The Epik Learning Tab fails to measure up to its name

As the parent to two kids who love (and need) technology we do love tablets. We were provided with an Epik Learning tab to review and have the kids try it out. In the house we have a couple iPads, a Kindle, Amazon Fire and a kid’s Samsung tablet that stopped working about a year after we reviewed it. In short, we have a couple tablets and know how kids (and adults) will utilize them. So how did the Epik Tablet stack up?

The Epik tablet is targeted as a device meant for kids. From its soft rubber case to the apps that are pre-installed on it this fact is obvious from the time it initially charges. The interface is simple for kids to use and there are the standard parental safeguards that one would expect from a tablet. The price point for the epik Tablet is attractive too with it being readily available for $75.

It comes in an 8” and 7” version, in a choice of four colors, built-in WiFi, 1GB of memory and a 1.2GHz Intel Quad-Core Processor.

Kids will enjoy playing with some of the apps that are installed. However, many of the pre-installed apps are the ‘free’ or lite version that let you play a couple of levels and then go to a paid platform. This staggered game play will frustrate kids and anger parents who simple want free apps without their children nipping at their heels every five minutes.

“It’s a tablet, play a game”, parents will think. And the kids will want too, but unless they pay or research feature length apps that are appropriate for kids the parents will be engaged far too much in their children’s tablet time.

When parents use the tablet they’ll be frustrated at how slow it operates. It’s a kid’s tablet and shouldn’t operate at adult speeds the ‘give the product a change angel on my right shoulder says’. I turn to said angel and remind them that we’ve tinkered with most tablets available and that the Epik Tablet is slow, even grading on a curve.

The tablet also gets warm after it’s been left on for a while. I touched the underside of it once and physically had to snap my hand back it was so warm. Speaking of the battery, it doesn’t last long. The manual says that it lasts up to 5 hours on a full charge, yet we were lucky to achieve that. It’s not like we live on top of a volcano or near the Arctic either. It’s a normal climate, 4 seasons and the tablet was left inside the house, where it simply behaved like we lived on top of a volcano.

Life is too short to waste on subpar tech. I’ve seen some reviews where the users had good experiences with the Epik Tablet, but we gave it a 2 month trail and had the same results (speed, battery life and temperature) over that course of time.