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Tablet fans who don’t want to sign up with Telstra when the Motorola Xoom tablet comes to Australia in May have another choice of provider if they are prepared to wait another month. Not all carriers launch handsets/tablets at the same time." The Xoom tablet runs on version 3.0 of Android’s operating system, Honeycomb, which is the first version of Android to be designed for use with tablets; previous versions were optimised for the smaller screens of smartphones.
Optus sells a number of other Motorola devices including the Defy smartphone, which was launched in March 2011, and the Motoblur range of Android-powered “social” smartphones which were launched into the Australian market on 9 April. The Motorola Dext and Backflip are available for free on $49 and $59 per month (24 months) Optus plans.
IT has taken a long time for Motorola's Xoom Android tablet computer to hit Australian shores. Having said that, the Xoom comes with strong hardware credentials: a 1 GHz dual-core processor, 32GB of onboard memory, 1GB of DDR2 RAM, a rear-facing 5-megapixel camera and a 2MP front-facing one.
Your first test with the Xoom is switching it on. Android's Honeycomb operates on the Xoom like it does on similar devices, such as Samsung's Galaxy 10.1v. You navigate Honeycomb with links on the screen. The links rotate as you rotate the screen.
The Xoom generally performs snappily, as it should with two processors. There are plenty of Honeycomb apps in Android Market that can be used on the Xoom. The Xoom has its own file manager, but File Station Tablet (free) is excellent. The standard Xoom soft keyboard is more than adequate, but should you want extra keys on the main keyboard, there's Tablet Keyboard (93c) and Thumb Keyboard ($1.82), although I found the keys too squashed on Tablet Keyboard.
Dropbox (free) itself works well on the Xoom and I found it extremely useful for porting all types of files between devices. Overall the Xoom is a quality, generously specced Android tablet device, and possibly the best Honeycomb device on the market so far, despite its work-in-progress MicroSD slot.
For one, the company's Motorola Xoom, the first tablet to use Google's new Android 3.0 "Honeycomb" operating system tailored for tablets, was characterized as rough, unfinished and difficult to use by some analysts and experts comparing it with Apple's market-defining iPad. Motorola said the Xoom sold 250,000 units for the first quarter, while the iPad shipped 4.7 million units in the last quarter.
Look at the Xoom issue. With 80 percent-plus market share, there is no catching the iPad or iPad 2 in the near term. Gartner Research analysts reasoned Android tablets could cut Apple's share to 47 percent but not until 2015. Forrester Research analyst Charles Golvin noted all the Android tablets have underperformed in the market so far.
Gartner analyst Ken Dulaney told eWEEK the Xoom is a good solid product. Global Equities Research analyst Trip Chowdry polled several early Xoom users and visited several Xoom retailers to come to the conclusion that the Xoom is a weak product compared with the iPad. eWEEK suggested Motorola desires to better compete with the popular HTC Droid Thunderbolt and the forthcoming Samsung Droid Charge on Verizon's 4G LTE network.
Chowdry said Motorola has grown more reactive since Apple's January launch of the iPhone 4 on Verizon, the same carrier that helped push Motorola and Android into the limelight with a $100 million marketing campaign for the Motorola Droid. Indeed, Verizon for 15 months was the flagship Android supporter. The positive reception of the iPhone caught Motorola off guard.
By. Android Phone Tips
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