like Gmail.
For presentations, I use Prezi almost all the time. I think they have an iPad app, but nothing for Android yet. An Android Prezi app, combined with HDMI out, would be perfect! We’ll see if it ever happens.
While it has some issues, you might want to look at the Notion Ink Adam.
I stongly considered it for a while, but they took too long to ship. Still, that Pixel Qi screen would be very nice to have on the Xoom.
7″ Xoom maybe?
http://www.alltouchtablet.com/flash/motorola-might-build-a-7-inch-version-of-xoom-by-end-year-7158/?utm_source=feedburner+RSS&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+TouchScreenTablet+%28The+Touch+Screen+Tablet+website%29&utm_content=Yahoo%21+Mail
Mickey,
I am going to be buying a tablet soon, and it will either be an Ipad 2 or the Xoom. But you see, I already have a DroidX phone, so the deciding factor for me, since I have invested a lot of money on my Droid apps, will I be able to use those apps I have already bought on the market, on a Xoom as well, or will I have to re-purchase them? I thought you might know, because I can’t seem to find a clear answer. Thanks.
Yep, you can get them all again for free (I just double-checked).
However, I wouldn’t put too much stock into that aspect of things. For most people, “a lot” of apps would be maybe $50 worth. When you’re buying a $500+ tablet, the $50 worth of apps should be a pretty low consideration.