After a few months, I decided to look again into the tablet world. QVC had the Velocity Micro Cruz T301 tablet for about $190, roughly $60 cheaper than anywhere else. Despite the fact that it was QVC selling the tablet, and I'm a guy, I decided to go for it. I had tried out a different Velocity Micro tablet (T103) that was on display at Borders; the build quality seemed acceptable, and the price was pretty good for the advertised features.
What were those features? The T301 was, first of all, partnered with Amazon and had the Kindle ebook app pre-installed. Second, the T301 had a capacitive screen, so no more poking the screen with a fingernail to select items. Third, the screen was in a 4:3 ratio, meaning that like the iPad, text should be larger when browsing the internet while held in portrait mode.
When I opened the box, I was hopeful this would be my ideal reading tablet. The price was right, the tablet seemed solidly constructed, the instruction manual was short but helpful, the tablet was fully charged, and there was even a display stand to use the tablet as a picture frame. But then I turned it on.
After an hour or so, I was trying hard to still like the tablet despite its flaws. First, the screen, while acceptable during initial testing, was clearly not high quality. Text was fuzzy, more so than the 800x600 resolution would warrant. Text was fuzzier than on my wife's 3rd generation iPod touch. Since the T301 is sold as an eReader or Reading Tablet, text clarity is crucial, and the tablet fails on that count.
Second, the apps crashed. All the time. I had assumed the Kindle for Android app would at least work, since that was the main one that was advertised. I signed in, downloaded a few books, and opened one I'd read with no problems on my iPod. The app crashed with a "force close" error. One or two books worked, but if a book had any special formatting, it would crash the app. Restarted the tablet didn't help. Upgrading the app via the included "Cruz Market" also didn't help. I'm guessing that insufficient RAM may have been a culprit, but it's hard to tell.
After constant crashes in the Kindle app, I decided to try some other e-reader apps. The Nook app wouldn't install. The Kobo app installed but I didn't have sufficient time to test it. Probably, the failure to install was due to the tablet only using Android 2.0.
Since I couldn't get any reading apps to work, I decided to try the web browser. The screen, while capacitive as advertised, is nothing like an iPod Touch, or even a basic Android phone. Instead, you have to press firmly to scroll. The web browser crashed. The tablet even rebooted at one point while trying to use the browser.
A few other basic apps were included (email, facebook, etc), and those mostly worked. But I didn't buy the tablet to check email or update Twitter; I wanted to read my Kindle books.
Time to call tech support. After finding the right menu options, I was at queue position 36. Two hours and fifteen minutes later, I was finally at queue position 2. When I got through and the phone started ringing, I discovered my two hours of waiting had landed me in...a voicemail box. There was no apology, no "sorry to keep you waiting for two hours when you could have left a message after 5 minutes." I left a message, expecting a call back the next day. I hadn't gotten a call back by noon, so I called in again. Once again, queue position 25. I called sales. They were also busy. I called PR and got in touch with a friendly but unempowered individual who promised to have support call me back "as soon as possible." By midnight Thursday night, there was still no call. Repeated attempts to reach tech support earlier on Thursday landed me in the queue at positions 26, 18, and 15.
Maybe I got a defective unit. But I couldn't confirm this, because I could never get through to tech support. Or sales. And the tablet crashed constantly.
The T301 went back to QVC.
What did I learn? Even if the hardware is acceptable, buying from a company that doesn't have much experience with programming software for mobile devices, and especially from a company with poor customer service, will cause you to regret your purchase.
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