Google Play on a no-name Android Tablet (Pandigital R70F200)

[Stryker]

My father has a tablet that is currently running android kernel 2.6.29. It has it's own app downloader/manager system called "SlideMe" or something. He's put me up to the task of installing Google Play or Android Marketplace on there (or at the very least, finding a way to install standard Google apps).

Of course, I know absolutely nothing about the android systems at all.

After some googling it seems it's running Gingerbread, or some non-standard version of it at least. After more research it seems it needs to be rooted to install custom software. Anyways, normally I would be much more equipped to figure this out but I literally know nothing about how Android works, especially with there (apparently) being two sources of apps. If someone more trained in Android (i.e. probably everyone on here) has any pointers for me to continue researching this, that would be greatly helpful.

All other details that may or may not be necessary (from the "Settings -> About" page):
• Hardware platform | RD101-2GB-W
• Firmware version | S64F_SHST_OP21PD_20110310_B
• Kernel version | 2.6.29 PDUI@ANDROID #53
• Adobe RMSDK | 9.1.0
If there's anything important I don't know about/skipped please let me know. As I stated I have no idea what I'm doing when it comes to Android products and the no-name aspect is not helping me. I'm not comfortable rooting this device yet, but only because I really know anything about it. I can educate myself if rooting is necessary, or at least I hope I can.

[st2000]

Yes, I've see this problem before. Google play just doesn't automatically work on all devices. Checking this list:
http://support.google.com/googleplay/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=1727131
I do not see your RD101 number or Pandigital Novel (which is what I think you have).

So I think you are right. That you need to get something like CyanogenMod running on it and then load up the gapps application (I believe Google Play is part of this package). It looks like Pandigital is one of those sub $100 tablets. So I would expect lots of people putting CyanogenMod on it. But I haven't found much evidence of this. If you go out and get another tablet do check the CyanogenMod official and unofficial support list.

In the end, Android is Unix with Java running on top of it. Yes, I know, that's a very simple way of looking at it. But I just wanted to point out that if you are already familiar with Unix or a derivative of Unix you already know a lot about Android.

-good luck

Just a thought. I am thinking this will not work. Mostly because your device is not on the list in the above URL. But you might try and installing the gapps for your version of Android just to see if it will work. If you follow any of the CyanogenMod install tutorials on line you will eventually come across the steps telling you where to find and how to pick out the correct version of gapps. But like I said, this is a long shot. Also, I have never tried this. For all I know this may make your tablet unusable.

[MS3FGX]

You can install GApps on a non-supported Android device, and it will usually work. I've put the Play Store on a few cheap tablets like this. The bigger issue is individual applications not installing (or running very poorly) on this type of device; but the Play Store itself should work well enough.

The issue is whether or not you can root the tablet, since you'll want to install the Play Store application under /system. Some of these cheap tablet's actually come pre-rooted, which makes things a lot easier.

[Stryker]

I have seen the word CyanogenMod a lot but have no idea what it is, research will be done on that later though. Anyways, I'm not able to get apps from the play store on there currently, which is what he's trying to do. Ms3fgx, how do you get the play store on a tablet? Just curious what your experiences with this kind of thing are.

[st2000]

CyanogenMod is probably the most commonly used (free) Android build. The people who create and maintain it have been working on it for years. It has been ported to dozens of popular Android devices. And to some devices never meant to run Android (i.e. HP TouchPad). People who buy perfectly good Android HW/SW have decided to run CyanogenMod instead of the version of Android that came with their tablet or phone.

Again, I believe the Google Applications download includes the Play Store and other Google like applications (i.e. mail, web browser). If it is possible to install this as Ms3fgx has indicated, then I stand by my suggestion to pull the steps regarding installing Google Application from the CyanogenMod instructions ... which should be easy to find.

I know this is not what you want to do. But if you were staring over, In the end, you might find it much easier for a number of reasons to start out with an Android device which has been "well used" in the CyanogenMod circles. Even if you are not going to use CyanogenMod. It would make finding instructions and SW specific to your Android much easier.

Last comment, not all Android devices are the same. For instance, if your Android were the only Android which used a certain camera - it would be very unlikely to find support for that camera under a more desirable build like CyanogenMod. Further, if the company that created your device stopped supporting it, you would be stuck at an older version of Android for the foreseeable future. Sooner or later, people (who write applications) would stop supporting older versions of Android.

-good luck

Edit: added later...

BTW, assuming you are new to Android. You should know about "side loading". If you have the *.apk file, you can install it into your Android device. That is probably what that utility you posted is all about. In short, if you have the *.apk file you can side load it and skip the entire Google Play store thing. Now the problem is that not all applications are (easily) available in this form.