Looking for recommendation: large-ish tablet with as little bloat as possible

[Ranayna]

The title almost says it all
I am looking for a large-ish tablet of 11" or larger, with as little bloat as possible, while still being relatively cheap.

It does not need that much computing power.
My use cases: PDF documents, comics in various formats, general webbrowsing, and the Readly app.

A 12" iPad Pro would fit the requirements, and i know they are relatively bloat free, but is way to expensive, and also totally overpowered for the stuff i want to use the device for.

I never have used an Android device, but I have to admit that i am a bit afraid of all the bloat that supposedly comes with most devices.
Are there any Android tables available that allow for the installation of a custom ROM? From my research this sadly seems to be not the case.
So which device would be comparatively bloat free?

[DiTBho]

sorry for the probably-silly idea, but ...
... what about a Lenovo X220 Tablet?
cheap, 12", intel, with a common hd.

acceptable? 

[Ranayna]

I am generally not against buying something used, but the X220 is maybe a bit too old now...

The display is crappy with it's "HD Ready" resolution, these old CPUs are also not powerful, the battery runtime will be atrocious, likely even with a new battery (if you can even still get genuine replacement batteries) and the thing is quite heavy.
Just about the only thing going for the X220 is it's openes. It will run Linux.

[Doctorandus_P]

There are some android tablets below EUR200, but the cheapest usually come with low resolution screens.
Between EUR200 and EUR300 there seems to be quite some choice for tablets with a higher resolution.

PDF is a very crappy format and it is very unfortunate this has become the defacto standard. Text only pdf's tend to "reflow" reasonably on my pocketbook E-reader, but when they get some pictures it's usually pure crap, and the screen is too small to view a whole page at once. An E-reader is also too slow to page though datasheets to find stuff.

So I'm pretty much looking for the same as you.
Very slowly some options are becoming available to run Linux (or Linux applications) on top of android. "volkspc" is one of such projects.
https://www.volkspc.org/product/volkspc-lenovo-tab-p11-plus/

[Halcyon]

You can remove a lot of the bloat from mainstream phones and tablets running Android using a USB cable, the Android Debug Bridge (ADB) and the via the "uninstall" command. This works for applications that have the uninstall option disabled/greyed out in the Android GUI itself.

I did this successfully on my last Samsung phone.

[Ranayna]

Ok, i'm taking a bit of a gamble. If it does not turn out well, i can still return the device.

I ordered a 12.3" Tablet (or rather "detachable", so essentially an included keyboard)), with Qualcomm Snapdragon 850 CPU, running Windows on ARM of all things. 
I cannot find much information on the device, but i hope i can install some flavour of Linux on the thing. The BIOS is supposedly accessible.
Hence the "gamble" part

But the price at 200 Euro, combined with it being the size of the iPad Pro, is just a combination that was too good to pass.

Ebay link (german) as reference: https://www.ebay.de/itm/404014316970

[sarge]

Just to throw this out there - I always resort to the following page, when I want to get a new device: https://wiki.lineageos.org/devices/

It helps a bunch, when trying to find a device that is known "hackable" and able to replace the system/ROM.

[Ranayna]

Yeah, i did that, and the number of tablets in that list is disappointing.

I haven't got the device yet (it's scheduled to arrive early next week), but i will report once i got it and played around with it.

Supposedly it runs Windows Education Edition though, so it should not force me to set up an account to use windows, even on Windows 11.
Since i essentially only need a pdf viewer, an image viewer, a browser, and maybe a videoplayer, i think that the pre-installed windows may actually be sufficient for me.

[Ranayna]

Ok, i got the device.

First impressions are actually decent. I was a bit miffed when i saw the included plugpack with a stupid barreljack, but the device can still be charged over USB-C. I would have hoped for another USB-C powersupply, but i have one that works, so that is only a minor nitpick.

My first impression of Windows on Arm is actually somewhat of a surprise. It looks *exactly* the same as on x86. It does not even mention ARM anywhere.
Biggest surprise: I expected installations to be locked to the Microsoft Store. They are not! You need to get Arm specific versions, but if you get them, you can just install them. Notepad++, which has a ARM version, works just fine for example.

First attempts to boot some live systems were not encouraging though. It detects the media, but what i tried always gives me a bootloop.
I am currently running windows updates, and it includes a "Hardware System Update" by the manufacturer. I would interpret that as a UEFI or Firmware Update, maybe it helps.

But i will finish the updates and at least give Windows 11 a try. Education Edition is hopefully comparatively bloat free.

[Ranayna]

Yeah, i realized that by now
I was maybe a bit misled by the fact the the tablet calls it's initial configuration screen, where you can set the bootorder and disable secureboot a "BIOS Setup Utility".

It looks like a BIOS, it has the options like a BIOS, it calls itself a BIOS, you enter it like a BIOS (hit F2 while booting), but apparently it is not a BIOS. :p
It is still stuck on Windows 10 at the moment. The only way to get it to 11 seems to be Windows Update, but that hasn't found the upgrade yet.