Acer Iconia A510 review
It says a lot about a Acer Iconia A510 that a many immediately important thing about it is an Olympic trademark on a behind of a casing, promotion a fact that Acer designed this inscription to applaud a partnership with a 2012 Olympic games. Needless to say, this doesn’t have an awful lot of temperament on a tangible device. There’s a rather irritating sports-themed video that pops adult when we foot a inscription and whenever we leave it alone for some-more than a minute. There’s hearing entrance to a new Eurosport Player app with giveaway coverage of a games and 6 Olympic wallpapers, and we competence use it to run Olympic apps or catch-up with a day’s events on BBC iPlayer and a ITV Player. Otherwise, however, a connectors are flattering tenuous.
The earthy pattern is stylish enough, though not utterly inspiring. At 11mm thick and weighing in during 680g it’s not accurately super-slim or super-light, and while a black support and seamless potion front are all unequivocally iPad, a china plastics on a behind feel a whole lot cheaper. It’s a ideally strong inscription and unequivocally gentle to reason in possibly mural or landscape orientation, though if you’re looking for a ‘wow’ means you’re not going to find it here.
Screen and Sound
The TFT shade carries on a ‘middle of a road’ theme. The 10.1in distance is still a one to go for if you’re looking for a inscription that can cope with capability applications as good as calm expenditure and games, though a 1,280 x 800 fortitude is totally bog-standard, and picture peculiarity is good rather than great. Brightness levels are adequate and colours demeanour good and natural, though a shade hasn’t got a punch or clarity of a arrangement on a Motorola Xoom 2 or Samsung Galaxy Tab 2 10.1, let alone a iPad 3’s strong Retina display.
There’s improved news when it comes to sound. The Iconia A510 incorporates Dolby Mobile technology, and while a sound from a built-in stereo speakers bears some of a hallmarks of inscription sound – a skinny low-end, a skinny mid-range and a bent to crush with a volume whacked right adult – with a volume during middle levels there’s some-more physique and clarity than we competence expect. This creates all a disproportion when you’re personification games or examination movies, assisting to recompense for a rather normal screen.
Connectivity
Connectivity is rather disappointing. The A510 has an HDMI outlay and there’s a MicroSD label container underneath a strap on a right, though no USB ports and usually a singular micro USB tie during a bottom, that doubles as a energy socket. Annoyingly, we can’t indeed assign a A510 regulating a customary micro USB wire – usually a horse can supply a compulsory volume of extract – so there’s no choice to cut down on chargers and cables when you’re travelling. The A510 comes versed with a inexhaustible 32GB of peep storage, so we competence not need a MicroSD label container true away, though it’s good to know that we can now double a ability if needs be.
Software
Like many stream tablets, a Iconia A510 is using Android 4.0.3 Ice Cream Sandwich, and while there are unaccepted ports of Android 4.1 Jelly Bean for Iconia tablets, Acer has nonetheless to make an central announcement. This isn’t a disaster. While Jelly Bean’s tweaks and Butter optimisations make it an even improved inscription OS, Ice Cream Sandwich is still a unequivocally good one, attack a good change between power, ease-of-use and customisation.
What’s more, Acer hasn’t overloaded a Iconia A510 with indeterminate apps and interface enhancements. There is a round menu, launched from a notifications bar, with app shortcuts, volume controls and Internet bookmarks, though you’re not in any approach forced to use this, and a pre-installed apps cover useful functions, like portion media from a inscription to other inclination on a same network, or streaming media a other approach around. A protected duplicate of Polaris Office is bundled in, along with a easily charcterised eBook reader, LumiRead, a Zinio repository app and a Zen Pinball and Solitaire games to keep we bustling on a move. LumiRead supports books with Adobe DRM, so it’s not singular to a tiny preference accessible on a built-in book store.
Cameras
The Iconia A510 has a rear-facing 5-megapixel camera and a front-facing 1-megapixel camera. Stills have some-more fact than from some other inscription cameras, though colours seem a bit flat, and video, while 1080p, is likewise disappointing. I’ve nonetheless to accommodate anyone who takes snaps with a tablet, and a A510 doesn’t unequivocally inspire we to do so, utterly as opening worsens in low-light. Still, for apps that use a camera or video chat, a picture peculiarity from a built-in snappers will substantially be good enough.
Usability and Performance
The A510 competence not have a brightest or sharpest screen, though it’s ideally responsive. Typing with a default Android keyboard doesn’t poise any challenge, and multi-touch gestures and controls work about as good as they do on any other Android inscription we’ve tried. If you’re looking for a inscription to crop a Web or understanding with email on a move, it’s some-more than adult to a job.
However, a A510 can also do so many some-more than that. It has a 1.4GHz various of a Tegra 3 chipset along with 1GB of RAM, and even cutting-edge games like Madfinger’s considerable zombie-blaster, Dead Trigger, run uniformly and though a hitch. The Acer took 1952.3ms to finish a SunSpider JavaScript exam and managed a Geekbench measure of 1588, that is allied with other high-end tablets. When we cruise that this is a comparatively inexpensive 10.1in tablet, you’re removing a lot of opening for your cash. The one downside is that a section gets utterly prohibited on a back towards a right palm side when it’s being pushed tough – not adequate to means any genuine discomfort, though adequate to notice.
Battery Life
If a Tegra 3 is a A510’s initial tip weapon, afterwards a second is battery life. Acer proudly quotes 15 hours in a marketing, and we’d guess that we got around 10 hours of video playback, complete gaming, web browsing and ubiquitous use out of it before it demanded a recharge. That competence not put it utterly adult there with a iPad 3, though it’s positively close, and it’s around what you’d pattern from a heading – and some-more costly – Android tablets.
Verdict
The Iconia A510 competence have Olympic branding, though it’s not an unmitigated champion. The pattern is unexciting, a shade is normal and it lacks a reward demeanour and feel of a heading Android models or a iPad 3. However, means in a prolonged battery life and a glorious opening and a A510 is still a good deal. For underneath £350 you’re removing a inscription that will final for over 10 hours and run a many complete Android games – with 32GB of storage space to boot.
As a result, while a A510 competence not be anyone’s dream tablet, it’s a plain concede for those of us who don’t have a additional income for a Transformer Prime or iPad 3.
