Got my Android Tablet!

Well, this past Thursday I finally bought an Android Tablet.  I chose the Acer Iconia A500.  Best Buy currently carries the A500 for $449.99 U.S.  It rocks the Android 3.0 'Honeycomb' out of the box.  And let me say, it is pretty freakin' sweet.

This isn't a comprehensive review by any means, but I'll quickly hit the highlights.  This tablet is sporting a NVIDIA Tegra 2 Dual Core mobile processor and 1GB DDR2 memory.  The A500 is a wifi only tablet, so no need to add it to your mobile carrier's data plan.  With public wifi being so readily available these days here in my area I don't have much of a need for a 3G connection at this time (this is subject to change).  This device also offers Bluetooth, A-GPS, 802.11 b/g/n WLAN, HDMI, Dual Speakers (with Dolby), MicroSD card slot, 16GB of internal storage, front facing and rear facing cameras.

The unit is slick to use and very impressive.  A lot of people have mentioned on other sites that this tablet is pretty heavy.  Personally, I don't have a bit of an issue with it's weight.  I had noticed that the battery life seemed to dwindle down fairly quickly.  After doing a little snooping around the devices settings menu I found the 'Battery Use' sub-menu which pointed to the 'Cell Standby' process as using a lot of my expended battery power.  After a few minutes of snooping around forums online, I found the simplest fix that has worked for me (without downloading an app from the Google Market).

I simply put the device in 'Airplane' mode and leave it in airplane mode while then activating the Wifi connection.  Wifi will stay turned on and the device will remain in airplane mode as well.  After doing this I have noticed a huge difference in battery life for the better.

The only other issue I have is voice chat is pretty limited at this time.  My wife has an HTC Evo 4G and occasionally  we'll use something like Yahoo IM to do a video chat from my PC to her Evo.  Which works great.  Right now due to limitations on the Evo (running Froyo) Google Talk's videochat is non-existant.  Supposedly the Evo is in line a the update for Gingerbread later in June which should alleviate this issue.  Honeycomb optimized apps are at a premium right now due to the fact that there just aren't that many apps optimized for Honeycomb.  However, most of the other apps I have tried have worked flawlessly.

Now that I am getting pretty familiar with Honeycomb, look for a few reviews to show up pretty soon.  Right now I am playing through Cordy, and have several other games in mind too.  So check back soon.

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Tidbits: Battery Lifesavers, The Governator, and a New Resident Evil Game?

This morning I stumbled upon a pretty good article about the HTC Thunderbolt Android based phone.  Do I have a Thunderbolt?  No, am I getting one?  No.  But my wife uses the HTC Evo, and as of late she has really been complaining about her battery life.  I found she had turned her screen brightness all the way up.  Which of course, was the kiss of death for her battery life (plus she lives on the phone causing even shorter battery life).  So, I forwarded her the link to this article and figured why not post the link here as well.  So if you have an Android based smartphone give this a quick read:
http://www.zdnet.com/blog/btl/five-battery-life-savers-for-htc-thunderbolt-and-other-androids/46747

On another note, Mr. Arnold Schwarzenegger has a new role.  Teamed with Stan Lee, he is now "The Governator".  That's right.  He has been transformed from action star, to politician, and now the only sensible thing for him to become is a superhero.  The stort takes place after Arnold leaves political office, he becomes a superhero to fight crime.  It will be semi-fictional; using details from his real life to establish the character.  Look for it in your comic book store next year.
http://www.tvguide.com/News/Arnold-Schwarzenegger-Comic-1031268.aspx

Lastly, guess what...Another Resident Evil game is making it's way to gamer's consoles.  The new title is called "Resident Evil: Operation Raccoon City".  Not much is known about the title other than it is a co-op shooter and player's now take on the role of Umbrella Security Services instead of the B.S.A.A. or the original S.T.A.R.S. teams.  Honestly, I loved the original Resident Evil titles.  For me the series started losing ground later in it's life.  But this could honestly be a neat experience.
For more details on the game, head over to: http://stickskills.com/news/1556/first-details-on-resident-evil-operation-raccoon-city-unveiled/

And for a look at the teaser trailer, see below:




Happy Surfing!

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