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Nvidia Shield

Earlier this year, Nvidia recalled its Shield Tablet over bug with the lithium-ion battery. The visitor has put the tablet back on sale and given the base model a whopping cost cut, from $299 to $199 for the 16GB flavor. At that price, the Shield Tablet is a steal, considering its overall operation, build quality, and features. Even amend, this new version seems to gear up the nagging touch-screen issues that were widely reported on Shield 1.0.

While I didn't review the first Shield Tablet for ExtremeTech, I practice own one, and the bear on screen has always been a little dodgy. It works perfectly in the desktop or in-browser, only oftentimes had trouble picking up multi-touches in the 1 Android game I play on a regular ground — Castle Clash. This was an issue unique to the Shield — the game ran perfectly well on multiple Android smartphones and devices. The issue would typically resolve itself after I attempted a multi-affect zoom-in / zoom-out several times, but reoccurred each time a new area of the game was loaded. While it didn't prevent play, it was annoying. Factory resets, new OTA updates, and reinstalling the game never had much bear on on the issue.

SHIELD Tablet-1

The replacement Shield I received in the post doesn't have this trouble and I'm hoping that means Nvidia quietly corrected whatever caused it in the first place. Information technology appears, yet, that there are at least ii subtly dissimilar SKUs shipping out to market. The replacement tablet I received is externally identical to the original device in every detail, merely over at Ars Technica Uk, Mark Walton reports that his replacement tablet lacks a stylus garage and has a slightly different case and branding.

What $199 buys you lot

Back in 2013, Google unveiled the Nexus 7, a $199 tablet with killer specs for the price and very solid overall features at the time. Since then, however, the market place has stabilized. There are enough of serviceable devices in the segment — Amazon's Burn eight and Fire 10 family aren't great, but they become the task done for many people, while companies like Acer, Asus, and Dell manufacture a variety of Intel-based devices in this price ring.

The Shield's quad-core Cortex-A15 CPUs might exist getting a flake long in the tooth (and are limited to 32-bit processing), simply Nvidia's 192-core, Kepler-derived graphics solution remains extremely strong. Graphics-wise, it competes well confronting the iPad Air 2, which puts it in the upper end of the tablet market. It's certainly far faster than the Intel-based solutions that often sell in this price subclass.

The 1920×1200 screen gives the Shield a 294 PPI, the device includes a microSD slot for additional storage, and it supports Bluetooth 4.0, 802.11n, micro-USB, and mini-HDMI. Current versions of the device are yet on Android Lollipop, but Nvidia has promised to update it to Marshmallow. Other features, like the controller, are still extra, and Nvidia isn't bundling the $199 version of the hardware with a power adapter, USB cablevision, or the aforementioned stylus. The Shield supports Nvidia'south GameStream (though yous'll want the controller to employ it), which allows you to stream local PC titles to your tablet.

The bottom line is this: If you want an Android gaming tablet with flexible streaming options, Nvidia's GeForce Now, a handful of loftier-end titles that showcase the chip'south overall performance, Twitch streaming, and a stock Android installation that isn't chaotic upwardly with cruft, it's very difficult to beat the Nvidia Shield Tablet. Now that they seem to have fixed the multi-touch result, I'd recommend information technology to anyone looking for a sub-$200 Android tablet that wants more performance than you'll get from a MediaTek or Intel SoC.

I caveat to annotation: If yous buy a Shield controller, it will not work in wireless way with your PC — and information technology won't work if you lot have an AMD GPU in your system. Despite being a standard USB peripheral, the controller only works if GeForce Feel is running on your system.