My kids received a lot of Barnes & Noble gift cards for Christmas, and my 14-year old son has been dying for an Android tablet ever since his younger brother has been playing Minecraft on his Samsung Galaxy. So, being impulsive as teenagers are want to be, he got a new Nook HD. Let’s see how it satisfies expectations.
The box is minimalist. The box claims that it has the highest resolution of any 7″ tablet, but fails to provide any specifics. Upon checking we find that the resolution is 1440 x 900, which is a little better than the average resolution of 1280 x 800 that most 7-inch tablets implement. Inside the box is the tablet itself (wrapped in plastic), a wall charger (with USB cable), and a Quick Start guide. No other manuals or documentation are provided, as they are included as an included electronic document.
Under the hood, the Nook HD is rather capable. It has 1GB of RAM, 8GB of flash storage, and a TI OMAP 4 Dual-core CPU running at 1.3 Ghz, which is adequate for what it does. There is no camera at all (forward or rear facing), and therefore the Nook HD cannot take photos or HD video.
Upon first look the tablet is very nice to look at. It has a nice white rubberized coating that helps keep a grip. This finish also repels fingerprints, unlike sleek plastic that many tablets have. It has a single power button on the top left side, and has a volume control on the top right side. The bottom features a micro SD card slot and has a connector that looks surprisingly like an iPod connector.
Setting the tablet up is relatively easy as long as you are the primary user. A first-time wizard walks you through connecting to a wireless access point. The Nook HD then downloaded an update and installed, which took about five minutes in total.
Setting up the Nook for a child however, is a nightmare. You can have three different profiles: the main account (created when in the setup wizard, which must have a credit card attached to it), an Adult profile, and a Child profile. If you want to prevent your kids from charging stuff to your account, then you have to set them up as a Child account and check a box that requires a password when making purchases. Unfortunately this also means you have to put in your password whenever they want to download any free apps or books, which is very annoying for the parent. Oh, and Child accounts apparently can’t have email, either. You can let them use the Primary account and then just check the box in Settings that requires a password to purchase, but they could just uncheck that requirement.
The Nook requires you to create a Barnes & Noble account, rather than a Google account as most Android devices do. As such, email is not part of the set up wizard, but can be easily done by launching email (as long as you’re on the primary account).
Once everything was set up I was astonished as to how little was on the desktop. You have a few options: library, web browser, email, and store. Any recently-opened apps or books appear on the desktop.
All of the pre-installed apps are very plain-Jane. The Nook HD does come with a decent web browser, but the email client, calendar, and music apps do not have any bells and whistles. If the Nook had access to Google Play then I would recommend any number of free replacements, but alas Barnes & Noble have a short leash on what apps you can install.
Even though the Nook uses Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich), it is a completely different operating environment. It is geared mostly as a reading device with games and apps as an afterthought. The device does not connect to the Google Play store, and instead everything must be accessed via the Barnes & Noble store.
You also cannot download any Free apps without adding a credit card to your account, and as mentioned previously setting credit card protection is a laborious process.
Additionally, there is an amazing shortage of game and app options in the Nook store when compared with Google Play. Google Play offers free demos of many games like Angry Birds, Fruit Ninja, Bad Piggies and all of the other popular casual games for tablets. The Nook store only has the paid versions of these, and they are always full price. You can usually find a deal on Angry Birds for .99 cents, but it costs $2.99 on the Nook store.
If you like books though, then the Nook is where it’s at. There are thousands and thousands of books, magazines and comics available for the Nook, and it integrates with the desktop very well.
The Nook is very limited in what it can do when compared with a general-purpose Android tablet. Seeing as there is a Nook app available in the Google Play store, you can easily transform any Android device into a Nook.
One can look at the heavy modification of the Android 4.0 OS as a good or a bad thing. On one hand you have limited choice on what you can install, and on the other the device will probably be a lot more stable than a general-purpose tablet because there won’t be a ton of misbehaved apps running.
The $199 price point will probably seal the decision for you one way or the other. You can easily get a more capable Android-based device (like the Google Nexus 7 16GB) for that price or less. The advantage of the Nook over a general-use tablet is its higher resolution and integration with the Barnes & Noble store. The Nook also requires a credit card on file to do anything, even to download free apps, so be wary if this is a gift for your child.
Most tablets are for “consuming” content such as browsing the web, playing videos or checking email (and in this case reading books). The Nook is not a gaming tablet by any stretch of the imagination, although it technically has the hardware to be a light-weight gaming device. For the same price you can get a general-purpose tablet with a decent resolution and video chip and do so much more with it.
The Nook HD is a very neat device… just know what you’re getting. I say spend your $199 on a Google Nexus 7 16GB. You’ll have the top-rated Android tablet with great gaming capabilities, camera, an extra 8GB of storage, and can also work as a Nook… for the same price as a Nook HD.