Archos’ $100 Tablet: Cheap. Worth It?

Archos has released its Android 2.2 tablet, the Arnova 7, featuring a seven-inch resistive TFT touchscreen (800×480 pixels). The bargain $100 price makes you think twice about something fishy going on (or at least, it did us).

For starters, Android Market access is not available. Further, the tablet is not running the tablet version of Google’s Android (3.0 or 3.1). Worse still, it is not even running the latest version of the mobile version (2.3).

Details are scarce, but we do know is that it supports 720p, and has 4GB of Flash memory. However, other important specifications like the processor, the battery time, etc are unknown. In this scenario, it is hard to recommend such a device. Maybe it’ll show its true colors hands-on, so it’s wise to stay put and wait a bit.

On a broader level, lack of coordination between Google and its clients makes for a very confused plethora of devices running the Android platform, with numerous also-rans such as (possibly) this one as a result. This explains to a great extent the lack of consumer satisfaction at the Android operating systems.

So Google, some terms and conditions are in order, no?