Google’s Nexus 7 Tablet shows that cheap tablets can work

Android tablets have been an overwhelming disappointment so far. Despite promising so much, the user interfaces have been clunky, content is questionable and the hardware itself has lacked the elegant desirability of an iPad. But that’s all about to change with Google’s Nexus 7 tablet.

Launching in mid-July for the completely reasonable asking price of $250, the Nexus tablet is manufactured by ASUS and features a 7-inch 1280 x 800 pixel HD IPS display, a front facing 1.2MP camera, quad-core Tegra 3 processor and inbuilt NFC, Wi-Fi, and GPS chips. It will run the newest version of Android, dubbed Jelly Bean, and comes in both 8GB and 16GB versions for $249 and $299 respectively.

The whole concept of the tablet is to take advantage of the Google Play store. There’s no expandable memory card slot, so Google wants users to use its cloud-based services to enjoy everything the tablet has to offer. The problem is that many of those services aren’t yet available in Australia. While you can now rent movies and buy music through Google Play down under, you don’t get TV shows, or the ability to buy movies just yet.

Still, given it’s an officially Google-endorsed tablet with state of the art hardware and software and it’s not much more expensive than the cheap tablets from the likes of Kogan, it’s certainly going to help blow the tablet market wide open. Who’s going to buy one?

Price: $249 (8GB); $299 (16GB)
Web: Google