The Barnes & Noble NOOK Tablet 10.1″ is available for in-store purchase today. If you are trying to purchase online and pick-up in store, it’s likely you cannot, even though a check of my area (Denver) showed availability at all but one location.
I entered Lone Tree Barnes & Noble at 9:30 A and headed directly to the Nook display in the store’s center. A very nice young lady asked me if I needed help and I informed I was there to buy the new NOOK Tablet 10.1″. She led me to the display and handed me off to another associate who hunted down the tablet for me. Several minutes after that I was on my way out the door, the first person of the day to purchase the new NOOK from that location. 15 minutes later I was back at my office, taking the NOOK out of its box and I’ve spent the past several hours using it.
My First Impressions of the NOOK Table 10.1″
The NOOK comes packed in a nice, sturdy box. The packaging has a premium feel. It’s a far different presentation than someone will get opening a new Fire tablet. And for the sake of comparison, the Amazon’s Fire HD 10 is the one to make and I will come back to it again in my upcoming review.
The tablet itself has a plastic body with a flush glass screen. The display is sharp and crisp. 100% brightness makes the display pop and the colors are vivid. There’s a little heft to the tablet, though I do not have an exact weight. I will put it on the scales later this evening. It feels lighter than the Amazon Fire HD.
Setup is quick and will be a welcome experience for anyone used to the Android ecosystem. The NOOK runs on Android 8.1 (Oreo) out of the box and there were no system updates pending once I connected to Wi-Fi. The NOOK OS is also integrated into the NOOK, but if I was forced to judge it I would say the NOOK OS feels like several optional apps, which I think is a plus. Users will not be locked down into an OS as they are with the Amazon Fire tablets. Seeing the Google Play Store icon on my home screen after setup was complete felt great, and I have had no problems searching the store and installing apps so far.
The verdict:
Obviously, I can’t give a comprehensive review but the first impressions are positive. I distinctly recall my experience in the first few hours with my Amazon Fire HD 10. I am enjoying my time with the NOOK 10.1″ more. I will use the NOOK 10.1″ exhaustively over the next few days, with an emphasis on its utility for reading books, comics, manga, and playing audio books, and going deeper into how it compares to the Fire HD 10.
