HP Slate 6: A value-for-money phablet at Rs 22,999

Tech giant HP has had an eventful journey in the handset segment. After acquiring Palm and then reselling it, the tech giant has now launched a tablet with voice calling in its Slate series - the HP Slate 6.

While HP is terming it as a 'Voice Tab', but for me it qualifies as a phablet. Slate 6 can be considered as a phablet as in the recent past we have seen phablets from Sony, Samsung and HTC with similar screen size. But when we compare, the Slate 6 is more handy than the Sony Xperia Z Ultra. It has got a 6-inch screen with touch keys. It has a grill-textured design on the top and at the bottom. HP has strategically placed the power key on the right edge and the volume control on the left, which are good for single hand operations.

The growing phablet category is eliminating the need of buying tablets separately. The Slate 6 aptly fit as a dual gadget. You can comfortably hold it and talk. It is not too big to hold next to your face and offers a decent sound quality. You can pair it with a Bluetooth headset too for handling calls.

Phablets are useful as the big screen can be used for watching multimedia, web browsing or handling documentation. The HP Slate 6 can do all this and much more without any trouble. Browsing the web on this screen was a delight as the text was readable and sharp. Similarly, the big screen was good to watch videos and playing games. I was a little apprehensive about the onscreen keyboard and for that I had to use both my hands. The keyboard was well spaced and rarely did I type wrong words.

The HP slate runs on Android 4.3 and comes with all default Google Apps including Chrome, Gmail, Google+. There a few additional apps such as HP Connected, HP ePrint, HP File Manager, Kingsoft Office, India Today group, WeChat and others. Although these apps can be downloaded with just one click from Play Store, it is still good to have them pre-installed. It comes with a 16GB internal storage, of which 12.37GB can be used. It also supports an expandable memory card. This phablet is powered by a 1.2 GHz quad-core Marvell chipset and it offers snappy performance and is paired with 1GB of RAM. The most disappointing feature about this phablet is the 5MP camera, which is just about average. Last but not the least, this is a dual SIM phablet. The battery backup is good, it lasted for about a day and a half on a single charge.

Bag it or Junk it: A value-for-money phablet
Price: Rs 22,999
Rating: 3.5/5
Specifications: 6-inch display; 1.2GHz quad-core processor; Android 4.2; 1GB RAM; 16GB onboard storage, expandable card slot; Bluetooth, 3G, Wi-Fi; dual SIM; 3000 mAh battery