Travel Technology: Best Buy Insignia 8″ Tablet

Occasionally when I travel, I forget things. One of things I forgot this time was a tablet computer. So I decided to get a little tablet to help me during the days I was in the USA.

As I don’t demand a lot from these tablets (namely, I need it to show pictures off a MicroSD card), normally I go cheap when buying these devices.

So a trip to Best Buy in the John Hancock building yielded a device that might do the job – an Insignia 8″ Tablet – coming in at a reasonable $69+tax.

The specs – Image, Best Buy.

Insignia 8″ Tablet – Image, Best Buy – I honestly didn’t get a chance to take a photo of it… namely as my one was about to go flying through the nearest window by the end of my USA trip

So, the good things? It’s 8″ diagonal. It “runs” Android 6.0 and it’s got 16Gb of storage… and the display is passable.

That’s about it.

These sort of tablets can be either absolute bargains or junk. Those with memories will remember the Maylong 150 that was sold by Walgreens.… that was pure and utter junk.

Sadly, this device is more in the junk category than not. Why?

• Inability to set up the device on a non-protected network. My first major problem was that I wanted to connect to a network that required validation to use it. Sadly, Android Setup and the Tablet refused to play ball. I found a network in the end, but it was a pain. More an Android issue, but if it takes me an hour to do something that should take a few minutes… something is wrong.
• Lousy WiFi Performance – This is partly Hyatt’s fault as the location where I was wasn’t hot for WiFi. However, the device was dropping connectivity more than it was holding connectivity. Considering I wanted to shift files  across the network… it wasn’t awe-inspiring seeing the WiFi drop every five minutes or so. Other devices in the range held WiFi connectivity happily.
• Actual Performance – Sluggish at best would be my description. I don’t expect devices like these to speed whizzes, but I expect them to show a slide-show in a reasonable time. This… didn’t.
• Display – Whilst the resolution of the screen won’t win any fans (I didn’t care much to be honest), the brightness of the screen was…. lacking.
• And the person who designed the USB charge point for it needs to be taken away and fed to the wolves. Poor design to say the least when you’re trying to plug-in a cable and it’s not clear which way round it needs to go.

Bargain Tablets can vary. Some are not bad quality at all (I can think of a couple of Android tablets that have passed me that worked well (a HP Stream 7 that was reasonable). Heck – even the Windows tablets “just work” – I have a HP one I brought a couple of years ago that’s reasonable). Others are pure and utter junk.

This thing… falls sadly into the junk category.

In the end, I was frustrated with the thing, and managed to wipe the device, and returned it to Best Buy before I left the USA within the 15 day return frame.

Please. Don’t reach for this one if it’s on discount, sale or on offer you’re desperate at Best Buy. Spend a little more (such as an Amazon Fire, an Asus, heck – even a Samsung), and I’m sure you’ll be happier with the results.

Or even better – avoid buying the bottom end Android devices.

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