Dell Streak review

BANGALORE, INDIA: This year CES was abuzz with tablets launched and showcased by all major manufacturers. Dell showcased its Streak 7 tablet as well which is expected to arrive soon. Currently, India has the Dell Streak --the Dell Mini 5, a 5" tablet that is priced at Rs 34,990.

Looks & ergonomics: The Dell Streak is an attractive device when it comes to looks. Its 10mm slim profile coupled with matte finish on back and the Dell logo prominently highlighted makes the device stand out.

The bright 5" display with the three feather touch buttons lit up in white makes the device look very elegant. The volume keys, power/hold switch and camera shutter key are placed on the side along with a 3.5mm audio jack. There is a proprietary port on the left side for charging and PC connectivity. The back houses a 5MP camera as well. The device feels great to hold, and is easy to carry in jacket/coats too.

Display: The Streak features a 5" capacitive touchscreen display with a resolution of 480 x 800 pixels. The touchscreen response is superb and even multi-touch works great. Sadly, it's not fingerprint resistive, so it tends to look dirty. The brightness on the screen is simply stunning and even with it set at 50% the display looked fantastic.

Hardware & software: The Dell Streak is powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 1GHz processor and comes with 512MB of RAM and 512MB ROM. It comes with 16GB internal storage and can take up 32GB of additional storage via microSD card. The tablet is just 10mm thick and weighs 220g. For connectivity, it has GPRS, 3G, WiFi, Bluetooth v2.0 with A2DP and even comes with on-board GPS.

The device has a 1530mAh battery for power. In terms of software, the Streak runs on Android v2.2 with Dell's custom UI on top. The tablet comes with social network integration and has QuickOffice document viewer preloaded. Furthermore, the tablet comes with MapMyIndia's navigation and maps preloaded as well.

Multimedia:In terms of sound, the Dell streak is a mixed bag in both media playback and voice calls. The output from Speakers on the device is superb with excellent clarity and loud volume. However, through the headphones, the volume level of the tablet was a huge letdown!

The Streak comes with a 5MP AF camera and has dual LED flash. The camera is an average performer, though we noticed a slight yellow tint across all images. With the 2.2 Android, the Streak can record video in 720p resolution, sadly the video quality is choppy and even though the Dell has an option to view it on an HD TV, we would not recommend that.

User interface: The Dell Streak runs on Android 2.2 and feature's Dell's customized UI on top of the android UI, which makes the device much simpler to use. The user interface by Dell is one of the best we have seen. The on-screen keyboard is what we love the most as the large keys along with the superb response from touchscreen makes typing emails, SMS a joy. For a business user, Dell preloads office document viewer on the tablet and the Android platform provides option to setup Exchange mail as well as mails from various providers.

Bottomline: At Rs 34,990, the Dell Streak comes into the same price bracket as the Samsung Galaxy TAB tablet. If a person has to spend that big an amount on a tablet, the Galaxy TAB that has the same hardware with a larger 7-inch display would be the ideal choice than the Dell Streak.