Acer Iconia One 7 Review

I have often regarded tablets as very unnecessary devices, bridging a gap between smartphones and ultrabooks. Especially with phone sizes increasing every year, tablets seem absolutely useless. They aren’t as productive as an ultrabook with a proper keyboard, and aren’t as portable as smartphones. However, there was a Yes roadshow at UTHM Johor and I was intrigued with the plan which bundles a tablet along with the plan. On an impulse, I bit the bullet and got the Acer Iconia One 7 along with my Yes4G internet plan. So without further ado let’s get into the details of the tablet.

Specifications

First off I would like to complain about the current habit of every other manufacturer naming their device “One”. It used to be only HTC One series but now there is the OnePlus One, Acer Iconia One… I wonder what else will carry the One branding later on. Anyway, let’s get the numbers out of the equation first. Here is a short list of the specs that should matter most to users.

Design

It’s a tablet. Nothing really sets it apart from the massive flood of tablets from China. But then, let’s have a look at the part most users will ever see in daily use, the screen. And trust me, it’s a pretty good one. At 216ppi, I can barely see the pixels unless I really look closely at it, from a distance where it’s hard to see the entire display. Viewing angles are good as well, but due to the fact that it isn’t a gapless screen, from extreme angles you may notice a bit of blurring of the display. The glass is sans an oleo-phobic coating and fingerprints and smudges need a bit of vigorous wiping to remove them. And oh, BEZELS GALORE. Actually it feels kinda awkward to hold due to the width of the tablet when held in portrait mode. The rather hefty weight of 320g doesn’t make it any easier to handle either. On the upside, you can grip the bezels instead of trying to stretch your hand across the back, which proved to be quite a challenge for me. And I am no midget in case you were wondering. I am 183cm tall and 74kg light.

The back has a knobbly pattern to improve grip. However it is just plain plastic and too smooth to provide any real advantage for gripping the tablet. It still is better than a glossy back though. Points given for not forcing me to wipe the back every time I touch it. You also have the absolutely amazing 2MP camera that shoots photos I am too shy to upload on this page. On a serious note, the camera sucks. No autofocus and poor quality lens make it an useless addition to this tablet.

There is also dual speakers (note it’s dual, not stereo) on the back. Rather loud but the sound quality is mediocre at best.

Along the right edge of the tablet, there is power button, volume buttons and a microSD slot. Buttons feel tactile and doesn’t wobble or wiggle. The volume buttons have a weird configuration where volume up or down is determined by the orientation of the tablet. For example if you rotate the tablet 90° to the left, the button that normally functions as volume down in normal portrait mode would now act as the volume up button. It’s disconcerting and serves to only confuse the user. The maximum capacity supported by that microSD is unknown. It’s not even stated on their official product page.

And this is all the connectivity you get. A microUSB slot and a 3.5mm jack. It supports USB OTG so you can connect your pendrives to the tablet with an adapter. The 3.5mm jack is one of the worst I ever heard. Whenever you touch the screen there is a static noise emitted through the earphones. Bad shielding I guess. It doesn’t really detract from your music listening experience unless you listen to quiet tracks.

Performance

It rarely ever lags down and I actually did quite a lot of surfing on this tablet to test it. I haven’t had the luxury of fast internet and unlimited quota to download more intense game like Asphalt 8 to test the gaming performance of this tablet. I did however download Antutu to benchmark this tablet and see where it stands against the top dogs of Android.

Well I guess it isn’t a speed demon. However, it does its job very smoothly and I think that is very good already. Benchmarks doesn’t mean anything except as a measurement of e-peen. It’s fast enough for me to do everything I want to.

Battery lasts more than a day with me using it to plan my class timetable, surf, watch The Fault in Our Stars and also play COC.

Software

Acer did quite a good job with the UI by leaving it alone. But it did throw in quite a lot of bloatware that can’t be uninstalled. Yes threw in the YesLife app, and Acer threw in a gazillion and a half of their apps which works by linking the tablet and any Acer computer to the cloud.

I wasn’t joking when I said a gazillion and a half. Look at all of these apps! And I actually can’t use most of these apps without connecting to the cloud. An example was the Acer Music app which doesn’t read the device memory for songs. It only loads the songs from the cloud storage. Like who uploads their own songs to the cloud? Memory cards exist for a reason. Duhhh.

Conclusion

Humongous bezels, loads of bloatware, so-so performance. Would I recommend this tablet? Barely. But because it’s bundled with the Yes plan, I would actually give it a pass and say it’s okay. But I would not buy this tablet by itself. However you already know I am biased against tablets anyway. :P It’s saving grace is it’s wonderful screen though. Perfect for watching movies on the go. I do not think it’s deserving of a Pokde award though. Sorry Acer.

Pros:
+ Non-glossy back
+ Wide viewing angles
+ Runs Android KitKat 4.4.2
+ Close to stock Android UI

Cons:
– Massive bezels
– Plastic back feels plasticky
– No oleo-phobic coating
– Average performance
– Gazillion and a half of bloatware