Samsung’s new Galaxy 10.1 Tab tablet is the latest in a series of recent Android tablets that include the Motorola Xoom, Asus Transformer, and Acer Iconia. Despite a similar spec-sheet, the Galaxy 10.1 Tab is a bit thinner and is also running the newest version of Android’s Honeycomb OS.
The Galaxy 10.1 Tab doesn’t have any built-in connectivity aside from WiFi and Bluetooth. Samsung instead chose to follow the Apple route, and offers a USB port via an add-on adapter. An SD card adapter may also be available.
I’ve been waiting a few months now for the right time to pick up an Android tablet, and so I splurged for the Galaxy 10.1 Tab. So far, I’ve got no complaints about the tablet itself. However, the same cannot be said about the accessories, or lack thereof. All the accessories I am interested in, such as a case and desktop dock, are out of stock. Not only that, apparently the separate desktop/media dock doesn’t come with its own charger.
The charging cable itself is also quite a bit too short. What the heck was Samsung thinking? Also, because of the battery chemistry or something of the sort, the tablet takes a bit of time to charge. Normally I charge my phone overnight, so I’ll probably do the same with the Tab.
Overall, I’m pretty pleased with the Galaxy 10.1 Tab. I know that Amazon tablets are due to arrive in the late Fall, and that Nvidia will be replacing the Tegra 2 processor with a much faster chip in the Fall as well. But, tablets are at the point where technology will keep advancing rapidly. There will always be better tech on the horizon.
Samsung Galaxay 10.1 Tab via Amazon
Maikeru says
A friend of mine picked this one up. The battery life is surprisingly decent when doing web browsing and playing music—all the while transferring large files over Bluetooth. Not sure if you’ve a Mac or a PC, but if you’ve a Mac I’d be interested in knowing if the update to Kies transfers files over the cable without too much hassle. When my friend bought this tablet about a week back they hadn’t yet released the utility for the Mac and we were stuck using Bluetooth to transfer a few hundred MB worth of files. I don’t think that he’s downloaded this version of Kies yet, so I’m curious.
Stuart says
I am mostly a PC guy, but do have a Macbook Pro laptop. I have not yet tried to transfer files at all yet, actually, but the last I read was that Mac compatibility has not yet been fixed.
I have used the tablet for web browsing, RSS reading, email, and playing a game or two. It can also work with Office documents, but I haven’t tested this out too thoroughly. I did try to view with a large powerpoint presentation, and some of the images were compressed and a little bit distorted. This isn’t a limitation of the tablet, but probably a quick-read feature of the software.