This came from no where. HCL has launched 3 Android tablets in its ‘Me’ range. The tablets are priced between Rs. 14990 to Rs 32 990. Needless to mention which segments and existing tablets they were targeted against. This launch is probably the most comprehensive tablet launch by any company. There were one-off tablets by each company but none so far has launched three tablets at once. How good are these tablets is something to be seen, but HCL got its moves right in the burgeoning tablet market. Well almost. All the three tablets run Android Froyo operating system and we all know the real tablet OS from Android is the Honeycomb. I am not a big fan of launching tablet’s without the latest software. But that’s just me. Let’s see what we have here.
HCL Me AE7-A1
At a price of Rs. 14990, AE7-A1 comes with a 7-inch resistive touch screen, 800 MHz processor, 256 MB RAM and 2GB onboard storage. It has GPS, integrated camera and WiFi. The tablet isn’t 3G ready but can be extended with a USB dongle.
The specs look more like a smartphone and less like a tablet. At that price, can you really complain? Sure you can. You are paying a price for a product and there are some expectations from the product. If we leave that aside, we still got the resistive touch screen to deal with.
HCL Me AM7-A1
AM7-A1 runs the same 800 MHz processor as AE7-A1 under the hood. It has a 7-inch capacitive touch screen, 512 MB RAM, and 8GB internal storage. There’s a 1.3 megapixel camera in the front. The tablet is 3G ready and has WiFi onboard. GPS, HD video capabilities are other added attractions. AM7-A1 costs Rs. 22990 a pop.
Nothing to rant about, but the tablet can use a faster processor.
HCL Me AP10-A1
At Rs. 32990, HCL Me AP10-A1 is expensive. Just what do we get for that kind of money? You get a bigger screen (10-inch) and a faster processor (1 GHz). The internal memory is jacked up to 16 GB. 3G, WiFi and GPS are on board. If you are following this blog closely, you would guess what I would say about this one. There is iPad right around the corner and it doesn’t cost this much.
Vendor lock-in are not, as a user Apple products give the best experience. As a customer that is all you want. The only decent Android tablet in the market is Motorola Xoom and that costs Rs. 35000. So why settle for anything else?
