14 DAY TRIAL // In a market where tablets sell for an average of $500, the Indian government basically caused tremors when it created a tablet that has a subsidized price of $35.
The $35 (26 Euro) Aakash tablet, even though it sells for $60-$65 (48 Euro) in retail, was put through an early preview by VentureBeast.
Needless to say, no one would actually expect too much from such a cheap item. After all, if the common tablet costs so much more, it isn't very likely that this will be any good.
It turns out that, while the Aakash is, indeed, not as formidable as the iPad or whatever else, it is still more than passable.
In fact, the folks over at VentureBeast seemed to be quite impressed, as the slate that was supposed to make do with little indeed makes do, and then some.
There was mention that the resistive touch is slower than what other media tablets can accomplish.
The preview also said that the web browsing was a bit slow, which was actually a reason for surprise when it came to videos.
One would expect the slow scrolling response and overall underwhelming web browsing to include stutter in video streaming and such.
It turns out that this wasn't the case at all, even when watching a clip from a Bollywood film on YouTube.
Of course, using the product does consume its charge pretty fast (180 minutes, three hours as it were).
Then again, this is supposed to be an educational device, for students and such, which means that the classroom is where they will stay, for the most part.
Presumably, there should be plenty of power sources available in such places, so even if the tablet does end up using the AC adapter a lot, it will still be able to perform whenever necessary.
Finally, the Aakash was very light, weighing about as much as two smartphones, and yet still has many practical things, like two USB ports instead of just one, for a keyboard and an external flash stick or HDDs, or whatever else.
The device may have the possibility to use 32 GB memory cards, but the built-in storage is still 2 GB, so having an extra storage drive connected always helps.