Tablet arrived yesterday. After getting it out of the box, (yes, no small feat), I started it up. First up was logging on to Wifi, and with that accomplished, the tablet knew who I was. I then entered my Gmail password and it was all ready to go. Easy, right.
Before I could poke around too much, I was notified that a System Update was available, Android 4.1.1. After rebooting, I immediately downloaded Amazon's Kindle and MP3 apps from the Google Play Store. It's significant: with these apps on board, why buy the Kindle Fire (which restricts what apps can be downloaded and doesn't offer Google's Play Store)?
The user experience is fantastic. It's sharp, it's fast, there's little to nothing to complain about. Asus did a bang up job and it only cost $199 plus tax and shipping, but with a $25 Play credit. Wifi is the limitation, but for a device that won't leave the house or office, there's no issue.
One thing I have to mention is that this tablet – any tablet for that matter – is it's kid glue. My daughters were chomping at the bit to get their hands on it, and within a few minutes of first possession, they had downloaded four games, along with some annoying shortcuts that appeared on the desktop. As a single user device, it needs to allow some protection from little meddling hands. Do I want my kids to access my Gmail? Spending with my Google Wallet? What prevents them from doing so?
A few oddities: There is no camera app, and I'm just not quite sure how the screen rotation works – I found it. In the notification drop-down at the top of the screen, there is a "lock" with two arrows. Simply "unlock". Also, arranging the icons on the desktop will always seems to be cumbersome to me.
Some cool apps:
Banshee Remote – control Banshee (linux music program) on local network
Squeezebox – app for controlling Logitech's Squeezebox
QuickDic – foreign language dictionairies
I'll update this as I use it….
the itjerk 
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