I thought I would let you know how an andoid newbie has got on with his initial  experiences.

I have an ipad2 and iphone (but not an apple fanboy) already but decided to try out android to see how it compared. I was also looking for portable DVD players for the kids as we have a big trip planned. I find it is quite a hastle puting movies on the ipad. An android tbale seemed like a good option. It can play movies and i can see what the fuss is all about and have a little tinker around which the ipad definately doesn't let me do. 

 I managed to pick up an Acer A200 tab for $399 from Noel Leeming on Waitangi weekend.
I thought the price was pretty good compared to the competition. The specs are similar to my ipad except no wifi or front camera (which i have never used)

Likes
The rubberised back housing. It doesn't slide around and is nice to hold.
Full USB port - can plug in hard drive stick mouse keyboard etc
Upgrade to ICS (can't really comment on it but everyone is raving about it)
Plenty of options in the market place 
Not much bloatware on the OS
Plays movies without having to convert them

Dislikes
I don't like the loose wobbly power cord (why couldn't they use the USB)
Terrible sound out the speakers
Not easy for a newby to get started
Wouldn't recognise my fat32 movie folder partition (set up for the PS3) on an external hard drive.
Market is a bit haphazard. I have spent a bit of time reading through forums and websites looking for the best/ safest apps. The market could be more regionalised and tablet focused. (it might just be me diving in too fast)
Would like to group apps in folders a la IOS
Wireless performance is terrible. The link keeps dropping out. I have a WAG160N which isn't good at the best of times but this tablet loses connection all the time. I have to switch to airplane mode and back to reset. I am looking to upgrade my wireless router so that might improve things.

As of last saturday I was sitting on the fence on the tablet. I wasn't bowled over like i was with the IPAD2 but then i didn't have great expectations to begin with. Just thought its a good wee gadet to tinker with and keep the kids occupied when we go on trips.

Unfortunately thats when I fell off the fence. My astro manager app crashed, got asked to force shutdown then it hung so i rebooted. I tried rebooting but the screen hung on the acer startup screen. After a few telephone calls and emails to the Acer Philipines help desk I finally got told how to carry out a factory reset. This didn't work so 4 hours later they gave me a DOA number and a straight swap at Noel Leeming yesterday but a week of my time wasted ( or lets call it practice).

The acer help wasn't very helpfull. The website for NZ doesn't know they sell the A200 here yet. The helpdesk number gives options for 1 - Acer A100 or A500 table or 2-Laptops. Didn't matter what option i picked they told me it was the wrong number/department. When i finally got through the language barrier wasn't easy. I am scottish they were fillipino
The instructions to hard reset they sent me weren't very good. I found better ones on you tube.
However +1 to them for swapping my machine over, their first option was to send the tablet in for repair 10-15 days!
Noel Leeming were great. Swapped over without questions.


So I am 7 days into our new relationship ( or 1 day as its a replacement tablet)  and I don't think the ipad has anything to worry about. I am concerned next time i try to copy a movie over I might break the acer again.
 
Has anyone got suggestions for good apps for me and the kids to get me back on that fence.

I currently have
Various news
BBC, Stuff, herald, huffington, engadget
Mobo media player
Astro and File Manager HD
Google earth