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Tuesday 3 September 2013

Acer Iconia A3 cheap and cheerful 10-inch Android tablet

If you thought the days of larger, 10-inch tablets were gone -- think again. Despite the popularity of gadgets like the Nexus 7 and iPad mini, Acer is carrying the torch for larger slates with its new Iconia A3.
Revealed just ahead of the IFA tech trade show in Berlin, this 10-inch device goes head-to-head with the larger iPad andGoogle's Nexus 10, though has a 1,280x800 pixel display, which isn't as many pixels as you'd find in some of its rival devices.
That's certainly a downside, but with any luck that screen looks clear and colourful enough that we forget its pixel-density shortcomings. Inside you get a 1.2GHz quad-core processor, so hopefully we won't have to worry about sluggish performance, and graphically demanding games can remain on the menu.

Elsewhere there's a Micro-HDMI port for hooking this tablet up to your TV, and a microSD card slot to bump up the on-board storage. A 5-megapixel camera lurks on the back, though holding this chunky tablet up to take photos is unlikely to boost your street cred.
On the software side, you get Android version 4.2 Jelly Bean, and an Acer tweak called -- brilliantly -- Intellispin, which will let the tablet know which way its user is facing, even when it's laying flat.
The best bit of news is that this tablet's going to be quite cheap. The Wi-Fi version of the A3 will cost 249 euros when it launches in October, and the 3G version, set to debut a month later, will cost 299 euros.
That equates to roughly $330 and $395 respectively, though for now the A3 is only confirmed to arrive in Europe, the Middle East and Africa.
We'll shortly be getting our mitts on the A3 to try it for ourselves, so if you're intrigued by Acer's latest offering make sure you bookmark this page, and check back later for hands-on photos and video.

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