Well here it is, my brand spanking new Nook Color. And yes, that is the little Droid Guy on it. My Nook Color is running Android 2.2.1 also known as Froyo. To be a little more precise it happens to be a custom ROM called Nookie Froyo. So far, I’m very happy.
For some reason, the Nook is a very easy device to “hack”. As most people are quickly finding out, it is extremely simple to get your Nook Color running any version of Android. Right now, the most stable version of Android, Froyo, is not quite optimized for use on a tablet, so there are still a couple of bugs. Some things look a little funky while others just stop things working all together. Most of the Nook hacking community is waiting anxiously for Honeycomb to be fully released and to become stable on the Nook, as it is specifically designed for a tablet.
The first option for getting your Nook Color to run Android is to boot it off of the SD card. Luckily, the Nook’s boot priority is set to check the SD card first, so if there is a bootable OS on the card, that’s what will be booting. Simple as that.
One tip to make the OS a little more stable is to actually flash the OS onto the internal memory. This may make it somewhat more stable but it will completely erase you Nook. You will not be able to get it back to the same software as when you first bought it. Luckily, I don’t ever want to go back to the original Nook Color software, so I opted for this option.
I followed this very simple guide from the fine gentlemen over at XDA Developers. The only thing I didn’t quite get by myself was how to get the image onto the card on a Mac/Unix/Linux machine. Unless you know your command line, I found a nice little helper here.
After a quick reboot you’ve got a full fledged Android/Nook tablet. This is an option for us poor tech enthusiasts that can’t spend $799 on a Motorola Xoom or even $499 on a Galaxy Tab. You can purchase a brand new Barnes and Noble Nook Color for $249. That’s the cheapest you’re going to get one of these things.
Do you have an Android tablet? What do you think of the Android Nook tablet? Let me know in the comments down below.
One thought on “Best Android Tablet So Far?”
I must heartily disagree with this post. I recently purchased a Viewsonic GTab tablet that blows the CNook out of the water.
I purchased it on woot.com for $284.99 including shipping. The tablet is running the nVidia Tegra 2 Dual Core 1GHz processor which is a far cry better than the Nook’s A8. The screen size is also a whopping 10.1″ screen vs the Nook’s 7″.
The GTab also supports full 1080p HDMI out, with a dock, allowing you to play HD movies directly from the tablet or via stream.
Lastly, the XDA forums have been hard at work and have made several roms available including some gingerbread flavored ones.