Acer is hoping to chip away at Apple’s dominance in the tablet market with the launch of its Iconia Tab A500, set to hit Best Buy shelves on April 24. The eloquently named tablet will under cut the iPad’s price with a starting price of US$449.99, and will run Google’s Android 3.0 operating system.
Acer’s Iconia Tab A500
Acer’s tablet will sport a 10.1-inch display, NVIDIA’s Tegra 250 1GHz dual core processor, is just over half an inch thick and weighs 1.69 pounds. It includes 16GB of storage, built-in Wi-Fi and Bluetooth, HDMI-out, an SD card reader, a 5 megapixel and a 2 megapixel camera, GPS, and Acer claims it has a 10-hour battery life.
In comparison, Apple’s 16GB Wi-Fi iPad 2 costs $499, includes a 9.7-inch display, Apple’s own A5 1GHz dual core processor, is .34-inches thick, and weighs 1.33 pounds. The entry-level iPad includes 16GB storage, built-in Wi-Fi and Bluetooth, a dock connector that supports HDMI-out, front and rear-facing cameras that support less than 1 megapixel resolution, and a 10-hour battery life.
The Iconia Tab A500 can take advantage of the Android Marketplace for third party apps, but it doesn’t support Apple’s App Store or the iTunes Store, nor does it offer the same overall user experience Apple offers with its iOS ecosystem.
While Acer may have a few more features in its tablet, it doesn’t offer the same user-friendly experience Apple has created for the iPad, and that may be harder to overcome than Acer’s executives anticipate.