Motorola Xoom Review: The First Honeycomb Tablet Arrives
by Anand Lal Shimpi on February 23, 2011 11:57 PM ESTOld & New Apps on Honeycomb
As we mentioned in our overview of Android 3.0, there are a number of features that Honeycomb specific apps are going to be able to take advantage of. For example the dual-pane view that we see in the Honeycomb email apps - we’ll see more of that in future Honeycomb apps similar to what we saw happen with iPad specific apps. We’ll also see developers use contextual action menus.
Existing Android apps should just work on Honeycomb (although some definitely have issues). Google runs these older apps by default full screen, just scaled up to fit the higher resolution of the Xoom.
The fourth button for backwards compatibility: menu
You’ll remember that Honeycomb does away with the menu button, however older Android apps are expecting it to be there. In these situations you’ll see a fourth button added to the lower left of the screen: a virtual menu button.
It’s Crashy
At MWC earlier this month I noted that the Galaxy Tab 10.1 running Honeycomb seemed to be unusually unstable. Given that the first tablet running the OS would be shipping in a matter of weeks I just assumed that it was due to Samsung not having access to the latest build of Honeycomb. After all, Motorola is Google’s device partner this time around.
After using the Xoom for the past couple of days I can say that while the experience isn’t horrible by any means, Honeycomb isn’t anywhere near as stable as Froyo on the Atrix 4G. I’ve had many application crashes in both older Android apps and native Honeycomb apps. For a while there I couldn’t get the Android Twitter app to work at all, even after a reboot.
As I mentioned, it’s not just third party apps. The Honeycomb Browser, camera app and even Marketplace have all crashed on me over the past two days.
There’s also no microSD support in Honeycomb yet, it’ll be added via a forthcoming OS update. And there are many bugs sprinkled throughout the OS (background data automatically enables itself after a reboot even if you disable it). Things like this combined with the instability I mentioned earlier makes me feel like Honeycomb was a bit rushed, perhaps to hit the streets before one other major tablet announcement coming this year?
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GotThumbs - Friday, March 18, 2011 - link
The platform is not that old. Apple just took their existing ois from the itouch and made it bigger. This is a whole new ballgame. Early adopters should understand their will be some hiccups...Glad to hear the WIFI only version is coming out March 27th for 599.00 This brings the competition directly to ipad and ipad2. My boss offered to buy me the ipad2 and I told him I only want an ADAM or a Xoom. An ipad would be a waste of money....I need a business tablet. Not one whose product is so proprietary...that you can't even load an app unless its through their store....how controlling is that?
Thermogenic - Thursday, February 24, 2011 - link
Samsung changed some of the basic internals of the system (I believe mainly to do with the filesystem and location of certain files). This makes it harder on them to release updates and also causes compatibility problems with certain applications.For me, I would only stick to the high end HTC and Motorola phones - they have the proven track record of updates. If you really want the latest and greatest for some reason, then you will want the Nexus line of phones.
ph00ny - Monday, March 7, 2011 - link
Not entirely true. Most custom froyo roms were based on galaxy s from overseas. Look at captivate, AT&T's froyo update just came out and the same phone offered through canadian carrier had froyo for quite some time nowchocks - Thursday, February 24, 2011 - link
"Android however did it the simplest way possible: tap home and run what you want to run next." Pre-Honeycomb Android has press-and-hold on the Home button which brings up a list of recently-used apps and can be used to switch between running tasks. Has had this since the first release I think.Anand Lal Shimpi - Thursday, February 24, 2011 - link
Woops, you're right :) That's very much a precursor to what Google did in Honeycomb, and tap-and-hold home is now out.Updated!
Take care,
Anand
Thermogenic - Thursday, February 24, 2011 - link
It's not a true tablet, but the NOOKcolor is a nice device for the money. If you are willing to do a little dirty work (mainly writing to a microsd card and booting it - very easy), you get a very basic tablet with a very nice screen for $250.I imagine for most users who use their tablet for web browsing, facebook, twitter, and youtube, that's plenty and a great bargain.
I guarantee there will be a usable version of Honeycomb running on it within six weeks. There is already a functional version, although with a decided lack of applications and very unoptimized.
wumpus - Monday, February 28, 2011 - link
I can't imagine anyone else competing with a wifi only tablet. My guess is that there are two reasons to avoid releasing such: First, you can overcharge and let the consumer pay the subsidy (and then some) back to the carrier. Second: nobody tries to compare it to the nook.Enormously Hatworthy - Thursday, February 24, 2011 - link
I read so many of those tech blogs that sometimes I forget what a real review looks like. Good work.Some of those benchmark results are pretty odd.
I wonder if the disparity between the Optimus 2X and the Xoom might in some way be related to the dual-core support in Honeycomb? The optimus is running on 2.2 which I understand has limited (if any) support for multiple cores.
Maybe the benchmark apps are showing some measure of incompatibility with the new code? Just a wild guess.
cj100570 - Thursday, February 24, 2011 - link
Just once I'd like to read a review of any piece of mobile tech where the reviewer stuck to reviewing the hardware in his/her hands instead of constantly comparing it to an Apple product. For Christs sake, enough is enough already! And don't give me that "Apple Set The Bar" BS. I'm not buying what you're selling! I've owned 3 generations of iPhones, an iMac, and 2 MacBooks so I'm very familiar with Apple products and I have great respect for them. But the simple fact of the matter is that not everyone wants to live the iOS/OS X lifestyle and when they read a review of non Apple products I'm quite sure they don't want to see Apple brought up every other sentence.Enormously Hatworthy - Thursday, February 24, 2011 - link
It is annoying but whether we like iOS/iPad or not (and I don't, to be honest) it is the market leader in tablets right now. It's the frame of reference for buyers.I think they'd be doing their readers a disservice if they didn't make the comparison.
Notice that in laptop/desktop reviews you'll see scarcely a mention of Apple products (unless they're talking about size and weight).