Acer have just announced the world’s first Chrome OS tablet – the Chromebook Tab 10. And while a conference environment can’t provide a definitive user experience, so far I’m not overly impressed.
Armed with a stylus, the Tab 10 is being hard sold as a competitor to Apple in the classroom market. It’s targeting both teachers and student, and this is definitely a good thing. But I just don’t know how decent the tablet itself is.
Being a touch-only machine, there is no home button. And while this may not bother some people, I don’t particularly like this lack of functionality. I shouldn’t have to exit an app to go back to the home screen.
I also found the touchscreen to be sluggish at times, particularly when scrolling down a page without the stylus.
It’s not without its redeeming features though. As a tablet aimed at schools, I appreciate the USB-C port, microSD slot and headphone jack. Not to mention the AR integration.
The Google Play store is also supported, so kids will absolutely be able to play Fortnite under the table during class.
I also can’t deny that the display does look nice. But for me personally, if it doesn’t function in a convenient way I couldn’t care less about how pretty it looks. And so far, I’m going to need some convincing.
Here’s the spec dump for you:
- 9.7-inch 2048 x 1536 IPS touchscreen
- 2Ghz Rockchip processor
- 4GB memory
- 32GB eMMC storage
- 5MP rear/2MP front cameras
- 9 hour battery life
There’s still a question mark over Australian pricing and availability but it will be selling in the U.S for $US329. For what you’re getting, that’s not bad. And in all fairness, it’s probably priced to try and undercut Apple.
We’ll have to wait and see what kind of markup we cop for being all the way over here.
The author attended Next@Acer as a guest of Acer.