Announced a little ‘surprise in July, well ahead of the IFA 2015, Galaxy Tab S2 is a tablet that has all the qualities to be talked about. The device comes in two versions, identical in design but marked with an 8-inch display and 9.7-inch; version with larger panel is that Samsung has decided to send for the complete test and is characterized by a price tag of 589 € , a substantial figure but aligned to competition especially considering that the device is accompanied by a LTE module for mobile broadband. The 8-inch version costs 489 € and, at least in Italy, there are no variations Wi-Fi only.
It is the thinnest tablet and is also a featherweight
Essential . That’s how we define the package of Galaxy Tab S2, that the box is accompanied only by the shipper, the USB-microUSB cable, a paper clip to the opening slot and a concise manual that probably few will read. Essential is also the design of the product, but in this case it is right alongside another adjective: smart .
Galaxy Table S2 tablet is a well made and marked by a metal body that contributes greatly to elevate the perception of overall quality. The frame gives a sense of solidity that few other products are able to ensure and thickness of only 5.6 mm (the camera slightly protruding is excluded from this count) make the tablet in question, to the time of writing this test, the slimmest on the market by far. The dimensions of 237.3 x 169 mm are right for a tablet display with the diagonal of just under 10 inches but what is most amazing is the weight 392 grams are really small thing and make it perfect to use with one hand to those who are not accustomed to using such devices.
Never mind if The back of the tablet is plastic and a little out of place ‘, both stylistically and qualitatively, with the rest of the building: in his hands he will always have the thinnest and lightest tablets on the market, which is soon forget this little ambition in choosing the material by Samsung. Beautiful color Gold specimen under test, although more that gold seems to find himself before a shade somewhere between gray and copper (there is also a black version). Buttons and slots for microSD and SIM nano are all on the right side of the device while at the bottom there are – symmetrically – 3.5 mm jack and micro USB input with the sides the two speakers of the system, positioned so stylistically perfect but impractical . When using media with two hands will eventually cover one of the two speakers, resulting in the production of a muffled sound. Irrational, as we will point out later, even the decision to place the camera rear main centrally located and very high: two-handed shooting is always a risk of putting a finger in front of goal.
As usual Samsung is a single physical button home on the front which doubles as biometric sensor for fingerprint recognition. The system works pretty well, but it must be said that many manufacturers have solutions that react in a more precise and fast. On either side of the home there are two touch buttons: left the command for multitasking and right is “ back” .
A display more alive than ever, now in 4: 3
The mobile division of Samsung has always focused on the display of excellent quality S2 and Galaxy Tab is no exception. The tablet is equipped with a SuperAMOLED panel 9.7-inch diagonal alone, as they say in other areas, would be the ticket price ; we are dealing with a display of 2048 x 1536 pixels more than that for the QXGA resolution – we are at 264 pixels per inch – affects the ability of color rendering (Samsung speaks of coverage of 94% of the Adobe RGB space), obviously one of the highlights of the AMOLED technology at the base of the panel and that always ends up surprising, especially if a judge is a consumer just geek and the most casual .
The display, in short, like in all the different possibilities of setting color values (settings are available five different preset ) are able to satisfy both the tastes of a user more comfortable with shades natural and those who prefer the utmost vividness. In any case blacks are always excellent (after all it is an OLED) while whites only perhaps a little ‘less pure, especially if you move the angle optimum viewing.
Good but not extraordinary viewing angles: considering the technology at stake something better we have seen it, but we are talking about little things mostly detectable only extreme angles. Lazy inaccurate and, finally, the ambient light sensor weblog LiteOn : always puts us at least a few seconds to adjust to changes in light and sometimes wrong in the selection of the proper display brightness.
The general vote on the screen grows even if you highlight the decisive change of direction imposed by Samsung as the aspect ratio of the display. We have gone from a widescreen 16:10 of the previous generation (the Tab S was fitted with a 10.5 “2560 x 1600 pixels) in one 4: 3 , then identical to the one mounted by Apple on iPad Air 2 in the resolution.
With this choice Samsung has therefore deliberately sacrificed something in terms of multimedia (before it was most enjoyable to see movies in 16: 9 or playing certain video games) but gained considerably in all Other issues: surf the web, browse an electronic journal, read an e-book or write a file in Word operations are certainly more suited to the format 4: 3.
Sponsored then with top grades the display component undoubtedly exceptional product in question.
CPU and RAM are ok, but not of the latest generation
In 5.6 mm thick that distinguish the tablet in question Samsung has decided to install a SoC Exynos 5433 with a processor to 8 cores (four ARM Cortex A57 2.1 GHz ARM Cortex-A53 plus the same 1.5 GHz) and graphic Mali-T760 joined to 3 GB of RAM LPDDR3 . It is a package more than adequate to ensure maximum reactivity of Galaxy Tab S2 in every situation, even if the Exynos chosen by Samsung does not represent the best it has to offer the company since it is a SoC previous generation that we have seen on phablet Galaxy Note and Galaxy Note 4 Edge of the end of 2014. The Exynos Octa 7 7420 of the newest Galaxy S6 (but also of Galaxy Note and 5 Meizu Pro 5) would be more appropriate for the top range of the tablet by Samsung but you can certainly complain: even if the benchmark scores are recorded not too exciting, especially when compared to those of competitor Air iPad 2 (but it’s still difficult to compare two different platforms ), Galaxy Tab S2 is doing very well in using peaceful and even in the most intense , recording sporadic (although embarrassing) slowdowns only with the system browser rare but still quite annoying as to prefer Chrome (preinstalled) in navigation operations daily on the web.
3 GB of RAM ensures opening, closing and switching between applications without the slightest problem; the CPU puts his in the most excited and The Mali GPU means that all the latest games are always fluid , albeit sometimes slightly poor in detail. You can play back movies in Ultra HD at 30 frames per second, certainly not essential but doing very comfortable if needed.
There’s Microsoft Office and little else
The Android version installed on board is 5.0.2 Lollipop ; Also in this case we do not talk very last release of the operating system of Google and even the penultimate, but what you find yourself in your hands is a solid package that provides maximum reliability and stability . At this point in 2015, the 5.1.x would be more logical, but will soon upgrade to Android 6.0 Marshmallow. In terms of customization then forget the old TouchWiz UI which Samsung has used for years; as for the last smartphone / phablet Also on Galaxy Tab S2 is streamlined interface that gives the system that mix of lightness, youth and, according to many, even of elegance , which goes well with the rest of the package. At first power it is hard to understand how the pre-installed applications are very few: in addition to Google Apps there is only room for proprietary applications MySamsung, SydeSync, Smart Manager (useful for optimizing system resources) and for the store Galaxy Apps .
The only ambition important is the presence of the Microsoft Office suite, adding that certainly is useful on this type of product. The model we tested was equipped with 32 GB of physical memory eMMC , of which almost 7 occupied by system files and about 25 actually available to the user ; those who want more space will have to settle for buying a microSD (up to 128 GB) in Italy is not available because the 64 GB version for sale in other markets.
Among the special features that distinguish the tablet in question point out the standby smart that prevents the display turns off when you are watching it, the ability to mute ringtones / alarms simply placing a hand on the screen and also the gesture scroll with the palm side of the hand from side to side of the panel to capture the screen , the latter feature that – frankly – it works once yes and a no. Definitely comfortable then the multi-window that allows you to keep the display two different applications; pity only that not all apps are compatible with this feature, especially if such failure afflicts software such as Microsoft Word and Excel (and other Office package). Convenient well as the ability to reduce application window; nothing new but on a tablet is a feature that should not be missing and Samsung knows it well.
As for the experience of use is not much else to report. The system, as we noted above, never gives the feeling of being “out of breath” and even in the most hectic the only thing you feel is only a slight overheating of the upper portion of the device , too nothing annoying .
Battery “small”, but it’s hard to do better
Great design, good construction and good performance make Galaxy Tab S2 a seemingly perfect product but to achieve this, of course, something had to be sacrificed. If the product in question pay pledge is autonomy General , definitely good if you consider the size of the device (we repeat, the tablet is only 5.6 millimeters thick) but absolutely not exciting , especially if we consider the results obtained by other similar devices offered by competitors.
With Galaxy Tab S2 we never managed to get over the four days of use , which should account for a tablet, perhaps the right result. With all active connections and display brightness set to maximum (but in automatic mode) three days of pretty intense use them are still unable to do : games and movies claim a lot of energy while consumption falls very more slowly in the mode of browsing the web or in the reading of books and / or documents of various nature. Very long charging times: to bring 100% battery 5870 mAh (starting from about 10%) it takes almost four hours, with the result reached this charger in the sales package that allows the Fast-charging of the device.
Present on board GPS and GLONASS, Wi-Fi 802.11 a / b / g / n / ac dual band (with Wi-Fi Direct) and Bluetooth 4.1 Low Energy. As we wrote previously as plenty of LTE connectivity while, although not essential in this field, is not an NFC chip . Finally we report that to transfer files from one computer to the tablet (or vice versa) Cable there necessarily need SmartSwitch , Samsung’s proprietary software available for PC and Mac and can be downloaded directly from the manufacturer.
Good picture for a tablet, allowing fingers
Who buys a tablet does not to take pictures or make videos, but in recent times there has been a certain tendency to the use of the cameras of the tablet, especially among the older age groups. For this reason, several companies have started to offer modules “decent” in this area. Samsung did not want to be outdone and decided to equip this Tab Galaxy S2 with a main module consists of a 8-megapixel CMOS sensor and a good lens with f / 1.9 .
Numbers aside, in the end we are faced with a camera made by more than enough ; under optimal conditions and with a little ‘luck you can even get some shots interesting but overall the photos are quite poor in detail and, once displayed on external screens, even a bit’ off the shades. A little ‘nervous the autofocus good minds seemed the white management. When light conditions start to get difficult yield falls accordingly: there is a flash that can help and noise increases noticeably.
Stesso speech we can do it also with regard to the video part: the movies are absolutely in the category average (perhaps a few steps above) and if registered in Full HD can also take advantage of the digital stabilization . Galaxy Tab S2 also allows video recording in QHD (2560 x 1440 pixels at 30 fps), but frankly, it’s not one of those things that make a miracle recovery and equal the result is undoubtedly better to 1080p with active stabilization.
If we were to assign a rating to the sector camera (by the way, the front end CMOS 2.1 megapixels is more than enough to selfie and video) this deserves a full enough and would go far beyond if we consider the average quality put onto the solutions available in tablet competitors. Let me be clear, several mid-range smartphone (also medium-low) are able to do better but within the tablet do not expect better results.
What exactly we were not able to digest is the positioning of the main module on the back is too high and when shooting in “horizontal “often it forces to grips not too natural in order to avoid the appearance of fingers in the photographs. Okay design, but one centimeter lower down would upset everything?
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