With the large number of Android devices available on the market these days, and with my very busy August having put some money in the bank, I figured that it was about time that Wizard’s Tower Press invested in an Android tablet. So I am now the proud owner of one of the Nexus 7 machines produced for Google by Asus. This is a very preliminary report.

I’m very impressed with the Nexus as a device. It is heavier than the Kindle, and I don’t expect the battery life will be anything like as good. However, it is much lighter than the iPad, has most of the same functionality, and is much less of a walled garden. I think that there is a good chance it will replace the iPad in my life for most uses, and replace the Kindle for reading on anything less than a long haul flight (and not even that if the plane has USB charging points at the seats, which modern ones do).

The one problem I had is with the main charger. It comes as a base unit plus an optional cover plate that they swap out depending on the regional plug standard. You do need to make sure that you push the two parts together firmly until they click into place, otherwise it won’t work.

I’m now looking at eReaders. The Kindle app, FBReader and the free version of Moon+ all seem to get the job done. However, Aldiko appears to be spectacularly useless. The free version appears to ignore even the most basic CSS commands, even with the “advanced formatting” option turned on. It may be that only the paid version will handle CSS properly. If so, there are other readers that don’t force you to pay to get that functionality. There are lots of Android eReaders, so I have a lot more research to do.