My first impression was : WOW, this UI is made for tablets! It is clean and large. Menu was on screen and the locations and labels are not very alien to Android users. However, it is a total different UI to Android 1.x or 2.x.
Read more about it after the jump. Lot of pictures, but pardon the quality; taken using my SGS phone camera.
Here are some pictures of the Acer Iconia A500. But am not reviewing the device this round, am reviewing the Honeycomb Android 3.0 UI. For more info on the Acer A500 (Click Here)
Alright, on to the Honeycomb review. The overall feel of the Home screen make it feel very "homey" indeed. As if the OS was built for large screen devices. Not like Galaxy Tab running on Froyo 2.2 which feels like using a larger screen Galaxy S phone.
It still has multiple pages for Widgets, App shortcuts, updates/feeds, clocks and all kinds of info to be placed on the home screen pages. The space is very generous and on a 10" device, the feeds from widgets can be scrolled in their little windows. Cramping more info in 1 page.
Back, Home and Multitask app switch buttons are on the bottom left. These are no longer hardware keys in Honeycomb, so I guess big LCD players like Samsung will try to make border less LCD panels for tablets. 10" device with a 10" screen...how neat is that. Can I patent it?
Bottom right is where you find your usual Notification bar items from Android 2.x. However, this adopted slightly some Microsoft OS's system bar concept. Slide it open; Windows users might find themselves at home here with a little extras : Settings & Brightness settings can be easily accessed here.
Now this is something cool. Tapping on the + button on the top right lets you add widgets, app shortcuts, feeds and many others to the home screen. The 5 default pages will be shown at the top part of the screen while you scroll thru the bottom for your widgets or apps that you want to place on the home screen. The interface and animations are so smooth, it was almost "Minority Report-ish"
The Android 3.0 also has a different Android market look and feel. Categories are displayed on the right, some top picks on the top (Animated in a carousel). The contents are generally the same, just the visuals.
Sorry for the quality of the pictures as it is very hard to avoid glare and reflection on the shiny device. I also had limited time to play around with it. So here are some Summary on Android 3.0
PROS :
- Good interface, built for tablets
- Nice visual items like drop shadows, 3D- curved looking pages
- All virtual buttons are on screen and still does not take up much space
- Improved Keyboard, Text selection (copy, paste), dragdrop
- Easier crossover for current PC users to self-learn Android 3.0
- Improved eMail. (Galaxy Tab has it's own email which is better than Galaxy S email, but this one is better)
CONS :
- Animations a bit laggy (Not sure if it is because of the device itself)
- The Android experience improved but still a bit too nerdy. (Compare to iOS experience)
- The add widget drawer is impressive but make no sense to take up 2/3 of the page
That's all from my initial review... I hope to be able to test the Android 3.0 on the new Samsung Galaxy Tab 2 10.1" which was redesigned after the iPad2 announcement. I heard it will be fantastic!
Honeycomb was great.....hope it will launch for Galaxy S....Because the i know the minimum screen requirement is 4" with 480 X 800. Which galaxy S is capable to support.
ReplyDeleteWishing that honeycomb will launch...