10/21/2011 11:34:00 PM
kakadiya Hitesh
Pricing and DesignThe Vinci comes in two models: the VH-1001, with a 3,200mAH battery and 4GB storage ($389 list); and the VH-2001, priced at $479, with a double-size battery (6,400mAH, good for six hours of video) and twice as much internal storage (8GB), plus a few extra pre-installed games and apps. (We tested the VH-2001.) In addition, you’ll pay a $99 yearly membership while you own the tablet, and an optional $49 (for the VH-2001) or $99 (for the VH-1001) for membership to MyVinci Platinum, which gives you access to all new content from Vinci (otherwise you buy apps individually). For a device intended as a toy for very young children, the Vinci Tab certainly isn’t priced like one.
The Vinci Tab looks a lot like most seven-inch Android tablets, especially the Samsung Galaxy Tab ($399, 3.5 stars), though measuring 7.25 by 10 by 0.63 inches (HWD) and weighing 1.45 pounds, it’s a bit bulkier. This is because of the rubberized red ring around the tablet that serves as a bumper against drops or collisions—one of the Vinci’s greatest advantages is that it isn’t nearly as easy to break as an iPad.
The display is a 7-inch, 800-by-480 multitouch screen. It’s not a terrific one, as it’s prone to glare and a glittery effect when it catches light, but it mostly gets the job done. Taps always registered accurately and quickly in my tests, but the occasional motion just wasn’t recognized; in one game, I had to try several times to drag something across the screen.
The Android-standard Home, Back, and Menu controls are physical buttons on the bottom of the Vinci, there are Vinci logos on the front and back, and a rear-facing 3-megapixel camera is placed off-center on the back panel. On the bottom you’ll find microSD and micro USB ports, which aren’t covered; this device may be drop proof, but spill proof it is not. Power and Volume controls live on the right panel. Otherwise, this is a minimal-looking tablet, with that red bumper as its only design flair.
Android 2.3.3 (Gingerbread) comes preinstalled on the Vinci Tab, but it’s a limited version of the OS, which is intended for phones rather than tablets. There’s no Wi-Fi or cellular radio, which renders apps like Gmail and Browser useless; it’s odd that they’re even installed. The device runs on a Cortex-A8 processor, which is underpowered for a tablet, but acceptable given the basic nature of what the Vinci Tab attempts to do.
Content and AppsThe key idea of the Vinci Tab is that its content is better for young children than your average app for an Android tablet or iPad. The idea of a kid-friendly device or app store is an excellent one: Though there are many good apps for children, they’re often hard to pinpoint in the typical app store clutter. But instead of going the curation route, Vinci has developed its own content.
There is some support for non-Vinci apps on the Vinci Tab, but barely. You can run most Android apps, but because the Tab has neither Android Market access nor any kind of wireless capabilities, you have to sideload applications. That process proved much more difficult than I expected. Finding APK files of Angry Birds and Cut the Rope, for instance, took a long time and required a lot of sifting through less-than-reputable sources to download; then I had to connect the Vinci to a computer, add the files as if the tablet were an external hard drive, and then locate and install them. But once I did all that, they worked well. Thanks to support for MP4, H.264, and M4V video, you can also add your child’s videos to the Vinci with relative ease.
This, to me, is both the biggest problem and the largest missed opportunity with the Vinci Tab. There’s a wealth of excellent children’s content out there, from Curious George to Goodnight Moonto my personal childhood favorite, The Very Hungry Caterpillar. Parents want to read, watch, and play with content that they know, that their kids know, and that their kids will encounter elsewhere. By making that hard to access in favor of its own closed ecosystem, Vinci prevents itself from selling a true children’s tablet. Most of these books, videos, and characters haven’t been made available digitally, which is a shame, and Vinci would do well to help make that happen. Vinci reps say that the company is in talks with Scholastic and other publishers to bring this content to its tablet, and if and when that happens the Vinci Tab could become a must-have for kids. But there’s not enough content right now, and parents and kids aren’t clamoring for what little there is. There are some excellent Android apps available, and Vinci should have made them easier to find.
Apps on the Vinci are divided into three categories: Games, Music Videos, and Storybooks. In the Games section are two apps: Explorations, which is a simple game designed for very small children to tap, touch, and learn basic concepts and words; and The World: Africa, a more immersive game in which you travel around Africa, learning and playing minigames the whole way. Music Videos has a number of different videos, a mixture of sing-and-dance-along songs and quiet lullabies, all with accompanying visuals starring Vinci’s mohawked mascot, Baby Haha. The music videos do incorporate some non-Vinci creations, like the "Hokey Pokey" and “If You’re Happy and You Know It,” but also includes things like an original musical take on the alphabet, which could lead to some real confusion when your child goes to kindergarten knowing the wrong A-B-C song.
The Storybooks section features several interactive stories, like "The Boy Who Cried Wolf” and “The Ugly Duckling.” Interspersed throughout the stories are animations, as well as games and tasks that make reading the stories more than a purely passive experience. As with the ABCs, however, the tales are subtly rewritten—the meaning is the same, but the stories are different. It would have been better had the interactive elements been built around the pre-existing stories.
Vinci is continually developing new games, books, and videos for the Vinci Tab, which are what your yearly subscription pays for, but it’s a small number of new applications coming over a relatively long period of time. In talking to Vinci reps, quarterly was the one time frame they said, but that didn’t seem to be definite.
To the company's credit, everything it has designed is backed by plenty of research, and everything is geared toward a particular age group and developmental stage. There’s little doubt in my mind that these apps are excellent for their intended audience; the problem is that by making it unnecessarily difficult to access what else is available, Vinci is essentially stating that its content is the best education for small children.
Kid Testing and ConclusionsBecause I’m hardly the target market for the Vinci Tab, I recruited some assistance: Nina-Rose Segan, the 5-year-old daughter of PCMag’s Lead Mobile Analyst, Sascha Segan. Nina-Rose’s job was to play with the tablet, try all the games and apps, and decide if it would be a good device for a slightly younger version of herself. Her overall impression was positive, and she thought that some of the videos and applications were fun (especially The World: Africa, which was the only thing to hold her attention for more than a few minutes), but she quickly grew tired of the preloaded content.
She was also helpful in testing how kidproof the Vinci Tab really is. We took turns dropping it on the ground; she played while alternately eating a bagel and sucking her thumb; and all the while, the Tab kept working. A direct spill would probably cause a problem due to the exposed ports on the tablet, but this tablet can definitely withstand more than your iPad.
All this raises one simple question: Why buy the Vinci Tab? If your child loses interest in the included content quickly, and the release cycle for new content takes time and is expensive, all you’re really getting is a child-proof tablet. If Vinci is ultimately able to create an app store for kids that’s full of content they already love, the Vinci Tab could be a must-have product for any family; kids seem to intuitively grasp how to use a tablet, and this is a good enough piece of hardware to catch on. But for now, I’d recommend buying an iPad or Acer Iconia Tab A100 ($329.99, 4 stars), putting a sturdy case on it, and wading into the app store mess. Heck, for the price, you could buy a handful of $99 HP TouchPads and just replace them every year. You’ll work a little harder to find great apps, but they’re out there. For now, what the Vinci alone offers isn’t yet enough to justify its price or its isolated nature.
More Tablet Reviews:• Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 (Verizon Wireless)
• N2A Card (for Nook Color)
• Fujitsu Stylistic Q550
• Motion Computing CL900
• Acer Iconia Tab A100 (Wi-Fi)
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• N2A Card (for Nook Color)
• Fujitsu Stylistic Q550
• Motion Computing CL900
• Acer Iconia Tab A100 (Wi-Fi)
• more
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