Finally, an Android tablet worth seriously considering
- Thread starter rockymtnhigh
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I went to the Sprint store to play with the Galaxy Tab today and it’s Still a yawner to me. But at least this time I was able to stream video off of the 3G connection since this was Sprint not Verizon’s ubercrappy data network. Still completely unimpressed. Too small for anything useful and too big to take the place of a smartphone. Video quality didn't impress me much. I was streaming my usual high quality videos off of YouTube and they looked awful in comparison to watching them on my 23” HP widescreen at home, watching them on the Evo and a host of other smartphones. I don’t know if it’s the color depth or what, but they don’t look as good as I thought they would. I also felt like a retard typing on the thing. In both landscape and portrait modes the keyboard is too big to navigate with one hand, but my hands felt crunched when using two hands. Again, this thing is simply too damn small! The apps also really don’t take advantage of the extra real estate. At least with the iPad from what I’ve seen, some of the apps are specifically designed for the iPad and take advantage of it, nothing yet to speak of for the Android. I wish Motorola or HTC would come out with an Android Tablet.
From a few days ago: Acer CEO Talks Android, Chrome OS and How to Take on the iPad In a recent PC Week survey, Acer beat HP and Dell in terms of quality and customer service. The 10" Acer tablet with Honeycomb may be the one to take on the iPad. I'm not sure about Windows 7 in a tablet, though. I haven't seen anything to convince me that a Touch UI on Windows is anything but painful. I'd rather see the Zune/Windows Phone 7 UI put on a tablet.
Agree. The only way a Windows UI works in a touch environment is if a stylus is being used in conjunction with touch ability.
Ugh. Staples has a 10.1" Viewsonic tablet running Android 2.2 on sale this week for $399. I don't know what processor it's running, but it isn't nearly enough. I would press the screen and a second later it would respond. Blech.
It could be. I didn't reboot it, but if you're trying to sell a tablet as an alternative to the iPad, it had better work no matter what happens to it.
Regarding the Viewsonic 10" tablet, it looks like it got pulled, so my impressions weren't based on a bum unit.
In Yet Another Tablet Tease, I spotted this over on the CNet page that was referenced in another thread:
[youtube]quI2I8wLPdc[/youtube]
You folks going to CES next month are going to be busy as bees looking for Honeycomb... Sorry, couldn't resist!
In Yet Another Tablet Tease, I spotted this over on the CNet page that was referenced in another thread:
[youtube]quI2I8wLPdc[/youtube]
You folks going to CES next month are going to be busy as bees looking for Honeycomb... Sorry, couldn't resist!
Steve Mehs- I thought that too when looking at photos on the Galaxy Tab. I got the idea that the images were lacking in color depth. It reminded me more of the look of those cheap digital picture frames. The ipad has a really great cinematic look to the videos. One of the best podcasts I see for image quality is Leo LaPorte's TWIT but many are equal to his when the podcast lists it as HD. Same goes for Netflix and the latest DishNetwork Sling app. I think most people will suffer with the smaller keyboard on the Galaxy, just to have the smaller screen size to fit in their sport coat pocket. Plus as Mike wants, the lighter weight.
There are new capacitive styluses now for those type of screens.
There are new capacitive styluses now for those type of screens.
Suffer with a 7" swype keyboard? Are you kidding me? What are you smoking? 
but I'll have my full review of the Tab next week.
but I'll have my full review of the Tab next week.
Mike- the keys on the Galaxy are about half the area of those on the iPad. Not too much of a problem for people like us with smaller hands. Plus, I would assume you will be using the Galaxy more as a one handed typing, maybe one finger since Last I saw you, you only had two hands. ( one to type, one to hold the Galaxy) The smaller Galaxy will not work as easy as a laptop keyboard because of the smaller size. I did feel more comfortable using it with one handed typing. At best and a stretch, the Galaxy could be used with the two thumb typing technique you probably use with the Droid. The iPad's size, in contrast, sits at a nice angle on your legs or table using the Apple case and makes for easy two handed standard typing. Anyway, this, I think is a very minor issue since the main advantage of the Galaxy will be it's "pocket" size and allow users such as yourself to carry it much easier than an ipad. Carrying in a woman's purse or even in a man's shirt pocket might be possible, definitely the sport coat inside pocket. With the ipad, you will be toting it as a separate carry.
Ah, Don... you are thinking in a linear traditional method of keyboarding. Unless I am wrong, the ipad does not have swype; which totally changes the game in terms of keyboard text entry. One finger is all you need, and it is extremely accurate. Swype has completely revolutionized how I use my Droid X. And the keyboard on it is tiny in comparison with the Tab. And the Tab comes with swype pre-installed.
But again, I'll have my review in a few days.
But again, I'll have my review in a few days.
No, I was not familiar with "swype." So, I looked it up and read a pretty good description of the technique. Seems it has been in beta since release in 2008 but began alpha development in the late 90's. The reviewer was quite complimentary on it but only compared it as better with touch screen smart phone devices, not PDA keypads nor full size keyboards. Here is what he had to say about that:
from: Hands-on: Swype keyboard for Android is sweeptastic
By Ryan Paul
I get the idea that this is just a bit of improvement over the spell checker but I'd need to try and learn it to understand if it would be faster. I don't think it is out for the ipad. I had enough trouble adapting to ipad's lack of navigational arrows method of navigation so maybe I''ll pass on swype and wait for a good speech to text software. I think swype would be good on a cell phone screen but tapping may still be the faster approach with larger keypad, especially if you have an increase in use of a spell checker like selection menus for possibilities. This would increase the number of times you'd have to stop and select the correct word from a list over the times where a word is not recognized do to misspelling. An innovation the ipad has is guess ahead and I get annoyed with it all the time.
I think the real innovation will come when a really good speech to text recognition software is developed. I did a TV show on this about 10 years ago at a NYC computer store and it was hilarious. The demonstrator volunteer was a NYC cop who read from a script the director prepared. It read: If you want to type, all you have to do is talk into your microphone and the computer will type what you say. So the cop read this into the computer mic while I videotaped this for a live show. What was typed was: If ya wanna tipe, all ya haftadoo is tokintooh your microphone ain da compyoottor will tipe what yooh say. The host said lets try this again. The cop read the script a second time, a third time and a fourth and it typed the exact same thing each time! Everyone was howling in laughter. Then in frustration the cop said- Ahh this thing has a few screws loose. The computer responded immediately, by typing, Ahh, dis ting has a few scwroosloose.
from: Hands-on: Swype keyboard for Android is sweeptastic
By Ryan Paul
I get the idea that this is just a bit of improvement over the spell checker but I'd need to try and learn it to understand if it would be faster. I don't think it is out for the ipad. I had enough trouble adapting to ipad's lack of navigational arrows method of navigation so maybe I''ll pass on swype and wait for a good speech to text software. I think swype would be good on a cell phone screen but tapping may still be the faster approach with larger keypad, especially if you have an increase in use of a spell checker like selection menus for possibilities. This would increase the number of times you'd have to stop and select the correct word from a list over the times where a word is not recognized do to misspelling. An innovation the ipad has is guess ahead and I get annoyed with it all the time.
I think the real innovation will come when a really good speech to text recognition software is developed. I did a TV show on this about 10 years ago at a NYC computer store and it was hilarious. The demonstrator volunteer was a NYC cop who read from a script the director prepared. It read: If you want to type, all you have to do is talk into your microphone and the computer will type what you say. So the cop read this into the computer mic while I videotaped this for a live show. What was typed was: If ya wanna tipe, all ya haftadoo is tokintooh your microphone ain da compyoottor will tipe what yooh say. The host said lets try this again. The cop read the script a second time, a third time and a fourth and it typed the exact same thing each time! Everyone was howling in laughter. Then in frustration the cop said- Ahh this thing has a few screws loose. The computer responded immediately, by typing, Ahh, dis ting has a few scwroosloose.
Try swype. Reviews of it do not do it justice. There are several folks in the Phone Forum who are sold on it. And for me it is way faster than touch typing. Its accuracy increases as you use it. You literally swype in the direction of the words and voila! 
Mike,
I'm looking forward to your review. I know that Leo Laporte likes his a lot, even though he wasn't expecting to. From the video that I've seen of him running through the GUI, it's clear that Viewsonic must have tried to "improve" on the Android UI and ended up with a FUBAR instead. One blog I read said that there is nothing wrong with the hardware (well, maybe the screen should be swapped out for a better LCD) so Android tinkerers picked them up for the $399 and rooted them, ridding the Tab G of the "Touch and Tap" interface that Viewsonic installed. Obviously, not something that the average J6P is likely to do.
Speaking of the Droid X, one of my coworkers came in to my office last week, saying that it was an early Christmas present, and could I help him connect to our Corporate LAN. Our IT policies forbid non-Company devices on our network, so that was easy. However, when I tried to see what settings there were for setting up e-mail accounts, I was surprised at the UI lag. Now, to be fair, he had an anti-scratch screen protector (which I abhor) so that could have been slowing me down. But there was no native Exchange support that I could see. Is there an Android App for Exchange e-mail support? I would think there must be, if a Tablet is expected to make any headway in a Corporate setting.
I'm looking forward to your review. I know that Leo Laporte likes his a lot, even though he wasn't expecting to. From the video that I've seen of him running through the GUI, it's clear that Viewsonic must have tried to "improve" on the Android UI and ended up with a FUBAR instead. One blog I read said that there is nothing wrong with the hardware (well, maybe the screen should be swapped out for a better LCD) so Android tinkerers picked them up for the $399 and rooted them, ridding the Tab G of the "Touch and Tap" interface that Viewsonic installed. Obviously, not something that the average J6P is likely to do.
Speaking of the Droid X, one of my coworkers came in to my office last week, saying that it was an early Christmas present, and could I help him connect to our Corporate LAN. Our IT policies forbid non-Company devices on our network, so that was easy. However, when I tried to see what settings there were for setting up e-mail accounts, I was surprised at the UI lag. Now, to be fair, he had an anti-scratch screen protector (which I abhor) so that could have been slowing me down. But there was no native Exchange support that I could see. Is there an Android App for Exchange e-mail support? I would think there must be, if a Tablet is expected to make any headway in a Corporate setting.
There absolutely is exchange support for the Droid X. I removed it, and don't even remember the app name, but it is there, and much improved I am told. I use gmail and the email app for IMAP for work email. Not sure about UI lag, or the anti-scratch protector (I use a zagg invisible shield, and have absolutely no UI lag or issues. He might have a bad device.
I think screen scratch protectors are way over rated! Haven't used them in years, since my HP-6300 days. On a stylus screen, if you use a proper stylus, it will not scratch the hard screen surface. If a capacitive screen you will get finger prints but these are easily wiped off with a microfil fiber anti lint cloth. I also have a spray bottle of eye glasses cleaner handy for a new like cleaning. IMO, don't waste your money on screen protectors unless you like to use a nail or metal file on your device.
AnandTech got around to review the Tab
Samsung Galaxy Tab - The AnandTech Review - AnandTech :: Your Source for Hardware Analysis and News
The usual: good hardware, Froyo not quite up to the task (just what Google is saying for a while).
More of an attempt to put a stake in the ground and test the DOA-size, I believe.
Leaves high hopes for what Honeycomb might bring to the table...
Diogen.
Samsung Galaxy Tab - The AnandTech Review - AnandTech :: Your Source for Hardware Analysis and News
The usual: good hardware, Froyo not quite up to the task (just what Google is saying for a while).
More of an attempt to put a stake in the ground and test the DOA-size, I believe.
Leaves high hopes for what Honeycomb might bring to the table...
Diogen.
Wow Leo actually had something nice to say about something that doesn’t have a shiny fruit on the back of it and is a direct competitor to something his beloved Apple offers? Get outta here!
Don, I use screen protectors to protect against fine micro scratches. When I had the 8GB iPhone 3G I just used a case and in less than a month’s time I had tons of fine micro scratches all over the place, and I wasn't hard on it at all. Got that way just from normal use. Before my 30 days was up I realized 8GB probably wasn't enough so I upgraded to the 16GB iPhone 3G and paid the $100 price differential. I had a second chance at life as I got a brand new phone again and immediately put on a screen protector. When I got the Evo I got a screen protector as well and put it on right away. My buddy who has the Evo too doesn’t believe in screen protectors has micro scratches all over his screen from normal use. My Evo actually took a nasty spill in my work truck and the protector was punctured, but not the screen. Thank God I had one! I replaced it and was good as new. The screen protectors I got cost $12 for two normal ones (can’t even tell they’re on) and an antiglare one, not bad at all. Especially considering I paid TWICE that for just ONE screen protector when I had the iPhone.
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