The Dell Streak — early name the Dell Mini 5 — has had its release with a ton of press coverage. One reason being that it was Dell’s first go at an Android tablet. Two, for the sake of it, it is an actually good looking Android tablet. A 5-inch WVGA screen with Gorilla Glass, 1GHz Snapdragon processor, 5 megapixel camera on the back with a VGA front-facing, Wi-Fi/3G HSPA+/Bluetooth combo, a user-replaceable battery, along with a 16GB microSD card in our review unit which we tortured with tests for over the course of a week.
So how did the 5-inch Dell Streak Android 1.6 tablet fare?
Full disclosure: Sent in by Dell for review, on a 1 week review period which could be extended
Price as Reviewed: $299 on 2-year agreement with AT&T, $549 “unlocked”
Let’s Get Down To The Review
I do have to say that the Dell streak is pocket-able in all of my jeans and shorts, it does look weird when used to place a phone call, and is hobbled by the Android 1.6 OS which will be thrown out later this year with a direct update to Android 2.2 Froyo. Before I wrote this review we asked AT&T and Dell for a preview version of the Froyo update but to no avail; we didn’t get a response.
I do like the Dell Streak quite very much actually. In the same way I like the iPad but a few times more. Watching movies on the Streak is as good as watching movies on-the-go can get, due to the iPad being quite large to hold comfortably; i.e by the pool downstairs for example, near the water (gulp).
The Dell Streak Is Confused
In a way. See, when you hit up Google Maps Navigation, it’s the best GPS unit you’ve ever used because of that large screen (5-inches people). When you start reading eBooks from the Kindle app, it becomes a sort of perfect eReader. Go ahead, play games on it and you’ll quickly see that it can do quite a lot of great things, without any lag and plenty of good times. Internet browsing with multitouch is very – let’s put it like this way — satisfying. And with a volume rocker, 3.5mm headset jack, camera button and power/sleep switch, you’re covered in all places for quick use of the Streak.
Yes, I know. I’m warming up to the Streak. I like it.
Photos Anyone?
Some gadget pr0n of the Dell Streak:
Followed by the pictures it takes with its two cameras (the last photo being the front-facing):
There Are Some Issues Though
The battery life for example is shorter than expected, the battery door (if removed) causes the system to turn off, it uses a Dell-exclusive connector port, which can piss a lot of people off (of course Dell provides you cables, headphones, and the like.), and last but not least the main drawback: for a new consumer that has heard of Android and sees the “Android 1.6 Donut” in the description, will fly away like a frightened pigeon if they’ve ever heard of the tasty Android 2.2.
Pricing
For $299 on a 2-year death grip contract with AT&T, you can call the Dell Streak your own. For $549 you can get the Streak without a contract, but still be confined to AT&T service (!), which honestly is missing something I call common sense.
The Conclusion
Do you need the Dell Streak? For managing email, which this is great for? Do you need to look funny when you make phone calls with a giant slab of extremely smart technology? Last but not least, you will always feel the same way about the Dell Streak as the iPad in some cases: do you really, really need it?
If you’re a gadget aficionado, heck yes! If you like new shiny stuff in general, surely you’ll enjoy it. But if you already own that iPhone 4, iPad, Samsung Vibrant, DROID 2, Droid X, HTC Incredible, Evo 4G, or even a Dell laptop, you might find that you just don’t need it, not that it’s no good or not right for you.
Pros:
- 5-inch responsive display is awesome (Gorilla glass is welcome, thx Dell)
- 1Ghz Snapdragon is fast
- Front-facing camera is a nice touch
- Lightweight, though large
- It can show me my emails while I kill n00bs in Bad Company 2
Cons:
- The no-contract philosophy
- Android 1.6 loaded from the start
- The fact that its many useful uses confused me for 15 minutes this week
- Both cameras are not so great in quality
[Shout-out to Dell for the review unit, and sending it before some of my colleagues got it)
