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Amazon is running a Gold Box deal today on the ViewSonic gTablet. You can pick it up today only for $279.99 + free shipping.

This is a 10 inch Android tablet with a 1 GHz dual core NVIDIA Tegra 2.2 processor and 1024 x 600 pixel display. It has 16GB of storage, USB and HDMI ports, and a microSD card slot for expansion.

Normally priced at closer to $300 gTablet is already one of the cheapest WiFi tablets available with a Tegra 2 processor. At $280, nothing else even comes close.

The tablet runs Google Android 2.2 with custom software from ViewSonic which gets mixed reviews at best. But there are a number of ways to improved the software experience by rooting the tablet and installing a custom ROM.

If you’re looking for something a little smaller, Newegg is running a promotion on the Archos 70 Internet tablet with a 7 inch display. You can pick one up for $250 with the coupon code EMCKFJF68. This tablet has a 7 inch, 800 x 480 pixel capacitive touchscreen display, a 1 GHz single core processor and support for HD video playback.

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19 replies on “Bargain Alert: ViewSonic gTablet available today for $280”

  1. Guys, dont you think youre going way off topic here? Get over it, ITS INTERNET FFS!
    Pitty they always have these great deals only in USA, EU as usual gets nothing!

  2. Funny part of Jaundiced’s critisizuim is this same basic “bargain alert” showed up in a lot of other dependable tech/phone related sites on the net! Including such sites as Android Central, Android tablet forum, Engadget mobile, etc. I guess Brad isn’t the only one that thinks this to be a REAL DEAL! Or maybe their all on the payrole! LOL!
    Cheers

  3. Nothing is free and everything has a trade-off. Brad has a right to monetize on the hard work in providing us all with tech news, updates and reviews. He’s done a fair job of disclosing any affiliations.

  4. >if I didn’t have a way to make a living

    As a blogger, you ride your reputation just as if you were a journalist. While everyone needs to make a buck, hawking old wares as “bargains” doesn’t do your reputation much good.

    As for the GTab, it is only a couple of pages back that had news of these outdated Tegra 2 as no longer being supported by Nvidia. And as for a “bargain,” you yourself posted of the Asus TF’s upcoming price of USD$400. While one can argue that anything cheaper than that is a “bargain,” that argue is severely undermined when one is “making a living” from it.

    I don’t assume anything. I read what is presented, and draw conclusions therefrom. One would hope that your making a living isn’t solely based on your ability to get commissions from “bargains.”

    Appearance counts. I can tell you that these “daily deals” doesn’t do your journalistic integrity much good–if that matters to you at all. May be it doesn’t.

    1. Like advertisements, classifieds, etc. in newspapers or even editorials really effect journalistic integrity? Like anyone would ever confuse them with actual news?

      Sorry but that argument lacks common sense. Everyone making a living both online and off uses some sort of method to develop revenue from running their site or newspaper. But unless they integrate them into the same article as an actual news piece then you’re way off base and you’re confusing posting of ads and deals with the actual reviews and news that have their own posts.

      Fact is Bargain Alerts are not reviews! Besides Brad clearly pointed out the device can be rooted to use more up to date software and fact is Tegra 2 tablets are still going for pretty hefty prices and few would offer it this low without some other means of getting the balance from you, like with a contract, etc.

      So whether you consider it so or not this is a bargain for what these devices are going for now!

  5. I’ve been up front about our advertising and affiliate policy since day one. You can read about it at our advertising page which is linked in the site footer:

    https://liliputing.com/advertise-on-liliputing

    I write about mobile devices because I’m a fan, but I couldn’t afford to run my blogs full time if I didn’t have a way to make a living.

    I make a point though of only publishing deals that are relevant to readers, and from time to time that includes deals from companies I have absolutely no relationship with.

    There’s been a lot of interest around the ViewSonic gTablet as one of the cheapest dual core tablets around. It may currently ship with Android 2.2, but it’s also about half the price of most Android 3.0 tablets, and custom ROMs are available which greatly increase the tablet’s functionality.

    If you’re not particularly interested in this device, that’s fine. But I’d appreciate it if you didn’t automatically assume I was a shill for the system just because I’m trying to earn a living.

    Take a look at the reviews section of the site and you’ll notice that I often include an affiliate link for anyone interested in purchasing a netbook, tablet, or other device — even if I harshly criticize the device in the body of the review. I also make a point of disclosing when a device has been sent to me by the manufacturer for review purposes so that readers are aware of the relationship. I should probably go further out of my way to point out that I send every device *back* to the manufacturer once the review is complete, but I kind of assumed that was obvious until I realized that some readers are under the impression that I have a stack of freebies lying around.

    1. Nobody should question the integrity of Brad Linder. I laugh at the criticism sent Brads way about linking to Amazon as an affiliate. Seriously, go ahead and find a blog or website linking to Amazon that doesn’t have an affiliate tag. Fact is? You won’t. It just shows how asinine the comment or criticism here is. Hardly worth replying to in all honesty. Perhaps this person doesn’t know how the internet works, and that’s fine. Best to think before ripping into this blog that’s for sure.

      Brad I’m sure you know who you are and that your integrity is really what made the site what it is. Dishonesty and manipulation generally has a short shelf life.

      I would hope the OP would post back a apology of some sort. Welcome to the internet!

      1. Funny that you posted all of this tripe without one shred of evidence, other than your personal opinion that BL is your personal idol. Fine for you. Not for anyone who can look up the term “conflict of interest.”

        As for your “everyone’s doing it,” you may want to look around. Most popular gadget blogs don’t normally hawk old wares to “make a living.” Examples? Engadget, Gizmodo, Ubergizmo, Slashgear, etc etc. Sure, one can dig up an occasional product pump. None of them are truly objective, after all. But none of them hawk wares daily.

        1. Trust me, I have had my arguments with BL and do question some things. I can’t question his integrity.

          This hawk old wares? I have no idea what that is all about. No idea at all. If this is about the post regarding ViewSonic then wow. Not everyone out there can afford the latest and greatest technology. Deals are deals for a reason. Sure the daily deals are quite regular these days but hey, I would be doing the same quite frankly.

          And btw, yeah I don’t need to post evidence to support what I’m saying. I know the internet. Take my word for it. If you are finding sites that aren’t attempting some income, then you are really are not aware, and that’s fine. Not everyone is an expert and I don’t hold lack of knowledge or understanding against anyone.

          1. >I have no idea what that is all about. No idea at all.

            That about sums it up.

            >Not everyone out there can afford the latest and greatest technology.

            $280 for an outdated tablet is no bargain. If you want cheap, buy a shenzhen tablet, which ironically enough, BL also knows of. May be he should cut a deal with some of those Chinese vendors for truly the “best deals,” eh?

            For those still clueless about the quality of the GTab, yes, it’s a shenzhen tab. The GTab is a Malata rebrand, same with the Advent Vega (UK) or the Toshiba Folio.

            If you do a check on the XDA forum for Viewsonic, most of the excitement is gone, as people are starting to realize they are holding a dead-product. Posts of selling the tabs are popping up more frequently. The lead dev has announced he’s moving on to greener pastures.

            Now, still a great “bargain”? I suppose it is, for the tech-illiterates and for those trying to make a quick buck from their ignorance.

            >btw, yeah I don’t need to post evidence to support what I’m saying. I know the internet. Take my word for it.

            Lord, are you really this naive? Do you honestly think you’re the center of the universe, and everyone should just take your opinion as gospel?

          2. I don’t agree with gemaster very often, and yes he has used I know what I’m talking about argument with me as well and I had a similar reaction, but he’s basically right here.

            You’re concept of outdated is premature, until the Tegra 3 comes out then the Tegra 2 is still viable and besides it takes more than a single year before something is considered outdated anyway. Especially with far more outdated products still being sold at even similar price range.

            Official support may be lacking but plenty of people know how to root and install their own OS or can look up how.

            Many people just got the wrong idea about how ARM tablet market works and expect too much from companies that are frankly not big enough to offer support like say Apple can. Those companies instead rely on selling the hardware rather than the software side of things, which they rely mostly on something they can basically just throw on the device at no cost to themselves like Android.

            So there are also plenty of other tablets with little to no support to begin with. Meaning this is hardly something that will stop everyone from considering it. The Augen tablet for example is far more outdated, yet there are still people buying it and rooting it to be useful. And of course this is also why so many are working on methods of rooting and developing their own versions of Android releases.

            It’s just a fact you may have to get use to that many things put at bargain prices may not be what you personally want but so long as they are being sold at less than the going rate then they are still bargains whether you consider them so or not. But for someone it may well indeed be the bargain they want if they’re willing to work to make it useful and can’t afford or really want the latest and best presently available.

          3. Clearly nothing any of us say is going to change what Jaundiced thinks here, but he’s clearly new around here. Nobody gives me more crap over the years than gemaster, but he’s never questioned my integrity, which I always appreciate.

            Long story shortish, my background is in mainstream news. I spent about 7 years working as a radio journalist where the line between advertising and editorial content was very very strong. One of the nice things about working in that kind of organization is that you’re free to spend your time researching and writing rather than trying to run a business and make money.

            When I started transitioning to running my own web sites, I brought that mentality with me and appreciated the fact that I could contract with advertising networks such as NetShelter and Google AdSense so that they would sell ads and all I had to do was figure out where on the page they should go. In fact, for a while I was using in-text ads on older posts as a way to make some extra cash without dirtying up the front page with annoying pop up ads. I did away with them a while back because even though I’d never received a single reader complaint, I’m personally not a fan of that type of advertising and I figured I could sacrifice a few hundred bucks a month for the piece of mind that comes with knowing that I’m not annoying my loyal readers.

            My take on affiliate links has always been that if I’m going to be posting links to Amazon, Newegg, and other sites from time to time as I cover tech products, there’s no reason *not* to include an affiliate link. Thats’ why you’ll find them even on posts where I bash the product and suggest you probably don’t want to buy it.

            A while back I started doing “deals of the day” posts where I rounded up some of the best bargains each day on netbooks, tablets, other computers and accessories. I worried when this started that maybe I was crossing that advertising/editorial line that I’d grown to value by including a large number of affiliate links. But time and again I’ve had people tell me that the daily deals posts were some of their favorite items on Liliputing.

            Recently Liliputing took a hit in Google search rankings, and since Google doesn’t like to explain exactly why its algorithm has decided to stop sending as much traffic your way as it once does, all you can do is guess. I know Google doesn’t like pages that are simple lists of affiliate links so I took a lot of these older daily deals posts offline because most of the deals are out of date anyway. I have no idea if that will appease the Google gods, and it certainly won’t appease Jaundiced. But for a little while I’m going to look for stand-out deals such as the $280 ViewSonic gTablet to highlight with full articles instead of rounding up links.

            Yes, it’s true that some large web sites such as Engadget and Gizmodo will highlight bargains without including any affiliate links. That’s because they can afford to work this way. Having worked for 3 years as a blogger at Download Squad, which was a sister site to Engadget, we had the same standards as any mainstream news organization — bloggers weren’t expected to raise money, just to write. Unfortunately as a self employed individual working to provide you with the latest relevant news *and* pay a mortgage, I don’t have that luxury.

            Anyway, thanks to all the readers who have stuck up for me. Normally I wouldn’t bother feeding the trolls, but I’ve been thinking a lot about this topic lately and it means a lot to me to know that most of you are on the same page.

            Generally I agree that the appearance of impropriety can be just as bad as actual impropriety… but I’d like to think that the work I’ve done over the past 3 years speaks for itself and shows that while I may have my biases when it comes to computer products, I’m pretty sure I haven’t let my relationship with any advertiser or affiliate retailer affect my reporting.

          4. I’m always open to a well-reasoned argument. Unfortunately, everything I’ve heard are personal opinions passed as universal facts. That, and the “everybody’s doing it” bandwagon argument.

            Neither does it reflect well on you, that your sentiment of those who disagree with your “making a living” stance are either “new around here,” or trolls. My time online well predates the Internet, back to the BBS days and the 300/1200 baud modem. Belittling and name-calling is a well-worn tactic when one has nothing to offer in way of a response.

            While your detailing of your personal history sounds sincere enough, I’m afraid it doesn’t do much in the way of justifying your mixing of “advertorials.” What I hear is that that’s the way you’ve always done it, and since it’s fine with you, then it should be fine with readers. Sorry, that doesn’t wash.

            That said, it’s not like there’s a shortage of gadget blogs, so I certainly will move along to one which doesn’t depend on hawking old wares to the gullible to “make a living.” My parting thought is that you may want to dwell on why you’ve been low-ranked by Google. Perhaps it’s your bent for commercialism that determines your site’s quality. I dare say that a “deals” site and one which reviews gadgets is a poor mix. If you can’t make a living from your words alone, that it has to be augmented by commercial chicanery, then may be it’s time to find another profession.

          5. Didn’t mean you were new to the internet, but rather to the Liliputing comments section. If you think gemaster considers me a personal idol then clearly you haven’t been reading his stuff very long.

            As for the other points, like I said, it doesn’t look like I’m going to change your mind any more than you’re going to change mine so I’ll just say that I believe my work speaks for itself. If you find it all to be horribly biased and commercial, you’re entitled to that opinion. It’s not what I set out to do, and I believe I’ve been running a fair and objective site for the last three years, but it’s up to every reader to decide for themselves.

            The great Google mystery is one that’s affecting almost every other blogger I know at the moment. Google uses machine algorithms to determine search rankings, and overall it’s done a pretty good job over the past decade of returning some of the best search results on the planet, which is why people keep using it. I’m not convinced that the latest change has been a good one. If you copy and paste text that originally appeared on Liliputing into Google, you’ll often now find “scraper” sites which republish our content without permission ranking more highly. Hopefully Google will work out the kinks, but if not I’ll just focus on what I’ve always done: trying to attract regular readers instead of search engine traffic.

            Sorry to hear that you won’t be one of those readers.

  6. Weird to see a $280 tablet that is stuck running an outdated Android version as a “bargain alert.” Then, I took a look at the referral link and understood why. Looks like Brad Linder is an Amazon Associates who gets kickbacks for each sales.

    Readers, beware. If Brad L can bend over for such low commission rates, one wonders how his reviews will fare if there’s a mention that he’d get to keep the toys if his comments were “approved.”

    1. Jaund. Easy to criticize Brad’s integrity. fact of the matter is most of liliputing readers do not care if Brad makes a few dimes. We can make up our minds if a deal is valid. If my page hits and referral sales can keep this site running with fresh interesting content all the better.

    2. Buddy of mine bought one of these from Woot a week or two back, and he is very pleased. Its a legit deal.

      Jaundiced… Your brain needs oxygen.

    3. I own this tablet — I got it at Woot a couple of weeks ago.

      Like most Android devices currently for sale, it runs Froyo at the moment. It runs a Tegra 2, making it one of the fastest Android devices on the market. It runs every Android app I’ve thrown at it, including some, like Dungeon Defenders, that require too much horsepower to run on many devices. Frankly, I love this tablet.

      As for newer tablets, as of its reviews, the Xoom was so new that it didn’t even run right yet. It was buggy, didn’t run flash, etc. Most of the rest of the next wave of tablets aren’t available for sale yet. So if the gTab is your idea of outdated, I’m a little curious what you recommend for someone who wants to buy an Android tablet today.

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