Recently Indian tablet market has started seeing the dawn of low cost Google Android tablets from nearly every low cost mobile manufacturer. Very recently in this regard we see the making of a milestone when the Aakash tablet was launched in India and due to its ultra-low cost, it grabbed a lot of attention.
Fly, a popular low cost mobile handset brand in India, had also announced the launch of its latest low cost Android tablet for the Indian market sometime back in the form of the Fly Vision. At Rs 7,200 maximum retail price, this tablet tries to make a balance between performance and pocket friendliness but how well it fairs in the real world scenario, let’s check out.
Look
To begin with, the Fly Vision although is a low cost device but it surely does not displays any such characteristics in the way it looks. The Vision surely impresses by its bold looks and matte black colour finish.
The phone comes in a carbon graphite colour which looks great and gives it a very bold and a professional type of appeal and appearance. The matter colour finish of the Fly Vision also aids in the handling of the device as it allows a firm grip on the device as well.
Design
The design of the device is very similar to any other 7 inch low cost tablet out there. But the device is without any doubt slim and lightweight that additionally makes it easier to hold and carry as well. The device just features a single home screen button and keeping in mind the Indian weather and habits, the whole area around the key gets an additional brushed metal strip that resists smudges and marks.
The display utilises a resistive touch technology and therefore the screen level has been raised form all the corners so that while keeping the device or transporting it, the screen does not get pressed or worked upon accidentally.
The Screen
The Fly Vision in order to make it low cost fitted a resistive touch based low Resolution display. The screen size of the display is a standard 7 inch that features an 800 x 480 pixel resolution. In terms of colour reproduction and brightness levels, the display is not highly impressive but it works just fine.
The low resolution is one of the major constraints as most things look slightly pixilated and dull. The resistive touch of the screen however works great and is certainly better than most touch screens out there. For a layman, this screen will be just fine as the touch input is sensitive enough while the whole display package is ok.
Due to the inclusion of the Rockchip 2818 processor, the device gets 720p video playback, but then again the display resolution is too low for enjoying the high definition content.
Build Quality
The device features a hard plastic body which is sturdy enough to handle most day to day jerks and bruises. But the bigger 7 inch display might be a little too fragile for a drop. Overall the device has a good built quality like the other devices coming from the manufacturers stable.
Performance
The Fly Vision tablet features a 600 MHz Processor with an integrated display processor provided by Rockchip. In terms of Android requirement, the 600 MHz processor is like the bare minimum configuration you can have to run a device. The processor is coupled with 256MB or RAM which is again the bare minimum in terms of configuration.
With the bare minimum hardware configuration, the table features a decent performance but no multi tasking. It is good for singular tasks and that’s about it.
For internet connectivity, the device features connectivity thorough WiFi and USB dongles. WiFi is good and speedy while USB dongles will take a hell lot of time to perform as there is support for really a few popular names in this regards as well.
Multimedia
The Fly Vision in terms of multimedia performance is good as due to the inclusion of Froyo 2.2, most of its applications can be installed on to SD card. There are also some specialised applications to keep the system fast.
There is a long list of audio and video codecs supported by this tablet natively plus users can easily download application from the Android marketplace as it is a registered Android device. The device features a 4 GB of internal storage memory which can be expanded up to 32 GB via SDHC cards.
The Fly Vision also features a nice 1.3 Megapixel camera without flash. The quality of the camera is good in bright light to medium light conditions while in low light the camera automatically adjusts the shutter speed to compensate the brightness loss. Ultimately it works as a great camera but due to a low resolution it is just for occasional snapping and nothing beyond that.
Battery life
One of the biggest disadvantages of the Fly vision is its battery that has failed miserably to impress us.
The Vision has a 4000 mAh battery which is big but strangely fails to power this device for abundant time. The battery pack powers the device for a maximum of 4 hours of usage time which is not at all good for a tablet.
The device also takes a longer time of around 5.30 to 6 hours to fully charge the device and at that cost a backup time of 4 hours is simply not acceptable. You can also use the PC USB connection to charge the device but hardly any difference in time for getting it charged came to our notice.
Finally
The Fly Vision tablet no doubt is easy on the pocket and offers decent performance for the price. We would not say that this device is an absolute bang for the buck but it just barely makes to the point where we can suggest people that they can opt for this but only if they need a very basic device.