Review: Advent Vega Android tablet, part one

So, I finally got my Advent Vega yesterday morning as I arrived at work. As there's such a buzz of interest around this budget Android tablet, I figured I'd contribute my thoughts to the blogosphere and add to the discussion!

First, some backstory.

The Saga of Getting One

Stock's been arriving in dribs and drabs for the couple of weeks since the Vega first went on sale at an insanely reasonable £249. When they first launched via the Dixons, Currys and PC World websites, the initial batch sold out in less than an hour; and subsequent batches have been even quicker (I think twelve minutes was a duration bandied around on Twitter at one point). I was lucky enough to get my order in quickly enough for the second batch, and a couple of days later it duly arrived.

Sadly, while the rather reflective screen was a very good mirror, that was about the only functionality I could eke out of the 10.1", 750g tablet. Repeated attempts to reflash the thing all ended in failure; after all the hype the Vega was DOA and I returned it to the PC World a short walk from my office that evening, where Mandie was very helpful in arranging a refund.

Back to the waiting game... and I managed to order again the next Saturday. Or, so I thought.

Apparently the DSG stock system couldn't quite cope with the sheer volume of people all trying to buy the Vega at once, and it sold about 100 more than they actually had in stock. After a few days of limbo, I got an E-mail telling me to call the customer service line otherwise my order would be cancelled. Not wanting to join the hordes of F5-induced RSI sufferers for a third time, I asked the lady I spoke to (who, again, was very helpful) if I could have my order put in a queue for the next batch, and she happily obliged. (I'd been reading on the MoDaCo forums about others in the same situation.)

All good, or so I thought... the next batch of stock came and went, and nothing was mentioned of my order. A further E-mail to DSG gave the impression that somebody had been promising so-called "forward orders" even though it was against company policy, and now management had been left with the task of fulfilling their promises. The gentleman who phoned me back was the third of three very helpful employees I'd spoken to at this stage, and he promised that the scheduling team were working out how to match up orders and Vegas as they became available.

And so eventually, one was placed in the (not-quite-so) capable hands of DHL who, after accidentally ripping the box open and repackaging it with lots of tape, managed to deliver a fully-working Vega to my office on Tuesday morning. And the fun began!

Initial Impressions

It was shiny - literally; the screen was very reflective, and is a magnet for fingerprints. They didn't seem too noticeable when the Vega was switched on and in use, even under office lights, but switch the screen off and just try and resist the urge to clean it!

Boot time was a little tardy by most standards, but for a device pretty much designed to be always left in standby I can forgive that. The initial app selection was pretty dire, and a last-minute change by Advent meant there was no central package manager (oh, OK, "app store" in your Cupertino-speak or "Marketplace" as Google would have it). Out of the box, the Vega is basically a touch-screen web browser - yes, it is possible to hunt down the Android .apk  application packages manually and install them, but it's far easier to take the brilliant efforts of Paul at MoDaCo and get the full set of Google apps - Market included - with a custom ROM image.

For part two of this review (which I plan on writing tomorrow, it's late!) I'll talk about how amazing the Vega is with that custom image, and how you should really buy one if you're looking for a tablet but can't stomach the cost of an iPad. Just so there are no surprises. :-)