ORANGE LAUNCHES NEW TABLET
ORANGE has released its first own-branded tablet, which is, of course, named after the largest island in the Windward group of the French Polynesian Society Islands.
The Tahiti is manufactured by Chinese telecoms giant Huawei – a strategy that has already worked out quite nicely for Orange with its San Fransisco smartphone (which was made by ZTE).
If you look at the Tahiti straight on, you could be forgiven for mistaking it for the Kindle Fire. Its seven inch screen makes it small enough to fit in your jacket pocket but its hefty weight ensures you won’t want to.
It’s a handsome enough device, with a brushed aluminium back that looks suspiciously familiar.
Under the hood it begins to show its limitations. It runs Android Honeycomb, a now superceded operating system, and at times it struggles to cope with even this, with very noticeable frame-rate glitches if you have a heavy-duty app running in the background.
The screen is a little dull compared the deep blacks and vibrant colours of more expensive devices and the camera is, frankly, horrible.
But you can forgive a lot for a reasonable price tag (although bear in mind a two year contract plus a £70 outlay will set you back £670).
The Tahiti isn’t aimed at heavy tablet users who need powerful processor speeds and enough storage for their entire music collection. If you just want something to pick up a few times a year to take on holiday, you could do worse than this.