Googles Nexus 7 tablet discussion, reviews

[skyscraper101]

Nexus Q won't work without a paired Android device. i.e. won't work as a standalone device. I'm thinking of less reasons why I'd want one.

A Netgear NeoTV for $50 will do everything that this will do for videos (and can be controlled by an android phone), while a Nokia MD-310 for £28 will do audio directly via NFC or Bluetooth from a tablet or phone. Both for half the price of a Nexus Q. And neither require Android to work either.

Also, the Nexus Q kind of assumes your best speakers and your best TV are going to be in the same place around the house. I think they're onto a loser here unless they drastically drop the price.

 

[mrs quoad]

Not directly, but like the cheaper Android phones before it, people will realise that this cheap tablet will do almost everything an iPad can do for a fraction of the price. Well heeled users will still go for the iPad, but those further down the financial scale may look rather keenly at this budget offering.

It's a bit more complicated than that, though. Isn't it?

There already £99 tablets that can "do pretty much everything the iPad can do." I accidentally got morbidly hooked on a late night shopping channel yesterday, and they were selling a tablet of a kind for £99, emphasising how it could play films, zoom in on photos, and DL Android apps.

Reading between the lines of puff and flim flam, it sounded like a staggeringly shit buy.

But, still, it can "do almost everything an iPad can do for a fraction of the price." From that point on, it's pretty much slickness, power & polish. Isn't it?

The selling point will surely be "do almost everything an iPad can do for a fraction of the price," AND in a relatively competent / slick manner, under a major household brand name.

No?

 

[editor]

It's a bit more complicated than that, though. Isn't it?

There already £99 tablets that can "do pretty much everything the iPad can do." I accidentally got morbidly hooked on a late night shopping channel yesterday, and they were selling a tablet of a kind for £99, emphasising how it could play films, zoom in on photos, and DL Android apps.

Except they didn't contain a quad core CPU and come under the Google name.

 

[mrs quoad]

Except they didn't contain a quad core CPU and come under the Google name.

Which is why I posted the rest of that post, thereby making pretty much exactly that point

But, still, it can "do almost everything an iPad can do for a fraction of the price." From that point on, it's pretty much slickness, power & polish. Isn't it?

The selling point will surely be "do almost everything an iPad can do for a fraction of the price," AND in a relatively competent / slick manner, under a major household brand name.

No?

 

[Divisive Cotton]

I'm looking forward to reading the reviews.

Interestingly, the tablet has been manufactured in the US not China

 

[editor]

Which is why I posted the rest of that post, thereby making pretty much exactly that point

Which was my point in the first place!

 

[elbows]

Lets just conclude that by emphasising that slickness is very important for mobile touch-based devices, and that prior sub £150 tablets tended to blow goats on that front.

 

[elbows]

Anyway where were you when we needed you editor, did you watch the keynotes? It was like an apple event combined with an early prototype of developer-LSD.

 

[paolo]

Why am I forever waiting at bus stops in London then, with the countdown saying my bus is 'due' when it's clearly nowhere to be seen

They work fine for me ??

I also use the text service. There's an ID on every bus stop. Text the ID, and you get the full list back, rather than waiting for the scrolling (or not having info at all, on the more 'remote' stops).

 

[elbows]

The bus driver is tracking skyscraper101 and veers off in a different direction if his GPS signal shows up

 

[mrs quoad]

Which was my point in the first place!

Ok; that wasn't the point you made in the post I quoted. I must've missed an earlier post or three

 

[skyscraper101]

They work fine for me ??

I also use the text service. There's an ID on every bus stop. Text the ID, and you get the full list back, rather than waiting for the scrolling (or not having info at all, on the more 'remote' stops).

I never knew about this texting lark. Do they advertise that? All I know is I've waited at bus stops on numerous occasions looking at the countdown where its saying the bus is 'due' and then it's taken ages to turn up. I don't trust it at all.

I'd rather there was an app which could actually pinpoint where the bus you want is, based on its actual GPS location. Does this exist? Preferably on a google style map, with little bus icons to show you where it is on the road, rather than a haphazard countdown facility guessing how many minutes it will take to get to you based on a factor of distance alone. I'm not interested in a system that just keeps saying '2 minutes' for a ten minute period, if the bus is technically 2 minutes away, but not moving.

 

[UnderOpenSky]

But they were never likely to go for Apple in the first place. So what will change is that they will end up with a cheap tablet thats actually good, as opposed to now where I've seen people at work spend £100 on a load of rubbish and then regret it, but still not be in the market for an iPad.

Mind you I shouldn't assume too much about Apple not caring about the lower end of the market, since eventually they will end up with a growth problem.

There already £99 tablets that can "do pretty much everything the iPad can do." I accidentally got morbidly hooked on a late night shopping channel yesterday, and they were selling a tablet of a kind for £99, emphasising how it could play films, zoom in on photos, and DL Android apps.

Reading between the lines of puff and flim flam, it sounded like a staggeringly shit buy.

But, still, it can "do almost everything an iPad can do for a fraction of the price." From that point on, it's pretty much slickness, power & polish. Isn't it?

The selling point will surely be "do almost everything an iPad can do for a fraction of the price," AND in a relatively competent / slick manner, under a major household brand name.

No?

This is why I don't own a tablet. I don't want or need something like an ipad, I want a low cost, smaller device, that does it's basic functions well. Browsing the web, checking email and playing films isn't state of the art, but they are such basic functions, I want them done well even on a budget device or I'm not going to bother.

If Google can put together all the basic things I use my smartphone for on a bigger, but still quite portable screen for sub £200 I'm sold.

 

[elbows]

As long as you don't need too much storage then I think this is the device for you.

 

[Kid_Eternity]

I'm looking forward to reading the reviews.

Interestingly, the tablet has been manufactured in the US not China

It was? Thought that was the Q that was made in the States?

 

[Kid_Eternity]

I never knew about this texting lark. Do they advertise that? All I know is I've waited at bus stops on numerous occasions looking at the countdown where its saying the bus is 'due' and then it's taken ages to turn up. I don't trust it at all.

I'd rather there was an app which could actually pinpoint where the bus you want is, based on its actual GPS location. Does this exist? Preferably on a google style map, with little bus icons to show you where it is on the road, rather than a haphazard countdown facility guessing how many minutes it will take to get to you based on a factor of distance alone. I'm not interested in a system that just keeps saying '2 minutes' for a ten minute period, if the bus is technically 2 minutes away, but not moving.

I use this great iOS app called Bus Tracker which shows all the routes in London and their due times. Very useful app which also has a built alert system that will ping you when you're near your stop.

 

[UnderOpenSky]

I guess an SD slot would be the out the question?

 

[Kid_Eternity]

It doesn't have one.

 

[skyscraper101]

Dropbox or similar will be a necessity in this respect.

 

[Kid_Eternity]

Dropbox or similar will be a necessity in this respect.

Yup, this is more a cloud/streaming device over wifi than a take all your media with you device.

 

[skyscraper101]

I use this great iOS app called Bus Tracker which shows all the routes in London and their due times. Very useful app which also has a built alert system that will ping you when you're near your stop.

Due times is one thing. Where the bus is though, would be more useful. I'm yet to learn of an app which will pinpoint where the bus you want is on the map. Does one exist?

 

[Kid_Eternity]

Due times is one thing. Where the bus is though, would be more useful. I'm yet to learn of an app which will pinpoint where the bus you want is on the map. Does one exist?

Hmmm not exactly sure, last time I spoke with someone about this that data wasn't available for app makers to scrape and wrap for users...wouldn't surprise me if it is now though.

 

[skyscraper101]

Hmmm not exactly sure, last time I spoke with someone about this that data wasn't available for app makers to scrape and wrap for users...wouldn't surprise me if it is now though.

It's such a simple thing though that desperately needs inventing. Central London is a place where you could quite reasonably decide to walk somewhere instead of waiting for a bus. If you decide to wait for the bus on account of it being 5 minutes away (measured by distance on a good day) and end up waiting 30 minutes (because of traffic), that would definitely be a situation where a walk might've been better.

If they would utilise the GPS data, which is obviously there, to just display each bus as a moving pinpoint on a map, then we'd all be much clearer about what to do.

To give another example... when I'm in London, I often have to get to Ladbroke Grove from Shepherds Bush. There's three buses I could take. Two of them go from one stop, the other goes from another. If I had an app which would show me where each of these buses was on a map before I had to make a decision, I could be better informed about which bus stop to wait at. Due times are entirely theoretical really.

I wouldn't be surprised if TFL withheld that info on account of it losing them money from people deciding to walk instead of catching the bus tbh

</thread derail>

 

[editor]

Interesting article comparing the pros and cons of Google Nexus 7 vs iPad 3 vs Kindle Fire.

Pretty much agree with this:

There's more to the Nexus than just mimicking Amazon, however, and the Nexus is a very capable and very desirable tablet in its own right: where Amazon's emphasis is almost entirely on selling Amazon content, the Nexus wants to be your sat-nav system, your gaming device and your work machine too.

If Amazon doesn't hurry up and offer the Kindle Fire internationally, the Nexus is going to steal all its potential customers.
We can imagine some prospective iPad shoppers going for a Nexus too: it's much, much more polished than similarly-sized Android tablets, and Google's clearly put an enormous amount of effort into making it as effortless and welcoming as possible.

The killer feature here, of course, is the price: Google's offering what appears to be a premium product for the sort of money you'd pay for a no-name Chinese cheapie. If it's as good as it looks, it's going to sell by the truckload.

http://www.techradar.com/news/mobil...ogle-nexus-7-vs-ipad-3-vs-kindle-fire-1087197

 

[elbows]

Its certainly not going to help the RT version of Windows 8 tablets to get a good share of the market quickly either. Shouldn't affect their Pro lineup much though.

 

[contadino]

I guess an SD slot would be the out the question?

I bought a 7-inch tablet this week that does all that, with an SD slot and Android 4. It's not a branded gadget, but it cost me £80 and seems pretty solid. My price ceiling was £100. This Nexus has a higher screen resolution, but it's still out of my price range.

I reckon it'll sell like hot cakes, though. The Kindle Fire is already dead in the water in Europe as far as I can see.

 

[Sunray]

Due times is one thing. Where the bus is though, would be more useful. I'm yet to learn of an app which will pinpoint where the bus you want is on the map. Does one exist?

The bus's times are now practically second perfect. You can text tfl with the bus top ID and it will tell you the times even if it doesn't have a sign and they are spot on. Whats the difference?

 

[maldwyn]

The bus's times are now practically second perfect. You can text tfl with the bus top ID and it will tell you the times even if it doesn't have a sign and they are spot on. Whats the difference?

Simply add
http://m.countdown.tfl.gov.uk/
as a link on your mobile's home screen and bypass the text charges

 

[RaverDrew]

Biggest drawback for me is no 3g. For a device that I'd use mostly when I'm web browsing out and about, it seems crippled to not have such a feature. Having to constantly pair it, and un-pair it to my phone is a right faff, and why the fuck would I want to drain the battery of two devices ? I'd rather just buy a Galaxy Note.

 

[Crispy]

Due times are entirely theoretical really.

Well, they're not. They're updated in real-time depending on the position and speed of the bus, and other buses on the same route. The system knows how far away the bus is, and works out how long it should take to get there, based on how long other buses have taken to make the same journey recently. The best it can manage is to within a minute or two. I don't think you or I would be any better at making that judgment if we had the location data.

Fascinating stuff

The Nexus Q is terrible. 3x the cost of Apple's equivalent, and doesn't even work standalone.