Buying a tablet is quite a tricky prospect, as there are just a few out there on the market with Apple being the biggest and most well-known with their iPad and iPad2.

So here is what you should look for when purchasing a tablet pc:

Size and Weight -

Tablet touchscreens vary in size, from the 7inch screens on the Samsung Galaxy Tab, up to 10.1inch screens as seen on the Apple iPads.

With a 10.1 inch screen you get the space for a decent sized on screen keyboard which is more than handy.

Tablet size and weight also varies considerably, depending on the size of the screen and the outer casing it is made from. The 7-inch Samsung Galaxy Tab weighs in at 384g, compared to the 10-inch iPad2 which is 603g.

Performance -

The performance of the tablets is very key, are they are touchscreen and most of them have sliding screen gestures, the power and the performance affects the smoothness of the tablet greatly.

The Apple iPad has a 1GHz dual core processor is kind of the benchmark with most tablets on the market having a similar spec processor, with the exception being the recently released HTC Flyer which has a 1.5GHz QualComm processor.

Battery -

The battery times vary quite a bit on tablets, but ultimately it is all down on usage and the amount of apps running.

The iPad 2 has a lithium-polymer battery with up to 10 hours of surfing the web on Wi-Fi, watching video or listening to music, while the HTC flyer states 480 hours depending on usage but on definitive figure unlike Apple.

Applications -

Applications is a key feature with tablets as they are the main source of attraction to customers, Apple have their well renowned iTunes and App store which is host to thousands maybe even millions of applications so the choice and vary it there. They also have their iBook store which is their online book store for their Apple devices. The other tablets use a operating system called Android, who also have their own version called the market which is home to a large range of applications which are also available on the Apple store. In terms of applications Apple are quite far ahead but the Android Market is catching up fast.