The question gets asked often: Is a 10″ tablet worth the purchase? Is 10″ even a tablet anymore? Is it too big? Holding a 10″ tablet up as a camera is bulky and slight awkward, and it doesn’t exactly fit in your pocket. Where does the Toshiba Excite 10 and similar devices in its class fit in?
Under the hood, things are more exciting
The Toshiba Excite currently runs Android 4.0 (ICS) on the NVIDIA Tegra 3 processor, which is a 4+1 core processor. This processor properly balances processing load across all four cores when fully awake, and uses a single core when “sleeping” to continue operating processes as needed. In my tests, it properly kept Kaspersky Tablet Security scanning for viruses even when sleeping, for example. The processor runs at 1.2 GHz, not quite as fast as some other recent tablets, but in those cases, we’re talking about dual-core CPUs. When choosing based on CPU specs, I chose to get a CPU that could do more at once.
The Excite has 1 GB of DDR3 RAM, and available options are 16, 32, or 64 GB mini-SATA interface NAND-based storage. Also, the Excite can hold full-size SD cards, and they can theoretically be up to 128 GB. The Toshiba File Manager lets you copy and move stuff to and from an SD card easily enough.
Finally, in my conservative use tests, it lasted about 10 hours per charge on average. Some have published lower numbers, but I used it for different average use scenario things and found a consistent average of about 10 hours—if you’re not constantly power-using the Excite, you can expect this kind of battery performance
The outside
The Toshiba Excite 10 uses Corning Gorilla Glass for its primary surface. However, Gorilla Glass does not come with a oleophobic coating on it, so, the Excite 10’s display does show fingerprints quite badly when the screen is off. With the screen on, however, I do not see fingerprints. I use a Toshiba stylus with it because it is a fingerprint magnet. Other than that admittedly minor problem, Gorilla Glass is close to unscratchable and does not easily crack at all.
The Excite’s cameras (one front-facing and one rear “main” camera) is something I’m not terribly interested in, as taking pictures with a large tablet is awkward. At only 5mp, the main camera is not going to serve you as well as many modern smartphones or, certainly, a dedicated digital camera. The front 2mp camera is full HD and sufficient for video chat tasks, however.
The metal back does flex some if forced to, but it takes deliberate force to bend it. When released, it springs back, it does not stay bent. This can be a slight advantage if the Excite is dropped and hits on one of its corners (which are rounded also). The alloy used for the back is aluminum in part, but it does not tarnish like pure aluminum does. It also has a dimpled surface, which makes it non-slip to a large degree.
The Excite has a micro-HDMI graphics port—Toshiba sells cables for use with HDMI monitors. It has a micro-USB port and a mini-stereo headphone port as well.
I do not see any screen edge brightness bleed as a reviewer on CNet claimed was happening. It’s possible that he had a pre-production unit, but the US production unit that I own has a nice black plastic bezel around the edge of the screen and under it to about 1/2 inch inwards from its outer edge, between it and the edges of the unit. This bezel also functions as a dust/water barrier as it is very tightly fitted.
It has no stand to stand it up, but I got a third party case that stands it up fairly inexpensively.
Is this the Android tablet for you?
I have used my Excite 10 for over 200 hours, and find it quite good value for the money. I personally would highly recommend it, especially since the size is large enough for older people or those with poor vision. They are currently available for a variety of prices on Newegg, Amazon, and Best Buy.
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