Archos 101 G9 review

What do you want from a tablet? It's a question that many reviews want you to ask yourself before invariably buying an iPad 2, but it's a question that's particularly relevant to the Archos 101 G9.

That's because Archos has focused on media playback for its latest machine, and it's done a pretty decent job of it. The Archos 101 G9 also happens to be a fully fledged Android 3.2 Honeycomb tablet at the same time. Plus there's the little point of cash - at £270 for 8GB, this is one of the most affordable Android 3.2 tablets that money can buy.

The obvious fear with any tablet focused on the budget market is that too many corners have been cut in order to bring it in at an iPad-destroying price point. But on paper, at least, there are no obvious miscarriages of silicon justice.

You get a 1GHz OMAP 4 dual-core processor courtesy of Texas Instruments, with a view to upgrading this to a faster 1.5GHz model in early 2012.

There are plenty of connection options - including a mini HDMI port, microSD slot and a standard micro USB port. And when it comes to the all-important display, you can rest assured that the 10.1-inch screen is capacitive (and responsive), and boasts a healthy native resolution of 1280 x 800 pixels.

The Archos 101 G9 comes in two different flavours, each defined by the storage options available. The basic unit packs 8GB of storage and has a list price of £270 (although you should be able to pick this up for around £250), while a 16GB model, the Archos 101 G9 Turbo, is going to be available at the start of 2012.

Potentially more interesting is the 250GB additional memory on the Archos 101 G9, which uses a traditional hard drive. This will obviously make the unit a little more fragile than your standard tablet, but for a media machine, that's plenty of space for hours and hours of movies.

Connection options for the base unit are limited to Wi-Fi and Bluetooth only, but Archos is keen to promote its 3G USB dongle that can be plugged into a special slot on the machine's underside. This doesn't make much sense if you're thinking of tethering this to your television, but it does enable you to extend the usefulness of the machine to compete against much more expensive options.

The dongle can be used with your PC as well, which ticks the versatility box nicely.