Battle of the Budget Tablets - Nook Color vs. Galaxy Tab
by Vivek Gowri on May 25, 2011 12:52 AM ESTRooting the Nook Color
When you boot the Nook, you’re taken to this lovely 5 step process that registers you with B&N’s site (there’s no way around this unless you avoid the stock ROM entirely) and gets your device on to the internet. When you get through this, you’re taken to a startup page that lets you select whether you want a tutorial on how to use the Nook Color or whether you actually just want to use it. Uhhhhh, yeah, I think I’ll just go to the home screen, thanks.
The homescreen gets you thumbnails of the book covers you have downloaded, and bringing up the menu (with a soft button at the bottom of the screen) gives you the option to go to settings, the browser, market, list of applications, etc. You can tell it’s running Android, but it’s relatively dumbed down, presumably so that the general non-techy public doesn’t find themselves confused by the inner workings of Android.
The only thing that surprised me about the Nook OS in general is the amount of stuttering I saw. The original OS was pretty bad, and the update to Nook 1.2 (read: Froyo) fixed some of that, but you could still see the occasional dropped frame as you navigated through the OS. But I got sick of the Nook OS in about 5 minutes, so I went straight to XDA to get me some CM7.
CyanogenMod 7 is basically a community-built and supported ROM based on Gingerbread, and it’s pretty sweet. The rooting process was fairly straightforward, first installing ClockworkMod Recovery, then flashing CM7 and the associated Google apps (Mail, Market, Talk, etc) onto the device. The XDA developer forums are very helpful with rooting and flashing different ROMs onto these devices, and there’s a number of different customizations you can do, including overclocking (the Nook Color supports up to 1.2GHz) and various skins and enhancements.
I have to commend Barnes and Noble in all of this for being not discouraging rooting or hacking the device, when I talked to some of the Nook reps, they definitely understood that the NC was developed for people who weren’t tech enthusiasts, but the enthusiast market could do whatever they wanted with it. Unlike some of the larger handset manufacturers who go out of their way to discourage jailbreaking or rooting, this was a refreshing mindset for them to take.
So now that our Nook Color is all nice and Gingerbread-ified, let’s see what Samsung has in store.
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VivekGowri - Wednesday, May 25, 2011 - link
It's got some issues, granted, particularly with the camera, but on a hardware/software/usefulness level, anything running Honeycomb at this point is a better bet than the Galaxy Tab, HTC Flyer, or the like, bugs and minor instability included.Heck, that $50 is worth it just for the jump to Tegra 2 and the better screen, if you despise Honeycomb that much you can see if you can get someone to release a Gingerbread ROM for it.
iphadke - Thursday, May 26, 2011 - link
Hey Vivek...How about adding the Adam in the mix? I think with that, we're getting something at a USD350 price point which will outperform both the Nook and Galaxy Tab by a hugh margin. No IPS panel, though plenty of usability...
Cheers
Neel
VivekGowri - Thursday, May 26, 2011 - link
I've been trying to get Rohan to send me an Adam review unit for literally 6 months now, nothing yet. They're still pretty hammered on filling pre-orders, so we'll see when/if I get one.softdrinkviking - Wednesday, May 25, 2011 - link
"no it didn't" what? what didn't it do? i don't understand! who are you replying to??!?"filled with lies?" that's a bit harsh. i see your point with the tab roms, but that's hardly "filled" with anything. i think the editorial nature of this article was pretty well laid out from the beginning. he likes the nook for cheap, thinks the tab is better and doesn't need custom roms to be good but the nook does. what's a lie about that?
medi01 - Wednesday, May 25, 2011 - link
He comes to the conclusion nook is better because, you know "40% higher price" and, you know, custom roms, that you don't need but could have with Samsung.And not that I would call Samsung Galaxy "a budget tablet" and not that I see a point in calling it "budget" besides somehow separating it from Apple's products that, you know, have very similar screen, less features, terrible restirctions in software, no rooting at all and a much higher price
Stuka87 - Wednesday, May 25, 2011 - link
Your comparison to the iPad is a bit off.1: The 9.6" display is really nothing like the 7" display on the Tab. Their quality is kind of similar, but the 16:9 aspect ratio makes the Tab unusable in landscape mode (And I have one sitting right here).
2: What features are you referencing?
3: I wouldn't say terrible. They are somewhat similar to Google's store regulations, only Apple does its best to keep out Malware, which Google doesn't seem to care much about.
4: Who cares if you can root the device? You can jail break it if you really want to.
5: Sure, it cost 150 dollars more. But the hardware is so much faster than the Tabs its not even funny. Not to mention its much more comfortable to hold with it being much thinner. And the battery life is top notch as well.
VivekGowri - Wednesday, May 25, 2011 - link
Did you not read the part where it said "In all honesty, the Galaxy Tab is the better device"?The Nook is a lot cheaper for something pretty close as far as usage model, simple as that. And if you look at the core hardware, the GT and NC are pretty similar, much more similar than the GT7 versus any one of the Honeycomb tablets. It's a better, more polished device as far as hardware and software, but that doesn't make it better value for money or a better buy, especially in light of some devices that don't cost a whole lot more and offer so much more power and functionality. Heck, just look at the 8.9" Galaxy Tab, if you dislike the Asus and Acer that much.
Lukemcd - Thursday, May 26, 2011 - link
Everyone just wants their favorite device to win. There's nothing wrong with this article. It made points for both sides.They're angry because they cannot make blanket "Your writing sucks" comments because it didn't. So they have to "rationalize."
Samus - Thursday, May 26, 2011 - link
I've had my nook color since january. Ever since CM7 went official with 2.3 last month its been super solid. Tethered to my phone for internet access when out and about, it's like having a 3G tablet and it cost me $200 bucks.I haven't held or seen the Galaxy Tablet, but it looks like its built like crap compared to the nook. It's thicker, the plastic looks korean and overall the finish isn't attractive. It looks like one of Samsung's cheap-ass phones that break the moment you drop them.
MonkeyPaw - Wednesday, May 25, 2011 - link
I have the NC, and it is fun to mess with. I read this article with mine (using CM7. Beta 3.1), and I'm posting this with it. Been using it for over a month and love it. Sure, a more expensive tab has better specs, but lets be realistic, a tab is for casual use in an easier form-factor. I can do email, web, gReader, games on the NC, and I will go to my PC if I really need to get something done.Nice to see thewrote this. There's quite a community around the NC. There may be a real HC build if Google ever releases the source.