Gadgets: Walmart's low-cost tablet, earbuds get the job done

Did you know Walmart has its own line of consumer gadgets? Both the Onn 8-inch Android tablet and the Blackweb True Wireless Bluetooth Earbuds are at the low end of the price range, so my expectations were not high.

Just as it's unfair to compare a Nissan Versa to a BMW or a Mercedes, you can't compare every tablet to an iPad. The Onn tablet's competition is the Amazon 8-inch Kindle Fire HD tablet, which starts at $79.99.

The Onn tablet doesn't have the latest hardware, and that's just fine with me. It has an 8-inch IPS screen with a resolution of 1,280 by 800.

It runs a 1.3 gigahertz processor with 2 gigabytes of RAM and 16 GB of onboard storage.

The operating system takes up 6 GB of storage, so the user has 10 GB left for apps. There is also a micro SD card slot to add up to 128 GB more storage.

It has front and rear cameras that are not very good. Walmart doesn't list the size of the battery, but said it should last for five hours of mixed use.

It's also slow. When you launch an app or rotate the tablet from portrait to landscape mode, you will wait a few seconds.

The Onn's tiny speaker also is not great, so earbuds are recommended.

Bottom line: This is a decent tablet for internet browsing, e-mailing, watching videos or reading eBooks — or to use as a remote control for my TV and sound system. But it's not the Cadillac of tablets, so adjust your expectations.

The Blackweb True Wireless Bluetooth Earbuds are well-suited for activities where you need a good seal to hear music and an over-the-ear hook to keep them in place.

The Blackweb earbuds are light, easy to put on and come with several sizes of silicone tips to customize the fit. They will run 3.5 hours before needing a recharge; they charge up in two hours.

Music sounded pretty good for a $40 set of wireless earbuds. They also work for taking phone calls.