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As with any other tablet, you'll be consuming a whole lot more media than you will be creating, and for this the Tegra Note actually strikes a nice balance in weight and size, while the stereo front-facing speakers give a wide, if not deafening experience that was slightly louder than those on my HTC one, though not quite as good quality. If you've got the compatible technology, then making use of the Miracast wireless streaming can provide a cinematic alternative – giving it a leg-up on the Nexus 7.
HD movies look great on the screen, and thanks to the wide viewing angles of the IPS screen, even friends can comfortably share in watching videos on the tablet, and because of the tactile rubberised rear, the Note doesn't feel like it'd get tiring to hold for extended periods of time.
Movies and photos are viewable through the standard Android gallery app, which is straightforward to navigate, but a little on the boring side compared to some of updated galleries you'll find on HTC and Samsung devices. There's no built in music player as an alternative to Google Music – which is no bad thing, as Google Music itself is a fantastic app and plays music stored locally or in Google's cloud without issue.
Nvidia hasn't attempted to gain any share in profits from music, movies, TV, books and magazines with the Note, instead leaving those duties for Google Play to attend to - and with ease it does. There's now an impressive array of content available from Google, that can be purchased with great ease thanks to the way your Google ID is so well integrated in to Android.
I tried searching for some more unusual artists in Google Music, and was able to purchase some toe-tapping modern Bluegrass I didn't expect to find for £7.49. TV episodes for the big stuff like Game of Thrones will set you back £1.89 an episode, while movies can be had from as little as £0.99 for a rental, or £3.49 for a purchase; with more than you'll find on Amazon's 7" Kindle Fire HDX, and only a little less choice than on iTunes.
Music
Music quality is excellent through headphones – I tried a variety of headphones including a set of Monster NCredible NTune on-ear headphones, a set of Pioneer in-ear headphones and a set of Sony Bluetooth headphones. I never heard any unwanted background noise or hissing through any music source, and while the sound is not quite as rich as that from my HTC One, it was better than other tablets I've tried.
As I mentioned earlier, the speakers are actually pretty impressive compared to most tablets, and surpasses any other seven-inch tablet with proper stereo speakers that can go pretty loud, and retain a decent amount of depth to the sound without sounding painfully tinny.
Where books and magazines are concerned, it's no Amazon, and again falls short a little to Apple's own Newsstand, but the variety caters for all the top sellers and major publications.
So with most of the major boxes ticked for media availability in one Googly package, It does make you wonder why some manufacturers insist on confusing things with their own (often mediocre) content portals. Thankfully, Nvidia is far more concerned with trying to get you gaming on your tablet without attempting any half-baked competitor to Google Play.
Apps and games
At your service once again, the Tegra Note's apps come exclusively from the Play Store. Even their own TegraZone will divert you back out to Google's store for Tegra-optimised titles. If nothing else, this is further testament that apps and games are no longer falling short of Apple's iOS App Store.
There's still quite an abundance of poorer quality apps, and tablet support is still not hugely uniform (a legacy of Google's lax approach to app quality control), but fortunately you should find all the apps you'd ever need. Of course if you choose, you can always sideload apps from alternative app stores, but there's rarely an app these days that isn't available, or widely catered for by a third-party alternative.
With Nvidia's gaming heritage, I was expecting top-notch gaming performance, as has already been proven by the Nvidia Shield. Without fault, the Tegra 4 processor does a class-leading job in delivering top graphics performance along with exclusive visual extras over non-Tegra devices with no notable slow-down or graphical glitches.
