Nice price...good alternative to the Galaxy tab.

[xmr405o]

Dell Streak 7 is impressively launching February 2 for $199 on-contract - Phone Arena

The only thing weakness I see spec-wise is the screen resolution but other than that...it's pretty nice.

 

[Komodo Rogue]

Totally agree. I wasn't even in the market for a tablet... well, not so soon anyway (considered saving money for the xoom), but I was shocked at this price. At first I thought I misread or misunderstood something!

About the screen resolution, I agree with that too - that is some poor, poor pixel density - the (somewhat) standard screen resolution for 3.5 to 4.3 inch phones is the same as a seven inch screen? Really?? Would it have been very expensive at all to make it at least the same as the galaxy tab, or just qHD like the Atrix/Bionic?

HOWEVER, there are some upsides to this that make it okay with me. Number one is that the higher the screen resolution is, the more work the chip has to do. Everyday things like flipping through home screens, launching games / apps, live wallpapers, and any other graphical thing will be easy as cake for the Tegra 2 on this display, so things should be as smooth as butter... especially once it gets optimized, and even more when dell or XDA makes a Honeycomb ROM (I heard Honeycomb supports hardware acceleration).

So yeah maybe I'm just rationalizing, and if I could pick I would go for a higher resolution, but there are definitely advantages to a lower resolution. I usually only loads episodes of seinfeld or simpsons or whatever that aren't HD anyway... the only place I think I will really want higher resolution is web browsing, so I can see a page without constantly zooming in and out.

 

[xmr405o]

Totally agree. I wasn't even in the market for a tablet... well, not so soon anyway (considered saving money for the xoom), but I was shocked at this price. At first I thought I misread or misunderstood something!

About the screen resolution, I agree with that too - that is some poor, poor pixel density - the (somewhat) standard screen resolution for 3.5 to 4.3 inch phones is the same as a seven inch screen? Really?? Would it have been very expensive at all to make it at least the same as the galaxy tab, or just qHD like the Atrix/Bionic?

HOWEVER, there are some upsides to this that make it okay with me. Number one is that the higher the screen resolution is, the more work the chip has to do. Everyday things like flipping through home screens, launching games / apps, live wallpapers, and any other graphical thing will be easy as cake for the Tegra 2 on this display, so things should be as smooth as butter... especially once it gets optimized, and even more when dell or XDA makes a Honeycomb ROM (I heard Honeycomb supports hardware acceleration).

So yeah maybe I'm just rationalizing, and if I could pick I would go for a higher resolution, but there are definitely advantages to a lower resolution. I usually only loads episodes of seinfeld or simpsons or whatever that aren't HD anyway... the only place I think I will really want higher resolution is web browsing, so I can see a page without constantly zooming in and out.

It's a give and take situation. For that price and most of the hardware, the screen resolution can be forgiven.

I'm also assuming that there's going to be at least 512mb of RAM just like the original streak which to me is a big plus. I might return our nook and get this instead.

 

[dbpaddler]

That is a huge weakness though. I have wvga on my phone. With three extra inches of real estate I want a higher res. And no onboard hdmi either. Extra functionality on an accessory only is another big negative. Too Apple like for my tastes. I'll pass an would take the galaxy tab instead if I had to choose. I'm passing on both though.

The only thing weakness I see spec-wise is the screen resolution but other than that...it's pretty nice.

 

[xmr405o]

That is a huge weakness though. I have wvga on my phone. With three extra inches of real estate I want a higher res. And no onboard hdmi either. Extra functionality on an accessory only is another big negative. Too Apple like for my tastes. I'll pass an would take the galaxy tab instead if I had to choose. I'm passing on both though.

It depends on the user. Some users can get by with that resolution. I think both the Galaxy tab and Streak 7 match up pretty well. I'm just saying it's just another option for people looking for a 7 inch tab.

 

[dbpaddler]

I actually wanted to like the Streak 7, but I think with the screen and lack of on board connectivity, I just don't see the price being justified. It's just another ok 7" tablet in a sea of many OK 7" tablets. If it had the 600 res and hdmi on board I would've given it a shot in a heartbeat. Not to mention Dell's tweaks are more phone related than tablet related and don't take advantage of the extra real estate. So the software doesn't help with the user experience. The lackluster battery life doesn't help either. Take your pick of negative reviews. IGN Gear, Gizmodo, Engadget, Slashgear and the list could go on of negative reviews. Slashgear's review is actually a bit on the lacking side.

The only way the 7 matches up is in it's processor. It loses every place else. Bigger, heavier, bad screen (resolution, viewing angles, colors), bad software tweaks, lack of on board connectivity, and poor battery life. I'd stick with the Archos 70 or some Asian export for half the price if people are that desperate. Me, I'll just wait a month or two when the market will begin to flood with tablets that will easily up the ante.

 

[xmr405o]

I actually wanted to like the Streak 7, but I think with the screen and lack of on board connectivity, I just don't see the price being justified. It's just another ok 7" tablet in a sea of many OK 7" tablets. If it had the 600 res and hdmi on board I would've given it a shot in a heartbeat. Not to mention Dell's tweaks are more phone related than tablet related and don't take advantage of the extra real estate. So the software doesn't help with the user experience. The lackluster battery life doesn't help either. Take your pick of negative reviews. IGN Gear, Gizmodo, Engadget, Slashgear and the list could go on of negative reviews. Slashgear's review is actually a bit on the lacking side.

The only way the 7 matches up is in it's processor. It loses every place else. Bigger, heavier, bad screen (resolution, viewing angles, colors), bad software tweaks, lack of on board connectivity, and poor battery life. I'd stick with the Archos 70 or some Asian export for half the price if people are that desperate. Me, I'll just wait a month or two when the market will begin to flood with tablets that will easily up the ante.

Yeah I saw those today. How sad. Another tablet killed by the UI. I'm sure a person can hack this and install a custom rom and make it more functional but that's if the hackers actually bother to mess with this device.

 

[dbpaddler]

don't think the hackers will bother. Larger case, bad screen, bad battery. Not worth it when the processor is the only redeeming thing about it. The software will at least be overcome if Dell follows through with Honeycomb, but as we found out with Samsung, do you really want to buy a product based on expected future updates?

 

[falconeight]

It has the same ppi as the Ipad and I have never heard anyone complain about that.

 

[alnova1]

So far I love mine. I have an ipad also and I actually like the size of the7. I really don't see the screen resolution a problem but to each his own.

 

[xmr405o]

don't think the hackers will bother. Larger case, bad screen, bad battery. Not worth it when the processor is the only redeeming thing about it. The software will at least be overcome if Dell follows through with Honeycomb, but as we found out with Samsung, do you really want to buy a product based on expected future updates?

Looks like the modaco devs are working on the streak. That's good news for this tablet. They ported honeycomb just like the nook. Its still early in the dev stage but at least its a start.

 

[Jamace1]

I've had mine for about a week. I will be returning it to T-Mobile. It's a good thing they have a 14 day no penalty policy for contracts of 1 year or more. I wanted so much to like it.

Good:
The price: It's as low as you can probably go with a tablet or anything that's more than an E-reader.
Navigation: The turn by turn was almost instantaneous. I started the Nav app and selected to use voice search and, without any hiccups, I was being guided to my destination.
Design: the slanted sides feels good on your grip.

Bad:
Battery Life: I can't figure out what they were using to come up with their advertised 4 hour battery life. After browsing a couple of websites and watching some Youtube clips, the battery meter dropped down to half full. The bottom half went even quicker. I continued to have it on by browsing some more web sites and it didn't take long for the 15% warning to pop up.

Photos and videos. I admit I only took one of each at the default settings but one of each was enough. The photo was grainy. It was set to "Fine" instead of normal so I assumed the photo and video I took were going to be better quality than the "Normal" setting.

Costumer support: I followed all instructions on getting it to sync with my PC and none of the steps worked. I called CSR and they basically walked me through exactly the same things I just did. they directed me to the downloads page to download the sync app (which was supposed to be in the Streak 7 but was not) and the page showed nothing to download.

I tried a 3rd party app but that only let me transfer music, documents, and photos (not a real sync). I finally found the Dell Mobil Sync app by googling "download Dell Mobile Sync" and installed it only to find it did the same thing as the 3rd party app. I was disappointed that i could not sync my Outlook calendars, etc.

As for contacts, I would have to move my contacts in my PC from Outlook by hand to GMail. From GMail, I could retrieve the contacts. No way to Sync to Outlook (that I know of).

The USB cable, when plugged into the PC, did not charge the Streak 7. I had to use the wall adapter to charge it. I read somewhere that I had to buy the special dock that is compatible with the Streak 5 to be able to charge.

It has other pluses and minuses but at this price point, those would be just nit-picking. Not that I wasn't nit-picking all ready.

The two main reasons I am returning it is the battery life and costumer support could not help me because, as the CSR repeatedly told me, the Streak 7 is too new.