The moment you’ve all been patiently waiting for has arrived and it’s time to get down to business with our top 10 list of the best tablets for back to school 2011. With so many new tablets on the scene this year it’s not easy making a selection, but never fear because we’re always here to help!
That’s right everyone, today we continue our Tablet PC Back to School Guide and present you with 10 of the hottest tablet PCs now on the market. What, you seriously didn’t think we’d leave you hanging like that before fall semester classes started did you? This list includes some of the best deals and available specs for tablets currently for sale to help you get the most from your hard earned money. We know going to school isn’t cheap and budgeting is important for students so we hope this list helps!
Well, we’ve kept you waiting long enough let’s get right to it!
Top 10 Tablets For Back to School 2011
Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1
Key Features
The Galaxy Tab 10.1 from Samsung is one of the few tablets that have been able to even slightly rival against the iPad. It’s well designed, built solid, thin and fully loaded with great specs and features.
Operating System
Android™ 3.1 Honeycomb
Price: $499.99 (32GB Wi-Fi) on Amazon
Asus Eee Pad Transformer
Key Features
The 10.1 inch Transformer tablet is a wonderful choice for back to school. It’s fast with the NVIDIA® Tegra™ 2 1.0GHz dual-core CPU, plays 1080p video and there’s also an optional keyboard dock available.
Operating System
Android™ 3.1 Honeycomb
Price: $352.99 on Amazon
iPad 2
Key Features
The iPad 2, there, enough said. Seriously though, the touch screen tablet that started a whole new trend just keeps improving plus there’s now more than 100,000 apps to choose from!
Operating System
iOS 4.3.5 (soon to be 5.0)
Price: $499.00 and up on Amazon
Toshiba Thrive
Key Features
Built solid and comes with ports galore. Full-sized SD slot, check. USB, check. HDMI sockets, check. Fast processor and high quality camera, check. Is there anything else you really need to know?
Operating System
Android™ 3.1 Honeycomb
Price: $399.99 and up on Amazon
HTC Flyer
Key Features
This is easily one of our favorite 7-inch Android tablets. It doesn’t run Honeycomb but it’s affordable, performs well and gets the job done. You can’t help but appreciate it’s solid aluminum design too.
Operating System
Android 2.3 Gingerbread
Price: $489.99 and up on Amazon
HP TouchPad
Key Features
The HP TouchPad is truly innovative. There’s not as many options (YET) when it comes to available apps, but it’s one of the best priced tablets available and the first ever inductively charged tablet on the market.
Operating System
webOS 3.0.2
Price: $399.99 and up on Amazon
Acer Iconia Tab A100
Key Features
The Acer Iconia Tab A100 might be cheap but don’t let the price fool you, seriously. It’s a smooth running and powerful tablet and also the first 7-inch tablet to run the latest Android 3.2 operating system.
Operating System
Android 3.2
Price: $329.00 and up on Amazon
ExoPC Slate
Key Features
What would a top 10 list be without a Microsoft Windows 7 tablet? That would be about as useful as a car without an engine. This Windows tablet is absolutely loaded with tons of great specs, no joke!
Operating System
Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium, 32-bit Edition
Price: $649.00 on Amazon
Vizio Tablet
Key Features
The 8-inch Android powered Vizio tablet makes up for it’s small 2GB storage space in many areas including it’s microSD card slot, long battery life and high-density display just to name a few.
Operating System
Android 2.3
Price: $289.87 and up on Amazon
Acer Iconia Tab A500
Key Features
This 10.1 inch Honeycomb powered tablet is one of the better designed slates on the market. It comes equipped with lots of goodies, has a front and rear facing camera and also a 10 hour average battery life.
Operating System
Android™ 3.1 Honeycomb
Price: $355.00 on Amazon
Conclusion
So there you have it, our top 10 tablet PC list of 2011 completed just in time for the back to school rush. Sure, there’s a lot more tablets nowadays to choose from and some choices listed above were easier than others, but we did our best to pull off a comprehensive list just for you. Our goal was to provide a list that included a wide range of tablet PC suggestions with various operating systems, sizes and price ranges.
Just like we mentioned in our tablet PC buyers guide series, owning a touch screen tablet is #5 on life’s top necessities list. I’m still not sure how food and water trumped portable slates in regards to importance but I guess that’s just another one of life’s numerous mysteries.
What are your thoughts on the tablets mentioned above? Do you have other suggestions or more you’d like to add to this back to school guide? Please share your thoughts and opinions below, we’d love to hear them!