Editor's note: As of May 2012, the Acer Iconia tab A100 is upgradable to Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich). For details on the advantages Android 4.0 offers over Honeycomb, check the Android 4.0 section of the Asus Transformer Prime TF201 review.
The Good
The Bad
The Bottom Line
Editors' note 2: Thanks to the release of recent, high-quality tablets, the overall score of the Acer Iconia Tab A100 has been adjusted down from 7 to 6.5.
As one of the first 7-inch Honeycomb tablets, the Acer Iconia Tab A100 attempts to make a case for the viability of 7-inchers, but does the fact that larger tablet alternatives are less than a hundred bucks away diminish its appeal?
Design
From a purely aesthetic perspective, the Acer Iconia Tab A100 looks a lot like the A500 we reviewed a few months ago. From its sloped edges to the placement of its front camera and SD card implementation, it's clear that the apple doesn't fall too far from the tree. However, due to the smaller form factor, the A100 has to settle for micro versions of ports instead of the full-size versions included on the A500.
On the bottom edge of the tablet sit the bulk of its ports, including a recessed reset button, Micro-HDMI, Micro-USB, a power adapter port, and a port for connecting to a dock accessory. On the opposite edge, from left to right, are the headphone jack, the power button/screen lock, and a microphone pinhole. On the top edge are the volume rockers, lock switch (which keeps the screen from rotating), and a compartment that opens to reveal the microSD card slot. The front left bezel houses the 2-megapixel camera with an iPad-like hardware home button located on the far right side of the bezel. On the back near the top edge sits a 5-megapixel camera with a flash bulb.
The Acer Iconia Tab A100 sports a glossy screen and piano-black bezel that attract fingerprints like a "CSI" crime scene. The back panel is gray with a silver Acer logo embossed in the middle and some wire-frame swirl designs to style things up a bit.
Though it weighs only 0.88 pound, the Acer Iconia Tab A100 feels fairly substantial in our hands. Its proportions are about on par with other 7-inch tablets, but instead of writing a bunch of boring text about dimensions, I've instead slapped together a well-researched table showing how the A100's measurements stack up against other popular 7-inch tablets, with an 8.9-inch tablet thrown in for good measure: