HP Slate 7Quick, what’s the best 7-inch Android tablet money can buy? And by “money,” I mean less than 200 bucks. Asus and Google’s Nexus 7, you say? Amazon’s Kindle Fire HD? How about HP’s Slate 7?

No, the Slate 7 is not the best Android tab out there. Not even close. But it’s cheap. So cheap in fact that it makes the N7 look like a luxury product.

Initially made available for $170, HP’s 7-incher goes for 30 bucks less starting today, both via the manufacturer’s official website and through Best Buy. $140 is a ridiculously low amount of cash to pay for a gadget nowadays and the Slate 7 does offer a couple of goodies for that dough.

Like Android 4.1 Jelly Bean. And a dual-core 1.6 GHz processor that’s not so very bad. Plus, you get Beats Audio sound enhancement, which is really a unique feature for low-cost tablets.

On the flipside, the 1,024 x 600 pixels resolution screen is about as sub-par as they come, there are only 8 gigs of internal storage, the battery is non-removable and a little too “slender” for our taste, not to mention the tab is a tad chunky, measuring 10.7 mm in thickness.

But again, at just $140 the HP Slate 7 is a definite steal. Go on and buy it while you can, what are you waiting for?

This post originally appeared on GadgeTell.

NO COMMENTS

The TeleRead community values your civil and thoughtful comments. We use a cache, so expect a delay. Problems? E-mail newteleread@gmail.com.