Looking for some feed back from the Nook guru's

[Mostly Harmless]

The other night I played with a Nook Color in the local BN store and was pretty amazed at this little device. The screen was bright and clear and the body was sturdy, the build quality felt like it was very high. So after playing around with it for a while I thought to myself, why couldn't I just buy this and use it as an android tablet? So a question to you guys is do you still enjoy your Nook as a tablet even with all these new tablets on the horizon? As someone who enjoys high end gadgets I have been waiting for one of these terga 2 honeycomb wifi tablets to come to the market. But after playing with the nook color I thought to myself that for what I really want to do with it, this device may suit me nicely. So I ask you these few questions:

1. Do you enjoy browsing the internet on it?
2. Does flash work alright on it?
3. Can you play all the decent games on it (angry birds, fruit ninja etc...)
4. If you had the choice (forget price) of picking the Nook Color or a Galaxy tab (the one out right now), which would you pick and why?
5. Any chance that there is bluetooth capabilities on the Nook?
6. How is the battery life?

I do plan on picking up a high end android tablet in the future, but from what I have been reading it will be a little while before the usefullness of Honeycomb will be realized (apps dedicated to that platform).

Any comments or concerns?

 

[HarleyChick]

The other night I played with a Nook Color in the local BN store and was pretty amazed at this little device. The screen was bright and clear and the body was sturdy, the build quality felt like it was very high. So after playing around with it for a while I thought to myself, why couldn't I just buy this and use it as an android tablet? So a question to you guys is do you still enjoy your Nook as a tablet even with all these new tablets on the horizon? As someone who enjoys high end gadgets I have been waiting for one of these terga 2 honeycomb wifi tablets to come to the market. But after playing with the nook color I thought to myself that for what I really want to do with it, this device may suit me nicely. So I ask you these few questions:

1. Do you enjoy browsing the internet on it?
2. Does flash work alright on it?
3. Can you play all the decent games on it (angry birds, fruit ninja etc...)
4. If you had the choice (forget price) of picking the Nook Color or a Galaxy tab (the one out right now), which would you pick and why?
5. Any chance that there is bluetooth capabilities on the Nook?
6. How is the battery life?

I do plan on picking up a high end android tablet in the future, but from what I have been reading it will be a little while before the usefullness of Honeycomb will be realized (apps dedicated to that platform).

Any comments or concerns?

You are going to get A LOT of feedback on this question! I'm definitely NOT a Nook Guru, but I've had a NC for 3 weeks, and I've tried a number of different things with it, so I can address some of your questions:

1. Yes, I do browse the internet on it without any problems.
2. Flash 10.1 - yes, BUT, you have to have Froyo (2.2), which you can get on an sd card with or without rooting. My NC is rooted, but I have Froyo on an sd card. Works great.
3. Games - yes. I'm hooked on Angry Birds right now.
4. I don't think you can answer this question without taking price into the equation. Price, and the fact that it is hard to brick the NC, is the primary reason I bought one, and I think that is true for many. Also, I'm already being sucked dry paying monthly charges for my cell phone that I was NOT going to pay even more for data. Wifi works just great for me
5. Don't know
6. My battery life has been great.

That's my take. I'm sure you will get a lot more from others. Good luck with your decision.

 

[stinky]

1. Yes, using Opera Mini, its very fast and smooth.
2. Flash works with Skyfire, or stock Browser, nothing else atm. It works fine
3. Yes.
4. If price werent an issue, I would opt for something higher end.
5. Yes, XDA has a nice thread going on about it.
6. Cant comment here, since I tinker with mine so much since I got it, I havent yet had time to gauge a decent "normal usage" estimate. It seems to be greater life than my Hero, which is greater than the EVO/Epic users are getting, so I'd say a full day at least on average usage.

Please note that to do all of this you have to be at least rooted, for Flash, you need to run Froyo, as no other build has it yet. Rooting this thing is very very easy. Getting Froyo on it is fairly easy compared to what I had to go through with the Hero. Setting up adb takes time and patience, but its required for a lot of things you'll have to do to get certain things going. Do a lot of research and reading before you buy, it seems easy but a slight hiccup somewhere can cost you lots of time and hassle to figure out.

This device wasnt meant to be a tab, but an eReader, the community of developers has done a great job at providing us with options and functionality. If you love to tinker, code, and customize, then go for it, if you want something thats easy, and works out of the box, shop elsewhere.

Performance seems to be on par with whats out today, obviously Tegra 2 will perform better, but the price point is a factor as well. If price werent an issue, I'd be getting a Xoom for sure, but since money is tight, and I had a few bucks to spare, I decided on this, and cant say that I regret it.

Hope that helps.

 

[xmr405o]

Dayam!!! look at HarleyChick go!

A few things that the nook doesn't have vs some full fledge tablets have that I care about but you or anyone else might not have an issue with.

USB 2.0
Built-in GPS- (There's a work around for that, just ignore all of the talk about floppy disks and dongles haha)
Bluetooth- It's being worked on.
Premium sound- It only has one speaker.

Other than those things, you can mod your nook to perform like a tablet. Just like what the previous posters above have stated. There's tons of options. Some have their own pros and cons. I love my nook and so does my family. I do not regret my purchase of the nook color. I would make the same choice again.

 

[Mostly Harmless]

Thanks for the replies so far. Can I ask what method you guys used to run froyo? I know there is a sticky on this page with instructions.

 

[HarleyChick]

Thanks for the replies so far. Can I ask what method you guys used to run froyo? I know there is a sticky on this page with instructions.

I'm using the sd card method found in this forum:

http://androidforums.com/b-n-nookcolor/286386-you-dont-have-root-nc-run-pure-android-2-2-a.html

Pros: does not touch the internal NC memory, so you don't have to worry about permanently changing your NC, and its very easy to configure the sd card. Cons: even with a class 6 8gb card, its just a touch laggy.

Trying to get the nerve to permanently put Froyo on my internal memory - I'm still a little wimpy about all this stuff.

 

[HarleyChick]

Dayam!!! look at HarleyChick go!

Hehehe. Hey - its only because I had such great teachers!

You can just move along now. I'll just go back over here and drink in all the knowledge that I can get from you, and UB, and bg, and.......

 

[stinky]

Coming from the Hero, I am used to always having everything I install internally, so its nothing new for me. Its quite safe, and even if it went haywaire, since the Nook boots from SD first, you can always recover it.

I am running Nookie Froyo internally. Once you root and get CWM set up, its as easy as going into CWM and wipiping data, flashing the ZIP file, and rebooting. Setting up GApps (market, Gmail, etc) was quite a pan since the flashabkle ZIP didnt seem to work, I had to manually code it in through adb, which is a pain to set up.

 

[nj02vette]

The other night I played with a Nook Color in the local BN store and was pretty amazed at this little device. The screen was bright and clear and the body was sturdy, the build quality felt like it was very high. So after playing around with it for a while I thought to myself, why couldn't I just buy this and use it as an android tablet? So a question to you guys is do you still enjoy your Nook as a tablet even with all these new tablets on the horizon? As someone who enjoys high end gadgets I have been waiting for one of these terga 2 honeycomb wifi tablets to come to the market. But after playing with the nook color I thought to myself that for what I really want to do with it, this device may suit me nicely. So I ask you these few questions:

1. Do you enjoy browsing the internet on it?
2. Does flash work alright on it?
3. Can you play all the decent games on it (angry birds, fruit ninja etc...)
4. If you had the choice (forget price) of picking the Nook Color or a Galaxy tab (the one out right now), which would you pick and why?
5. Any chance that there is bluetooth capabilities on the Nook?
6. How is the battery life?

I do plan on picking up a high end android tablet in the future, but from what I have been reading it will be a little while before the usefullness of Honeycomb will be realized (apps dedicated to that platform).

Any comments or concerns?

1. Very much. Screen is high resolution and most web pages display nicely.
2. As other mentioned, you either have to run 2.2 (Froyo) on an SD card, or install the ROM over the original software to get flash capability.
3. Most of the common games work fine. I can't say all, but every game I've put on has worked.
4. I like the Nook Color, but that's a tough question. GTab has lower res screen, but comes with 2.2 out of the box, cameras, HDMI output, official support, warranty, etc. All else equal, I'd probably get the GTab. But price is certainly a factor, and the GTab's extras aren't worth the extra cash. Actually, I'm pretty sure I'm also going to get a Xoom Wifi when available, but will be keeping the Nook Color.
5. There is a BT radio built in that is disabled. Mods are working on getting that working. 50/50 whether that feature will ever be enabled.
6. Battery life is excellent, lasting quite a while. I'd estimate 8-10hrs continuous use. Full day of typical use shouldn't be a problem. But if your idea of battery life is to be able to play HD movies constantly for an entire day, then it will fall short of expectations.

 

[ghodzilla5150]

I LOVE having the NC as a Tablet. I am running Honeycomb on it and it runs pretty smooth for what I need (Surf Webz, Check E-Mail, Play some Angry Birds) either from couch or out and about. I have a rooted HTC EVO and have Wireless Tether and can connect my NC to the EVO while I am away from a WiFi network. One great thing about the NC is it plays Emulators (SNES, NES, Genesis) and their ROM's very, very well. I am really impressed with this aspect. The 7" form factor is perfect for Emulators. I was in BestBuy and downloaded some ROM's to the Xoom and it was just too damn big to hold and play comfortably. Plus the gorgeous screen makes games like Legend Of Zelda and Super Metroid pop off the screen. There is not a better option for the price point. I use Skyfire as my Browser and it's pretty darn good.

 

[Mostly Harmless]

Well I brought one.

 

[loribug26]

5. There is a BT radio built in that is disabled. Mods are working on getting that working. 50/50 whether that feature will ever be enabled.

Why would they do that if it's not meant to be used?

 

[xmr405o]

Why would they do that if it's not meant to be used?

B&N probably turned it off because they put out a device meant as an Ereader but since this device can be turned into a tablet, BT would be useful.

For example, BT can be used to connect keyboards, speakers, headsets, and possibly connect the Nook to a phone via BT for gps location or wireless tethering.

Bluetooth will probably be the best way to add peripherals that the nook lacks since it does not have a USB port or something similar.

 

[stinky]

Why would they do that if it's not meant to be used?

Short Answer, because we can.