[JMG181]

Hey all, I'm looking for some help deciding on what to get (or to wait).Here's my situation - I have a moto droid, love it. I have a hybrid laptop (TM-2), love it. While I use both extensively, neither is really all that good for reading ebooks. The droid gets about a paragraph of text before I have to flip the "page", and the laptop gets heavy to carry during extensive reading sessions.So, I need an inbetween device until I can upgrade late next year to a bigger cell. Primary concerns:

• 5"-8" Display, good enough res to have smooth looking text
• Good battery life. This is the kind of thing I'd and chill out with for a few hours, and I don't want to worry about finding an outlet.
• Wifi
• For apps, I want Wordplayer on there. I use calibre, and this is tops with calibre.
• I'd love it if I could get Adobe Reader - are there any 2.1+ devices out there?
• Cheap - the usable life on this device is about a year. Pricey is not worth my time.

Secondary thoughts - when this outlives its usefulness in a year or so, I may toy around with it in other ways. So...

• hackable is a plus - I wouldn't mind being able to toss a custom rom on there.
• Google app friendly - would be a nice thing for viewing emails/browsing the web/etc on a whim.
• Bluetooth - I use bluetooth stereo headphones, so bluetooth is a plus.

If there is something that meets all needs, I'll buy it today. If theres one that will meet my needs and is supposed to be out within the month, I can wait - but not too long.Thoughts? TIA

 

[Guest]

See my previous posts for my recommendations for the aPad.Few other things to note:- most cheap tablets are Android 1.5 / 1.6- battery life in them is almost universally poor (anywhere between 2 and 4.5 hours is what I see most of the time- they almost always have Wifi- how cheap is cheap? the cheapest one I would recommend would be a Eken M001 which is about $100 shipped from dealextreme.com- the M001 and the aPad are two tablets with a handful of custom "ROM" firmwares for them- they're all (I think) compatible with Google Apps, but Market is hit and miss with some, usually requiring custom ROMs for access- some devices (not all) have USB so you could (pending ROM support) use a bluetooth adapterI only have hands on experience with an M001 which my mother uses as an ebook reader and it performs well (though I really would like a proper PDF reader). I have ordered a 2nd gen aPad for myself and hope it will be as good as I hear it is.

 

[JMG181]

Thanks - and to answer, I'd say less than $200 would be cheap to me. I'll check out the apad and m001 in more detail - thanks again!

 

[Mp4]

I have M001 and the apad and I find the M001 more user friendly . although hands down the apad is faster and scrolls pretty smooth

 

[Guest]

I have M001 and the apad and I find the M001 more user friendly . although hands down the apad is faster and scrolls pretty smooth

Do you mean out the box or in terms of modifications? I see the aPad requires running a program from a host PC to upgrade where the M001 can be upgraded anywhere.As JMG181 is after "hackability" (albeit in the future) stuff like that shouldn't be too taxing. The M001 requires a hardware mod to use put a female USB in it (fun with a soldering iron ) whereas the aPad supports that out of the box but might (!) allow for 3G tinkering in the future.

 

[Mp4]

you are correct i missed the hackability partApad all the way then