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When you think about giving someone an Android tablet as a gift, you might automatically assume you’ll have to spend hundreds of dollars to find what you need. While those hundred dollar tablets are certainly worth their skin, some people just might not have that kind of dough to throw around, especially if they have half a dozen people to take care of as far as gifts go this holiday season.
Datawind recently announced plans to bring one such tablet to the United States, with the London-based firm bringing a full-featured tablet for just $38. It’ll be named the UbiState C7, a 7-inch 480 x 800 Android 4.0 tablet with a 1GHz single-core processor and just 4GB of internal storage. Not a looker by any stretch of the imagination, but if you want to enable friends and family with cheap and easy access to the internet, this is probably the way to go.
Don’t want to wait? Good news — you won’t have to! Big Lots is already doing Datawind one better by selling this 4.3-inch “tablet” for just $30. We’d consider it more of a personal media player at this size. The Trio Stealth Lite apparently comes with Android 4.1 Jelly Bean, a 1.2GHz processor, 4GB of internal storage, a rear-facing camera, and more. You’ll have to head to your local Big Lots store if you want in on it, but that might be a small price to pay if all you’re looking for is a cheap device for basic needs.
This thing sells in India as the Akash, and it even has USB OTG support at that price. Performance is too bad though, but for $40, you can’t complain.
You guys should know better than recommending anyone buy a single core processor device. They will be happy with it for about a week and then regret it and not even eb able to sell it.
I don’t even think I’d want to sell it on. How much of a return could you even expect for selling it on? This is Car Boot Sale-material if you ever choose to get rid of it.
I am pretty sure it would be fine for a little kid.
That is the market I see for this. They break things all the time, so a cheap device is perfect.
While that may be the intended target, the ones we will hear from are the one’s that bought it expecting a usable device and blaming Android – trolling the forums about how slow, laggy and ugly “Android” is compared to…whatever else they may have heard is just so gosh darn amazing.
whats the resell value on something used that was $30 brand new?
the catch is you have to also give the person you sell it to $10. try that for resale value. lol
This is not god advice for people new to Android looking for a cheap Android tablet.
Nor is it good advice
This would make a good alarm clock that could display the weather when you get up (put it on a picture frame stand?) or something like that you could keep by the toilet/bath or in the kitchen or some place where it doesn’t matter if it gets destroyed/messy
Never looked at it this way! thats a good idea, alarm clock!
That is a great idea! Some digital picture frames used to sell for $25 on black friday and all they do is show pics. Awesome.
Unless the speakers suck.
if 4.3″ is considered a tablet what is anything bigger than that considered nowadays? Lol
A phablet…
LOL…
wait Big Lots! I don’t know if it’s the same everywhere in America but where I’m from if you saw a Big Lots you were officially in the hood. I suggest ordering online.
That is not the case through all of America. YMMV -.-
Some cities aren’t as skank as yours. We have plenty of Big Lots in middle-suburbia where I live.
You feel good about yourself? Since you called my city skank I will show how idiotic your comment just made you look. How does the amount of Big Lots have to do with anything. Bravo to your city for having tons of Big Lots. Also if it’s plenty of Big Lots in your area then YOUR AREA is the hood lol
It’s more like…your comment came off as elitist. We all know you’re not that elite.
Thanks for explaining like an adult. I speak from experience. I’m from the hood. Gary, Indiana born and raised guess what… we had one Big Lots. You go to the nicer neighborhoods and you didn’t see one. In my area big lots served as the dividing line just like Churches chicken or any neon sign that read “checks cashed” outside of a liquor store
Great tablet for little kid :D
Oh yeah I’m sure games will run great on a single core processor #sarcasm
Not everyone needs a tablet that can run Dead Trigger 2. Quit being an elitist douche.
It would make a good door stopper
So would your face
This is good as a quick toy to put in the car for the kids on a long trip. Or like someone said already, a great alarm clock and picture frame.
Still has more functions than an iPhone.
The perfect passive aggressive gift to an ex or frenemy.
Does it run kitkat or cupcake
Read the article
Interesting.. I’ve been looking for a tablet for my coffee table to use as Chromecast remote.
I doubt this will do it for you. Maybe. I’ve been thinking the same thing.
Yeah I’m most likely going to get an older nexus 7. Even if its just a remote for me itll be what guests use for quick internet access and I want them to have a good impression of Android :).
The description on big lots has it listed as 4.0. Where did you get 4.1 from?
My fault. It’s says 4.1 in the title but the description says 4.0. So which is it lol
I don’t think this should be promoted. It’ll lead people to have horrible experiences with Android and leave us for Apple. E.g. my uncle and his Polaroid? tablet, garbage.
I doubt people who buy low-end $30-$40 hardware are going to buy a far pricier iOS device next.
You would be surprised …
I don’t mean only tablet wise, but they’ll consider an iPhone purchase instead of Android first if they had a bad taste the first time around.
Just picked one up at big lots. Definitely 4.0 and screen resolution blows. Gonna play with it tonight and probably return it tomorrow
It is these devices that have given Android a bad name. I have known people who buy crap Android phones and then leave for the iPhone and complain about it. If they bought a high-end Android device, they wouldn’t have had the issues they had.
Agreed. A shame Google cannot somehow cut off these unauthorized devices after 4.x. I knew someone who bought their kid a $99 Craig tablet at CVS in 2011, deemed it and Android both crap, then bought an iPad Mini last Christmas after hearing a year of relentless complaining.
Exactly. This, and other devices like it, will probably sell more iPads than Apple’s marketing department.
Not everyone needs a Nexus 7. Not everyone can afford even a Memo Pad. Not everyone wants to shell out a coupe of hundred for a 5 year old kid to play Candy Crush. This is a great thing for people who don’t make a lot of money, but still would like a tablet.
I personally have a 2013 Nexus 7. That’s me. For my 6 year old niece? Her mom is a single mother and can’t afford such an expensive extravagance. This is do-able though. So quit hating.
People need to know what they’re getting into. Datawind isn’t pretending their tablet is a Nexus 7. I have Nexus 7 (both versions), and I ordered the Datawind tablet anyway. It’s interesting and at under $50 delivered I should get enough education out of it to make it worthwhile. It is intriguing as this is a device that tens of millions of schoolchildren in India are going to be using every day. I’m learning Android app development and it will be interesting if I can make apps that do well on it. I bet I can. Other than that it will give good service as a Chromecast remote.
I bought a bunch of the $100 cheap Chinese resistive tablets last Christmas for my kids. The browser and app experience was not the best in the world but it was
workable, and I’m not an elementary school kid in India who’s never seen
a tablet before. One of those actually made it through the summer. One didn’t last through February. They got enough use that I don’t feel bad about having spent the money – it costs $100 just to take the family out to a 2 hour movie. It was a good intro to tablet tech, and they would have broken iPads too – at horrific expense. Our kids get Nexus tablets this year so I hope they learned their lesson about being careful or doing without.
Datawind has delivery issues so I doubt I’ll see my new toy before Easter if ever, but that’s a different thing.
I was wrong. Got it right away. It is great. See above. No worries.
Went and picked one up for my younger daughter today, It comes pre-rooted and I was able to upload google play easily. Thing isn’t to shabby for 30 bucks
Looks like I’m returning it. Runs a tablet version of 4.0 and there is no play store. It does come with the Amazon app store but it’s so tiny that it’s almost unusable. Do not buy
On most of these, it’s simplicity itself to add the Play Store by downloading the APK and side-loading the Play Store. It took me all of 5 minutes to do this with my nieces’ tablets this year before my mother shipped them off to them.
You are not talking about the Datawind tablet. It arrived with 4.2.2.
This will give Android a bad name, there should be some minimum specs issued by Goodly or be banned from accessing the play store.
I ordered this tablet late Monday night. $37.97 + $9.99 shipping, via Paypal. Strangely, no sales tax. It arrived with today’s mail. I have the thing in my hand, so I may be just a teensy bit more qualified to say what it is like.
It is completely legit. It does not give Android a bad name. Comes with charger, USB cable and USB OTG cable. Looks nice with a professional grey case. Powers right up, has Android 4.2.2 loaded. Localized US (where I am). Instant on, capacitive touch is as responsive as any Android 4.2 tablet. Google Play store and a bunch of Google apps are preloaded and work great. Voice recognition is perfect. Sound is much better than my Nexus 7. Apps load right up. Developer options are on by default. Front cam works just fine. Horizontal angle of view is close to 180 degrees – vertically not so much. Display is plenty bright, colors fine. Storage is tiny but mounted my 16GB uSD card just fine.
Includes an app store for India’s NCERT (National Council of Educational Research and Training). So I get to find out what material India puts on these for their students. Neat.
I want to know how they managed to sell this for under $40.
Picked up a few tablets for nieces/nephews – One is the Lenovo 7″ – for 79.99. Nice tablet for the cost. Also got an Asus Memo pad – for 129.00. The other 2 are for 10 and 7 year old girls…only spent 85.00 for 2. :)