Deals.Woot

Yep picked up the 16 gb thrive over Christmas from Woo, and have been very pleased.
It has a strong user community over at http//www.thriveforums.org.

Woot is offering this tablet so soon again.

When last offered, no one responded, so I will try again.

Toshiba repeatedly confirms that the Thrive, as-is out of the box, does not support NTFS on any attached USB MSC device. Is it possible (with/without rooting) to update/make the OS support NTFS?

Thank you all in advance.

@miniaturepeddler: You bought a Thrive from Jeremy Lin's brother?

Hi guys. I need internet connection but dont have Wifi spots available so I plan to use my cellphone as a modem. DO you think the Thrive comes with a dialer so I can connect via Bluetooth to the cellphone and use that connection? It's getting very hard to find tablets with 3G or GSM nowadays. Thanks in advance.

It's easy to play a movie that you download from the net. Just put it on a USB drive and stick it into the Thrive and you're good to go!
Try that on an iPad...

I guess there is no end to the tablet madness...

I bought this a few weeks ago, but the 16 GB. Wish I had waited for this one to get the 32 gb. My husband got one too. We love, love, love them! Best item I have bought from Woot, Thanks!

I bought one elsewhere but I've never had an issue with it. The not waking from sleep issue is fixed by updating the OS, but if people can't connect to the net then I see the problem. Not sure why so many bought on Woot have been defective, but I've never had any issue with mine.

@wallsg: AFAIK it's not AT100 vs AT105 (they're basically interchangable, some even have one label on the box and a different one in the software) but the firmware version. Some people seem to end up with a testing/engineering firmware that has test apps and is not upgradeable on the Woot Thrives. I myself had 2 (original and replacement b/c I thought I had a GPS issue, long story) but both had the non-test firmware. I was kind of disappointed actually because I was hoping to play around with the test app before rooting it which I was going to do anyway.

On that note, those who are into rooting/alternate ROMs should know that while this is hackable, it's got much less of a hacking community around it than other tablets. There isn't even a section on XDA. And AFAIK just 2 custom ROMs on thriveforums, 1 of which is barely custom. Of course if you don't care about any of that then it doesn't matter.

I bought a refurbished 32GB Toshiba Thrive not too long ago. I got mine from eBay, but came in a box still taped up with "from the manufacturer" tape intact.

There is an issue right now with the refurbished models where they come with the first iteration of Android 3.1 that was put on the Thrive. System updates for some reason require that they be installed incrementally (so you can't go from that version of 3.1 to 3.2.1). Toshiba is not hosting the incremental updates, only the most recent one, which fails to install.

The Thrive has one of the strongest community forums amongst Android tablets. Through rooting and applying custom ROMs, you can essentially update the OS on your own. It can be a bit tricky for those that aren't familiar with rooting Android devices.

There are two other problems I've come across. Can't connect to normal bluetooth headsets. And Google+ app doesn't work right. This appears to be due to some Toshiba-specific tweak.

I still love my Thrive though.

i love my thrive. it all day long every day. I havent had any problems connecting bluetooth audio but I have had the google+ issue. I don't really care about google+ though.

@mjc05: No word yet on whether or not Toshiba will be doing an official ICS update.

Have two of the 16GB I bought for my kids (17 and 21). They work but will not update, still deciding how to approach this problem. Really hate the thought of having to spend so much time on each of them. With my lack of technical skills I am fearful I will ruin the tablets. Otherwise I would consider buying this for me.

I got the 16 gig version that was posted a few weeks ago, and I absolutely love it. Yes, I did have the issue with not being able to upgrade; however, the woot post on Thrive Forums explains step by step everything you need to do. If you do it right away before you get to carried away installing stuff, backing everything up to do the install doesn't take nearly as long as they they tell you it will. The issue is caused by Toshiba no longer offering an incremental update that is required to get past the version it ships with. The update will fix the problem with the wake/sleep issue.

I think it is an amazing deal! Shipping was a bit slow for my liking, however. It takes Woot several business days to actually prepare the shipment, and their shippnig method, FedEx Smart Post - where FedEx ships it via ground to some regional distribution center and then gives it to the postal service for the rest of the journey, is particularly obnoxious and slow. The tablet, however - awesome!

@barbiejb: These are good tablets. We've purchased two from Woot, no issues whatever and they came with the factory tape in place and appeared brand new. While a little heavier than some brands, the Thrive makes up for it with having more ports built in than anything else plus an SD slot so you can expand the memory even more. Excellent screen, feels good in the hand. We've had them since December, daily use, no problems.

I'm using a 16 gb Thrive now, I did not buy it from woot so I do not have the ROM issues. But, I love this tablet and have reccomended this to several people over the past 6 months, all of which went out and bought one.

I bought this 2 weeks ago from Woot when it was $279 + $5 shipping, and I have to say, this tablet is a VERY GOOD BUY. I strongly recommend it to anyone who wants a cheaper tablet that functions as well as some of the higher end tablets out there.
P.S. I have the 16GB one

I bought 2 weeks ago as well. I bought this tablet because I will be leaving on a long ski trip and wanted to bring my gopro 2 along. I noticed this has SD slot and can play back 1080i(p?) movies. However, once I tried to watch even 720p videos shot by my gopro 2 they would shutter badly (play for 3 seconds skip 3 seconds). Both systems use mp4 with h.264 codec but arent compatable. After googling and looking for anwsers the only things I could get was the Tegra 2 chips are iffy with playback as in "subcodecs" for lack of a better word need to be the same and the only solution (doesn't help me) was to run the files through a program like handbrake or DVD catalyst.

Good news is that Gopro in a month or so is planing on releasing the wifi adapter with remote and a gopro app. Its supposed to allow live streaming to tablets and smart phones.

This is my first android device and its pretty neat. Ive had every iphone and i can also say ios is more polished for sure.

@iwantthewoot: download free app MX video. This will play any file perfectly without even converting it. Sometimes you have to switch between hardware decoder and software decoder within the app itself.
[edit: keep it legal] I have used this on EVO, ASUS transformer (Tegra 2), Lenovo K1 (tegra 2) and Rezound- with excellent results each time. I can play .mkv files natively.

Just ordered the the refurbished Toshiba Thrive, my first transaction with Woot. I forgot to click the $59 option to add Warranty. It comes with a 90 day Toshiba warranty. Does anyone recommend that I add this, and is it too late? Will I have option once it arrives?

“gak0090”,

Appreciate the reply.

Without getting into the whole filesystem I is better/worse than filesystem Y kind of debate on this forum, however, that proposed solution simply will not do. This site is not converting any external storage to FAT32.

Thank you.

Cool, I'll be waiting for the $250 Asus quad core SUCKERS

I picked up this tablet the last time it was on woot in it's 16GB format. Absolutely LOVE it. The speakers are more than adequate, battery life is great, I love the SD card port and the usb / hdmi ports - a very well thought-out tablet. I was worried that the screen would pick up scratches pretty easily, but even with my girlfriend's nails tapping on it there's no damage.

@gak0090: Thanks, I believe I tried everything with that and mobo player and VLC direct. But im not entirely sure if i checked the sw decoding. I also updated my gopro firmware last night. Maybe, I will give it another shot when i get home.

I bought 2 of the 16gb versions after Christmas for me and my wife. Both had to be updated via the instructions on the Thriveforum.org site. (I handled that myself with great support from the members there.) One of the tabs had a screen protector that had bonded itself on a molecular level. That was the worst thing I had to deal with trying to remove. Still, we LOVE our Thrives & use them every day!

I just got my mom hooked up on Skype this weekend & she gushed over being able to see the grandbabies on live video (via video Skype on my Thrive). I also used the HDMI out port to hook up to my 55" LCD TV while Skyping - that was freaking awesome! Sooo, guess who is getting another Thrive? ME! :) I'm gonna send my 16gb version to my mom & I'm keeping the 32gb for myself! Bwoo-ahahahahaaa!!