Acer Iconia Tab A200

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The Acer Iconia Tab A200 is Acer's latest 10.1" Android tablet, and it's very affordable at $349 for the 16 gig model and $329 for the 8 gig version. In fact, we're pretty impressed at what you get for the price: a sharp and colorful 1280 x 800 capacitive touch screen, a dual core 1GHz Nvidia Tegra 2 CPU, a gig of RAM and 16 gigs of storage (in the more commonly available 16 version that we recommend). Basically, you get a 2011 Android 10" tablet with a full set of features at a low price for 2012. The tablet ships with Android OS 3.2 Honeycomb but Acer promises a mid-February upgrade to OS 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich (there's a sticker on the box stating it's ICS upgradable).

Since 80% of Americans are still tablet-less, there's definitely a place for the Iconia Tab A200. Many of you are new to tablets and aren't sure that you want to spend $500 or more, or maybe you've got a tight budget. If that's you, do check out the A200 since it offers a lot of bang for the buck. This is a full-featured WiFi only tablet with single band WiFi 802.11b/g/n, Bluetooth 2.1 + EDR and a GPS (that works). It has the full suite of Google apps including the Android Market, Maps, Navigation, YouTube and Google Talk. It compares well against lesser or no-name brands that cut corners by using grainy resistive displays, run old versions of Android meant for phones or lack access to the Android Market.

The A200 is a slightly slimmer and lighter version of the Acer Iconia Tab A500, and to our eye the display has improved. Video playback performance of MPEG4 content is most definitely improved, as you'll see in our video review. And you get that Acer special touch: a full size USB host port that works with USB peripherals including keyboards, mice, game controllers, flash drives and external hard drives (NTFS too!). Only Acer and Toshiba offer built-in full USB ports: some other Android tablets have micro USB ports that are compatible with USB host adapters like Acer Aspire 1200 Adapter, Acer Aspire 1680 Adapter, Acer Aspire 1690 Adapter, Acer Aspire 1600 Adapter, Acer TravelMate 2100 Adapter, Acer TravelMate 290 Adapter, Acer TravelMate 4000 Adapter, Acer Extensa 2000 Adapter, Acer Extensa 6600 Adapter, Acer Ferrari 1100 Adapter, and the Asus Transformer tablets have a full size USB port in the $149 keyboard dock that's sold separately. Acer does a nice job of adding USB driver support to the OS and external storage items like videos and photos appear in Gallery, while music appears in the Music app (if you have a large drive with lots of files this can take a minute or two). There's also a microSD card slot, so storage possibilities are good here.

What's missing from last year's Iconia A500 that launched at $449? There's no rear camera and no HDMI port. There's a good 2 megapixel front camera that works well with Skype and Google Talk video chat, but no rear shooter. There's also no HDMI port, so you'll have to rely on DLNA wireless streaming to get the tablet's contents to play on your (WiFi-equipped) TV.

What do more expensive Android tablets have that the A200 doesn't? Tablets like the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 and Asus Eee Pad Transformer Prime are thinner and lighter at 0.33" thick and 1.3 pounds. Most other name brand Android tablets have a rear camera and micro HDMI ports (the Samsung doesn't, but Samsung sells an adapter that adds HDMI). While we expect 2012 tablets to run on newer CPUs, the Acer Iconia Tab A200 sticks with the pervasive and pretty decent 1GHz dual core Nvidia Tegra 2 with GeForce hardware graphics acceleration.

If you already own a 10" Android Honeycomb that's promised an upgrade to Ice Cream Sandwich, the Acer A200 offers nothing new or better. If you want the latest and greatest hardware, the A200 isn't for you. The Asus Eee Pad Transformer Prime with its quad core Tegra 3 CPU, and upcoming tablets from Lenovo and others offer newer generation dual core CPUs with faster clock speeds. But for everyday use that includes web, email, Netflix, YouTube and Office files, you probably won't notice the difference.