I would suggest that to some degree you get what you pay for and good hardware is expensive. I would also suggest being suspicious of any deal that appears too good to be true or buying from companies you never heard of. Those companies may not even be in business 6 months from now and in the case of China, where the discussion is not about the latest, greatest device but who makes the best knock-off of the latest, greatest device, to be even more careful. You might even want to think about how you feel about intellectual property theft. These no-name companies are often relying on others to do the R&D and simply copying the design. Frankly, some do it better than others. While you're reading reviews, you might want to make sure you are including some professional reviews from leading publications or reputable web sites. More than a few folks "rationalize" the purchase of mediocre equipment by downplaying deficiencies as a trade-off for a lower price. The simple fact is a lower resolution screen is a lower resolution screen and that cheap device with inferior hardware will never be an iPad or Xoom. Maybe off a little but kind of like saying a Chevy is just as good as a Cadillac and justifying it by thinking you never really wanted leather seats anyway.

Another interesting day with an android tablet. Last night I bought Discover magazine from the Nook app store and it said it would take over an hour to prepare and download the current issue. No problem. At bedtime I left the tablet on thinking it needed to be on for the download to complete. This morning it seemed the download must have terminated because the app had closed, but the magazine wasn't in the library and I couldn't reach it online. I checked and had received an email receipt. I called tech and they told me to turn the tablet off and then back on. The magazine then was in my library, but everything there had ribbons saying "download," indicating I'd have to redownload everything. Tech confirmed this. O.K. So I did. Later, I took the tablet to the market, planning to use the recipe book I bought on Nook for shopping. When I tried to open the book a box popped up that said wi-fi unavailable. Later I called tech, who didn't seem to have a solution, then took the tablet to Barnes and Noble (oddly, their ATT system wouldn't allow a download from the Nook store to my tablet) and to Office Depot. Everyone said I should be able to read a book or magazine offline, without wi-fi, but noone could figure out what to do to enable it. This evening I figured I'd buy something from the Toshiba book store app. One of the techs had me set up an account during the bookmarks issue because she said she was most familiar with that app. Tonight I tried to log in and it wouldn't accept my user name and password. I confirmed they were correct as I had written them down. I had the site email my password and the correct password arrived in my email, so what's with this? Does some of this just amount to requiring a network tablet and data plan for this sort of thing to work? The password thing makes me feel like I'm being singled out or something. It's getting weird. Later I checked in to Yahoo on the tablet and when I logged out there was a tiny message box that said I'd made changes in my Yahoo account. I'm on a PC as I write this, checked Yahoo and didn't notice any changes. Anyone know what that's about? Now that I'm safely on a PC I'll be reading all the previous posts. Thanks, everyone, in advance.

yes I think the new Microsoft Surface tablets can or any that are running windows. They will be pretty expensive since they are newer versions. Android tablets and Ipads will not. However there are apps that are office apps that are very good but if she wants just those specifically she will have to go with a microsoft based tablet. Tell her to look at the Surface tablet first and go from there. Surface Pro My Asus transformer Tf300 has Polaris office on it which is a very good office suite if she can look at the specs on that and thinks it would work for her then she will find several Android tablets that can have that app installed. Work On Microsoft Office Documents On The Go With Polaris Office For iOS [Sponsored Post] Polaris Office IF she thinks Polaris will work for her then pretty much any good quality Android tablet would be a candidate including the ASUS transformer like I have it is a great choice since you can get the additional dock which is a real laptop type keyboard which snaps right onto the tablet making it both a laptop and tablet. ASUS Transformer Pad TF300T I got mine complete tablet and dock for under $300 so there are deals out there.

I have had my almost 10 inch Samsung tab A for several years and it's still going strong and not one issue with it. Got my husband a Samsung tab E last year for father's day and that works good too. I have a small battery operated wireless keyboard for it but seldom use it. Mary