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Review: Acer Iconia Tab A500 (Android Honeycomb)

Acer's offering in the Android tablet game is plain vanilla -- unspectacular but reliable.
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Rating:

6/10

WIRED
Priced aggressively for top-shelf hardware. As precise and dependable as a Swiss clock.
TIRED
Tinny rear-facing speakers destroy music. Massive: Snapping pictures with this thing feels like shielding yourself with a cafeteria tray in a food fight. $450 and up

Acer's offering is plain vanilla—unspectacular but reliable. Hardware-wise, other than a jumbo 10.1-inch screen, it differs little from other high-end Android tablets: HDMI-out, front- and rear-facing cameras, and a drab exterior that doesn't offend but won't set design nerds' pulses racing. The software, however, was the most reliable in our test. We didn't suffer a single browser crash, and the Nvidia dual-core processor ran even resource-hungry apps like WeatherBug and Need for Speed: Shift without a hitch.