Travel Essential? 7" Android Allwinner Tablet

MoneySupermarket are running a project called Inspect A Gadget to discover the best cheap gadgets for taking away on holiday with you.  They selected the top 5 items which were: a portable DVD player, MP3 player, Kobo Mini eReader, Android Tablet and an HD camcorder.  I chose the tablet to try out as I either have or wouldn't use any of the other things.

The tablet is a 7" Allwinner A13 with touch screen, and is available in various different colours but I chose the white one.  The operating system is Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich (love the name!) and has a 512 MB RAM and 4 GB hard drive.  It also comes with a charger and a USB cable for connecting it to the computer.  I haven't tried this yet, I'm not entirely sure what I would use it for!  Maybe for transferring files or documents onto it, in the manual it says that it supports office applications like Word and Excel.

It only seems to be available from Amazon here.  The RRP is £60 but it is now down to £36!  I am not used to reviewing techy items to I am just going to make a list of pros and cons!

Pros

• Price - so cheap, even full price at £60 is great!
• Size - nice and neat, not too big or too small.
• Wifi
• Range of Apps - Google Play store, similar to The Apple App Store.
• Comes with a pen - good for typing and when I get sore fingers from too much touch screen! 
• Accessories - earphone jack, HDMI output interface (DC-5V), TF card slot (microSD card), mini USB, DC adapter for charging.
• Built-in Flash Player.
• Easy to use but comes with small instruction booklet.

Cons

• Battery life - 3 hours
• Speed - I found it slower than what I'm used to, but this could be internet or the tablet itself, or a mixture of both!
• Poor quality front facing camera
• Sometimes the touch screen doesn't respond immediately, particularly around the edges and I have to use the pen instead.
• Never used this operating system before (although will be very straightforward for those with an Android phone!)
• Hard to read in direct sunlight/bright light

I have downloaded quite a few free apps so far:

• Kindle - great for travelling, I already have a Kindle so very handy.
• YouTube
• Daily Yoga
• Instagram - just for browsing, I probably won't be taking any photos with the tablet!
• Facebook
• Twitter
• Candy Crush - so much easier than playing it on my iPhone!
• BBC iPlayer
• Babbel - an app for learning French!

Overall I am really pleased with this little tablet!  I do generally prefer Apple operating systems as I am so used to them but for such a tiny price I am willing to make that sacrifice!  MoneySupermarket supplied me with the money to pay for this tablet but I would have happily paid for it with my own money.  I am away 3 times this year, ahhh so excited, so it will definitely be coming with me on at least one of my holidays!

<3

EDIT 7/6/13: I took it to Spain with me and it discharged and wouldn't charge up.  When I got home I managed to get it back on via the USB connection to my computer but it isn't holding charge at all.  As soon as it gets unplugged it dies.  I have contacted the company who make it and will update here how I get on!  I'm very sad!!