Acer Unveils the Budget Minded 7 inch Iconia B1 Android Tablet

Acer’s second tablet they are announcing today is the Acer Iconia B1. This one is a 7-inch tablet that starts at $129.99. Acer doesn’t mention what the resolution of this display is, but I’d suspect it’s around 1024 x 768 resolution. It’s also sporting a 1.3GHz dual-core processor, which again Acer doesn’t mention who’s making that processor, but I’d guess it’s a MediaTek processor. There’s also 1GB of RAM inside, along with a microSD card slot inside. The Acer Iconia B1 is sporting Android 4.2.1 at launch. Hopefully we’ll see an update to Android 4.4 – KitKat since it is made for lower-end products like the Iconia B1.

Similar to the Iconia A1-830, the Iconia B1 is also launching with some accessories. Acer is offering a protection case that is available in multiple colors. The case guards against scratches and acts as a stand to let users read, type, and play on their tablet. This is the Acer B1-720. Which does come with 16GB of Storage and is WiFi only. Acer is going to be releasing this one in North America in mid-January at a price of $129.99.

For a price of $129, I think this is probably the best tablet you can buy. Now I’m not saying it’s the best tablet to buy, but for this price it probably is. We see many tablets from manufacturers we’ve never heard of selling these Android tablets at this price. But here we have Acer, a company we know and trust. So if you’re just looking for a cheap Android tablet, this is a good choice. But if you can afford to spend another $100 on a tablet, I’d suggest the Nexus 7 (2013). As it’s got a much better display and processor, in my opinion.

How many of you are interested in the Acer Iconia B1 tablet? Be sure to let us know in the comments below.

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Kid Friendly Kurio 7x Tablet Arrives on Verizon Later This Year

Letting you children use your tablet can be a tricky situation, so it’s no surprise that we’ve seen more than a few companies offer up their versions of kid-friendly devices. Say hello to the Kurio 7x, a new tablet from KD Interactive and Techno Source that the two companies will be showing off at CES 2014 this week. Like most kid-friendly tablets on the market, this offers parents a certain degree of control over what their children do with it. However, with the Kurio 7x, we’re also seeing KD Interactive and Techno Source bring their devices into the mobile data space, as this latest release is compatible with Verizon‘s 4G LTE network.

It’s an interesting feature, and one that may not have been considered much in the past. The idea behind this is to put the Kurio 7x on a Share Everything plan, so kids can enjoy access to the Internet on long car rides or other excursions that move the family away from a consistent Wi-Fi connection. Another interesting feature the Kurio 7x boasts is its support for multiple user profiles. With the Kurio 7x, up to eight different users can have a unique profile on the device, so if you’ve got a particularly large family, this might be the tablet for you.

It doesn’t just stop at different user profiles, however, as parents can assign varying levels of security to each one. So, if you’ve got an older child among your bunch of rascals, you can give their profile fewer restrictions than the profiles that belong to your younger ones. Parents will have the Kurio Genius Internet Filtering tool at their disposal, which claims to cover 450 million websites across the Internet. In addition to all of that functionality, parents can also set time limits and manage applications from profile to profile, so it sounds like the parental controls that come installed on this tablet offer quite a bit.

The Kurio 7x tablet comes with a 7-inch screen, will be running Android 4.2 Jelly Bean, and has a blue bumper packed in to help the tablet deal with rough use. KD Interactive and Techno Source have yet to talk pricing, nor have they set a specific release date for the tablet. We do know that it’ll be hitting Verizon sometime this summer, though, so at least we have some kind of launch window to work with. Would you consider picking up this tablet for your kids?

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HTC might be planning on a nice and disruptive tablet wearable devices are also on its list

HTC will look to wearables and a new tablet in order to try to reclaim market share, the company has teased, promising “something nice and disruptive” for its new slate. The company has been slow to capitalize on recent attention in either segment, though according to CEO Peter Chou that’s because many such devices – particularly smartwatches – have been more gimmicks than anything else, the Financial Times reports.

“It has to meet a need, otherwise if it’s just a gimmick or concept, it’s not for people’s day-to-day lives” Chou said, describing the wearables market as “still too early” and some of the existing products from HTC’s rivals – presumably including Samsung’s Galaxy Gear and Kickstarter-success Pebble – “version one”. However, Chou argues, that leaves a space HTC could step into.

“That is an opportunity for us,” he suggested. “People laughed at us when we came out with the first smartphone … Now everyone has a smartphone. I’m pretty sure wearables will be the same, but don’t judge from what is in the market [now].”

Chou was recently tipped to be scaling back on his day to day operational duties as CEO to instead focus more time on R&D efforts, something unofficial reports from within HTC suggest he is considerably involved in.

Exact details on what the HTC wearable and tablet might look like are unclear. However, according to HTC chairman Cher Wang, when the tablet comes out it will be something nice and disruptive,” teasing that “ubiquitous intelligence is not just wearables.”

That could imply a greater focus on contextual computing, something we’ve seen Motorola attempt recently with the Moto X. Wearables, meanwhile, match “what we do today as a mobile experience overall” Chou suggested. “That is one area we are excited about.”

HTC hasn’t had a tablet since the ill-fated Flyer and Jetstream, which pre-empted the pen-enabled tablet trend but, for a number of reasons – not least being very expensive, even with carrier subsidies – failed to make significant inroads into the market. More recently, the company revealed the HTC One max, a 5.9-inch “phablet” that the company says it expects many owners to use both as a phone and a compact tablet. SlashGear

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