Acer Iconia A1-810/811

One can’t really complain about the price of the Acer Iconia A1 – after all, it’s already been pretty much universally marked down from the standard budget tablet price of $200 – but, despite its Android 4.2 operating system, simply doesn’t measure up to the similarly-sized Google Nexus 7.

Having described the Acer Iconia A1 as a budget tablet, most will have guessed that this device is hardly sleek (at 0.44” thick) or lightweight (weighing 1.01 pounds), but the Iconia A1 sadly also falls below average in essentially all other areas as well.

Perhaps most grievous is the incredibly poor resolution of the touchscreen: In 2013, Acer figured a 1024 x 768-pixel tablet would impress the masses? Really? And while 7” and 8” tablets can afford to include a slightly slower microprocessor, the MTK MT8125 1.2 GHz in the Iconia A1 is already years out of date: Larger and newer files and apps will make this evident.

If any positives may be touted, the battery life is quite good at eight hours of regular use per charge; and the good-for-the-price 16 GB of storage space may be expanded via micro SD card. Of course, if one is willing to splurge on micro SD cards, why not simply plunk down the extra money on the Nexus 7 or another 7”/8” tablet? Honestly speaking, the market supplies many models with more to offer than the Iconia A1.