Archos 101 Tablet Review

Archos 101 is one among very few Android 2.2 tablets having a beautiful screen measuring 10.1 inches diagonally. The other extras like mini-HDMI port, front facing camera, microSD memory expansion, sync ports and USB host as well as many other interesting features. However there are minor drawbacks such as poor responsiveness of the screen, incompatible with Adobe flash, no support for Google Mobile Apps and Android Market etc. All you need a wall adapter to charge this device which is another limitation of this tablet. The screen quality is mediocre and also touch screen response is quite slow.

The sluggish performance is balanced with affordable price of 299 USD for 8GB version while the 16GB version costs 399 USD. All other tablets are supporting latest Honeycomb version of Google Android 3.0 which has got many advanced features but Archos is not offering support for this version still. The dimensions of this tablet are 10.5x6x0.33 inches and it weighs approximately 16 ounces. The lightweight of the tablet is because of the design. Instead of using materials like aluminum and glass similar to iPad, Archos has made the design more plastic to reduce the weight and make it portable. The design is very fragile and not rugged like other tablets.

Another design detail which experienced Android users with this tablet is that there are no tactile navigation buttons. There are onscreen controls for back, menu, home which are present on the right side of the screen. The navigation controls get reoriented based on how you hold the device in the hands. The connectivity ports are also present together in left side of the device which includes MicroUSB to interface with your Desktop, power adapter, headphones, miniHDMI port, USB 2.0 port etc. There is also a front-facing camera which can be used for taking pictures and videos at VGA resolution of 640×480 pixels. The tablet also comes pre-installed with Fring Video chat application which works in camera, pinhole microphone present on same side.

There is also a kickstand present on back side. There are plenty of useful applications with software including e-mail app, web browser, Android music player, video player and photo viewer. The Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, thumb drives, USB port are other common features. You can watch HD videos by connecting the table to your HDTV in 720p. The viewing angles of the screen are too bad and brightness is limited. The resolution is 1024×600 pixels which is not suitable for watching HD videos. To conclude, this tablet is not the brightest and fastest in market, but provides basic functionality and some interesting features for a fairly reasonable price and can be useful for average customers.