The time has come to review the world’s most controversial tablet and it’s not even a HP model I’m talking about. Coming after a couple of months of legal trouble from Apple, Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 started off as a potentially doomed slate, since it was banned in a few countries, but the ban was eventually lifted. What we have right here is a Honeycomb unit and the one that I tested lacked TouchWiz sadly.
Considering what I’ve been hearing recently, that the TouchWiz update cripples the Galaxy Tab 10.1 rather than enhance it, I’m lucky I didn’t get it. Supposedly, TouchWiz and the update bricked a number of units and really dug into the battery life. Back to our device on the testing table, this slate is thinner and lighter than the iPad, at 8.6mm and 565 grams respectively… and that’s felt the moment you grab the gadget with two hands.
The only time when I felt that Samsung was copying Apple was when I found out that this tablet lacks any kind of useful port. No trace of SD or microSD card slot, micro USB, full USB, HDMI or anything like that. We’ll have to do with an audio jack and the 30 pin port provided by Samsung. The display is top notch quality, with a 10.1 inch diagonal, widescreen view and 1280 x 800 pixel resolution, superior to the one on the iPad 2.
Galaxy Tab 10.1 comes with a 1GB of RAM, up to 64GB of internal memory and the usual dual core Nvidia Tegra 2 processor at 1GHz. HSPA+ connectivity of up to 21Mbps is available, as well as WiFi and Bluetooth 3.0. Don’t expect too much from the 3MP camera at the back, although on paper it promises HD 720p video recording. At least it has an LED flash and autofocus.. and it’s paired with a front 2 megapixel camera for videocalls.
The experience with this model didn’t give me any specific thrills in comparison with other Honeycomb models. The only difference here is the Samsung dedicated App Store and the Music Hub, that gives you the latest hits in the music industry for a certain price. In the Samsung application store there are a few nifty apps, like the Benny e-book for kids or the Star Chart for astronomy buffs. All in all I had a pleasant experience with this very light and thin tablet… but in the end the software spoiled it for me.
The tablet froze to bricked status for a day or two and that was a complete turn off for me. I may have been unlucky enough to get a buggy device, but that’s not the case. The bugs I saw here are the same as the ones on any other Honeycomb tablet: force closes especially in the YouTube app and lots of lag and blocks when the tablet runs multiple apps. Maybe with Android 4.0 this slate will perform better…
The Motorola DROID BIONIC is Verizon’s first Android Phone to have both 4G LTE Connectivity and a dual core processor, immediately launching it into the elite smartphone realm. But with it’s delayed release – having first been announced in January and just launching in September – does it still carry enough bravado to warrant your hard earned dollar? Read (and watch) on to find out.
Bionic Hardware Review
The Droid Bionic has an attractive and familiar look consistent with several other Motorola Droids (most notably the Droid X2) with a little lip below the 4.3-inch screen. While the Bionic is slightly thicker than the X2 it’s still only .43-inches thick, the thinnest 4G phone on Verizon to date, and it feels reasonably sized and weighted. It’s pretty impressive what Motorola is able to pack into the Bionic’s relatively small frame.
The 4.3-inch qHD display has 960 x 540 pixel resolution and is pretty darn good. Close inspection will reveal images and videos that seem to have a slight cross-hatched pattern underlayed which might irritate some, but overall I was impressed with the screen quality. The screen is made of Corning’s “Gorilla Glass”, an extra tough material that protects against scratches and broken screens. It’s not indestructible, but it makes an awesome difference.
Below the display you’ll find the typical Android buttons (Menu, Home, Back, Search) which are capacitive (touch sensitive) and very responsive. The left side features a MicroUSB port and a Micro-HDMI port, the right side has a volume rocker, and there is 3.5mm headset jack on the top of the phone along with a power/sleep button.
The Bionic has two cameras: an 8MP camera on the back and a VGA camera on the front for video chat and self-pics. Also on the front, on the other side of the earpiece, you’ll find an LED status notification light; this is a small feature but one I appreciate – it’s nice to have a visual indication that you have calls, messages, or e-mails awaiting you when your phone is otherwise “off”.
On the top/back, behind the power button, is a little slot to help pry open the battery cover. Call it nitpicking, but the battery cover along with the MicroSD Card and 4G SIM Card underneath were the most frustrating part of using the Bionic.
Don’t be shy: you really have to yank the battery cover to get it off (but if you break it don’t blame me!). Once it’s off you’ll find a 1735 mAh battery which you’ll need to remove to access the 4G SIM card. You can remove the MicroSD card without removing the battery, but neither are easy to finagle. Luckily we don’t usually need access to remove/replace these so the irritation will be rare.
The Motorola Droid Bionic has a solid set of features and an impressive spec list, but what makes this phone special is a certain Bionic trio:
4G LTE Connectivity
1GHz Dual-Core processor
1GB RAM
These three hardware features together on one phone make the Bionic a powerful beast… let’s take a look at what this combination means for you.
The Bionic Trio (4G + Dual Core + 1GB RAM)
The Bionic is Verizon’s first phone to rock both 4G LTE connectivity and a dual-core processor- throw in 1GB of RAM and you’ve got an impressive combination of specs serving as your phone’s “engine” of sorts.
Let’s start off by looking at the Bionic’s 4G connectivity advantage which is an easier feat to illustrate. Check out the below video where we run three tests comparing the Droid Bionic’s 4G LTE speeds on Verizon with both 3G Verizon speeds using the Droid X and Home Wi-Fi (Comcast) using the Nexus One
As you can see, the quality of Verizon’s network spoiled my fun in two of the three tests. I’m in Baltimore where Verizon has an excellent 3G and 4G signal, so loading Phandroid.com and loading YouTube videos was lightning fast for both scenarios (even when compared to Wi-Fi). But Speedtest.net is where you truly see the power of Verizon’s 4G LTE network.
The Droid Bionic absolutely CRUSHES not only 3G but also Comcast Home Wi-Fi running the Speedtest.net app. With Verizon 4G I consistently got download speeds of 20+ Mbps and upload speeds of 3.5+ Mbps. It might be hard to understand how that extra power comes into play when 3G loaded websites and YouTube HD just fine, but think about this: if the 4G network only had 1 or 2 bars would it still be faster than Verizon’s 3G at 4 bars? My bet is yes and that’s where I think you would really see the value of the 4G network- even in areas with only average connectivity your 4G should zoom while your 3G might struggle.
While the 4G LTE Radio provides quick downloading and uploading of data/multimedia, the dual-core processor splits the on-device work across two processors thereby lightening the load. Add the powerful 1GB of RAM and the Bionic powerfully pumps where other devices might putter along.
While it’s harder to visualize the importance of processors and RAM, one popular measuring tool is Quadrant which looks at a number of indicators and metrics, boiling them down to a “Quadrant Score”:
As you can see above, the Droid Bionic well outperforms a number of top Android smartphones. I consistently scored between 2,200 and 2,500. Quadrant is a great way to ballpark the value of hardware specs but it’s only a relative comparison tool and not an exact science. There are other benchmarks out there but I offer this example simply to prove the Bionic is indeed a beast.
Bionic Software Review
The Droid Bionic ships with Android 2.3.4, the most recent version of Android (at publication of this review). With a new version of Android expected by year’s end, some might be tempted to wait: although Verizon has promised to support software upgrades for 1+ years, they usually come with a fair delay.
That being said, the Bionic runs the Android OS rather flawlessly. It’s quick, without lag, and an overall enjoyable experience. Credit the dual-core processor and 1GB RAM here. From apps and games to web-browsing and videos, the Bionic offers smooth sailing smartphone use.
MOTOBLUR, the manufacturer’s former custom OS overlay, has been replaced with a less intrusive option which offers some of the same features – like resizable widgets – without the bulk that previously dragged down performance. However, the Bionic does come preloaded with a large number of annoyingly undeleteable apps and games, some welcomed and others dead weight.
Bionic Multimedia Review
The Droid Bionic comes preloaded with a bunch of apps that occupy a chunk of its 16GB of internal memory. Among them: Amazon Kindle, Blockbuster, City ID, GoToMeeting, Let’s Golf 2, MOTOPRINT, NFL Mobile, Quickoffice, Slacker, Videosurf, and ZumoCast. It’s also packed with Google goodies like Maps, Navigation, and Places while Verizon pre-installs their entire VCast lineup.
It’s a mixed bag, but some of the apps I already regularly use (NFL Mobile, Slacker) and others I tried for the first time and enjoyed (ZumoCast, VideoSurf).
ZumoCast is pretty awesome: quick signup, quick install on your computer, and all of a sudden your phone can access any file on your computer from anywhere in the world. Of course your computer has to be online and running ZumoCast, but after setting this up once it’s like your own little free version of Dropbox. You can choose what folders and files to share with your phone and let me tell you- it’s worth downloading and trying out. While many people assume preinstalled apps are bloatware, ZumoCast is nothing but files-on-the-go goodness from Motorola. Great stuff.
VideoSurf is like Shazam for TV and Movies – pretty neat – but after thinking about it seems a lot less logical. Whereas you’re often listening to music with no way of identifying the artist/song, you usually have access to see the programming guide when watching TV or movies. Unless you’re watching YouTube or another online video source, but I found using VideoSurf on my desktop monitors with YouTube a lot less effective. Even so, cool idea.
Additional multimedia features include HDMI mirroring through the Micro-HDMI port, DLNA connectivity, and the ability to turn your device into a mobile hotspot if you pay for the associated plan. All of these features are well documented and work beautifully with the Droid Bionic, although I’ve always had headaches and troubles with DLNA across the board.
The enjoyability of the Bionic’s multimedia is due in large part to the hardware specs: the 4G LTE connectivity allow you to stream videos and load webpages with great speed and the processor and RAM give the device more than enough power to operate effortlessly. The nitpickers will point to the less-than-perfect display as a flaw when compared to other top phones, but the vast majority of folks will find it perfectly pleasurable for all types of multimedia viewing.
Bionic Camera Review
Of all the high-end features of the Bionic I was most disappointed with the camera. After seeing spectacular pictures captured with the phones like the Droid Charge, my bar for mobile picture taking has risen. The Bionic photo experience comes in under that bar. While it’s capable of taking great photos, there are a couple of problems and irritations that prevent it from being a top smartphone shooter. To summarize:
Auto-focus is hit or miss and takes a few seconds to stick
Pictures may mis-focus and appear blurry
Colors can seem dull and/or washed out
The rear 8MP camera comes with an LED flash and auto-focus. I took several pictures in different environments with various settings and just didn’t see consistent results. See the samples below and click to enlarge each picture:
This picture of a flower is taken with all automatic settings and although the real-life color was vibrant and robust, we see the flower washed out and leaves too contrasted in the picture. Definitely doesn’t capture what I intended.
I got much closer on that same flower and used the Macro settings. Although the clarity and focus was good, something simply wasn’t right with the color balance. Interestingly enough, , what I saw in the viewfinder and what I saw once the picture snapped were very different, making me wonder if an imposed software filter causes unintended alterations. Maybe a software update can fix the color issues.
Landscape photos were generally better in terms of color and focus.
One thing I noticed was a delay/lag in the auto-focus finding a target and often improperly focusing, leading to blur. It didn’t happen the majority of the time, but enough to find myself resnapping the same picture several times on occasion.
The above picture is taken in a pitch black room and the results are as you’d expect: seeable but blurry when large. Not bad for a completely dark room though.
The above picture was taken with the front-facing VGA camera. Let’s face it: you aren’t trying to work masterpieces when using this camera, you’re either trying to video chat or take a self-pic. For these purposes, the Bionic was perfectly servicebale. Since I don’t have a British accent, standing in front of a bookcase full of Encyclopedias is my main gimmick to appear intellectual. Unfortunately, I’m undermined by the beard.
I found the 1080p video recording on the Droid Bionic to be really good considering the lackluster still photo results. Here is a video of my brother and I trudging into the backyard where a usually dry ditch made way for a steady stream during a crazy weekend of rain:
One thing I did enjoy about the Droid Bionic Camera was the software. Whereas I’m usually left sifting through menu after menu to find various settings and options over here and there and drag-click-open-zoom what? Yeah… the Bionic makes it easy with a simple side drawer that comfortably explains/expands further.
Let’s clear something up: unless you’re some type of mobile photo guru, chances are the Droid Bionic camera will be perfectly fine for you. There are plenty of settings to help optimize you pictures and I did indeed snap some good photos. It isn’t one of the best mobile cameras on the market by a longshot, but it’ll do the trick for your casual everyday photos- just don’t expect to blow up your Bionic photo of the Egyptian Pyramids into a poster for your wall.
Battery Life & Call Quality
The battery life and call quality are essential elements of phone use but typically get a footnote in reviews because of their unexcitability. The same goes here. I found call quality to be better than average and battery life to be average.
One thing Droid Bionic users NEED to keep in mind is to turn off resource intensive features when they’re not being used: this means 4G, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, GPS, and other non-essentials. That alone will extend your battery life a good deal if you’re not already paying attention to these factors. I also imagine the Bionic will get more mileage out of the battery charge once more developers and Android in general better supports the dual-core architecture.
The bottom line is that the call quality is good, the speaker phone is reasonably loud, and the battery life falls in line with what any high-end Android Phone would yield. While I’d love to get more juice out of the Bionic, this is just an industry-wide issue that needs to be addressed. I’d suggest snagging a car charger and additional wall-charger so whether you’re at home, at work, or in-transit you can always stay plugged up. This and smart feature-use should solve a lot of your problems in the first place (with any phone).
Bionic Accessories
The Motorola Droid Bionic has a few accessories that are MUCH more interesting than car chargers and wall chargers. Try the Laptop Dock for example, which turns your Bionic into a fully usable laptop, promo image from Motorola below:
“Fully usable” is relative as you’re still limited to a somewhat netbookish environment but the nice thing is your phone does all the heavy lifting and already has your contacts, data, files, and information so no syncing is required. The Bionic actually powers the Lapdock which is more or less just a shell. Think Krang on TMNT. Or forget I just said that.
The Lapdock is kind of pricey at $300 but certainly a nice option. There’s also an HD Station for $100, Standard Dock for $40, Car Mount/Dock for $40, and Webtop adapter for $30. The latter of those is a nice bargain, allowing you to then connect your phone to an external display for using the Webtop experience that’s found on the Lapdock. It also lets you use the phone to scroll and type although bluetooth peripherals are welcome.
The Verdict
Friends and family constantly ask me, “What Verizon Android phone should I get?” and I’ve consistently told them, “Wait for a dual-core Android Phone with 4G LTE so that you’re phone is future proof.” Here it is.
The Motorola Droid Bionic is an excellent option, highlighted by the Bionic trio of 4G LTE, 1GHz dual-core processor, and 1GB RAM. A lot can happen in the 2-years until your contract is up, and these specs essentially “future proof” the Bionic, ensuring it’ll have the horsepower to run more resource intensive apps, games, and content as time goes on. It’s not the perfect device – the camera isn’t great and it’s missing a couple features like GSM/World radios and an NFC chip – but if these aren’t deal breakers then the Bionic is a top-shelf option and Verizon’s best.
Patient techies that crave the highest of high end phones may want to wait for the holidays when Verizon is likely to launch the rumored Droid Prime, but everyone else can confidently buy the Droid Bionic knowing it’s a great phone that should last them the duration of their contract… and considering the pace of today’s technology, that’s a mighty bold statement.
If you have been browsing the web over the past hours I am pretty sure you’re familiar with the fact that Microsoft detailed the Windows 8 platform during BUILD 2011. Courtesy of Slashgear we got to watch a hands-on experience with the new tablet, that’s shown below.
These guys have testing the tablet in all its aspects, from the 8 second booting sequence to the efficiency of Internet Explorer 10 and the touch browsing. The first thing that comes to mind when using the UI of the tablet is Windows Phone, since the Windows 8 interface borrows heavily from Metro UI. Microsoft wants you to know that this is a mere preview, at least of the hardware, since the software will most likely keep this form factor.
Slashgear reports that the virtual keyboard is very usef-friendly, well laid out and responsive, plus there’s a clever lock screen system that allows you to choose a photo and sketch out lines, circles or swipes. Another reminiscence of the WP7 system is the Live Tile desktop with custom wallpaper and day/time.
Aside from touchscreen and potential mice and physical keyboards, you can control the tablet using swipe motions, well integrated into the Metro UI. For example, a swipe to theright will pull out a bar of 5 charms: Search, Share, Start, Device and Settings. The multitasking system involves thumbnails like those in Windows Phone and shows apps running at the same time in a sidebar with the main app taking the most screen estate.
Keep in mind that you can also switch to the classic view like the one of Windows 7, but what’s the point since Win 8 is all about novelty? You’ll find more info in the hands on video below.
Apologies in advance for horrible focusing on my camera’s part and a couple of shots where the entire phone wasn’t in view while looking at the software. Also, please allow an hour or two for full HD video to process.
Our friends at Sprint dropped off a little gift for us to share with you guys. It’s the Samsung Epic 4G Touch, Sprint’s keyboard-less version of the original Epic 4G and their version of the Galaxy S II. Quick first impressions? Sure. This phone is amazingly fast. Samsung’s work on TouchWiz UI on top of Android 2.3.4 must have been long and hard because they’ve constructed arguably the smoothest and most user-friendly user interface on top of stock Android.
I’m sure a lot of that is backed by Samsung’s extremely powerful (twice as powerful as competing chipsets, apparently) dual-core 1.2Ghz Exynos processor. In my 30 minutes of gleeful playtime I was unable to produce lag, stuttering or freezing in any application. I applied a live wallpaper to see if it would fall to its knees from me flipping back and forth with an animated background, but to no avail. Needless to say, this makes me smile.
I wondered if that would be different if this had qHD resolution, but I’m not so sure that would make a huge difference. Yes, you read right - the 4.5 inch display on this phone only has WVGA (800×480) resolution.
The result of so few pixels being stuck into such a large screen is overall bigger text, icons and everything. It might be a desirable look for those who struggle to read small text without glasses, but it really disappoints me to think about how much nicer and spacier everything would look overall with qHD.
Thankfully, the display is Super AMOLED Plus so a lot of would-be negative effects that would come about with this disproportionate combination of screen size and resolution aren’t present here.
You’d have to be looking really hard to spot individual pixels, and if you’re like me and can barely see even with strong glasses, a microscope would have to do the trick. That’s backed by very deep contrasts and vibrant colors. As stretched out as everything looks, it all still looks very good.
There are other small things about the phone that make the experience that much better, too, such as motion control. It’s more than a novelty – it’s actually useful. Pinch to zoom takes a backseat to moving the phone back and forth, and panning homescreens to place a widget or icon is no longer the most painful experience ever. Pinch to zoom is still in, but I’m most certain you’ll enjoy this method a lot more.
Other goodies inside the Epic 4G Touch are its 2MP front-facing camera, 8MP rear camera with LED flash and 1080p video recording, 16GB of internal storage, 1800mAh battery and the microUSB MHL port for HDMI-out.
I had a chance to play with the camera for a quick minute. Still photos are beautiful, 1080p video is even better. The camera sensor inside picks up the color accurately and the software helps it achieve great white balance.
Playback of 1080p videos were stutter-free and you could really see the high resolution sensor at work with how crisp and clear footage was. Samsung’s on the top end of the spectrum in the camera department, we’d say.The quick hands-on video is above, but stay tuned for continued coverage in the coming days and weeks, including benchmarks, the full review and more.
A couple more things I forgot to mention in the video:
Battery is definitely removable and there’s a microSD card slot beneath the battery door.
There is an LED notification light, thankfully. Hard to see in images but it’s there.
Well, isn’t this the mother of all leaks? A Samsung Windows 8 tablet we’ve heard about previously has just leaked ahead of the BUILD 2011 keynote that’s taking place today. You can see the tablet below and originally we were supposed to show you some videos, but we didn’t quite manage to get them to work, since they were pulled from YouTube.
As far as the source goes, the images were posted by Weibo user Michelle Hu and it’s a pretty credible image if you ask me. The confirmation will come in the following hours, when hands on videos with the original Samsung Win 8 slate will appear. Right now we can notice that the device looks like 16:9 aspect ratio material and speculations say that we’re looking at a unit with an Intel quad core CPU inside, although I wouldn’t vouch for that.
Other rumors say that Microsoft has been working on the design of product together with Samsung, so they must have left behind the Courier complex, right? Well, too bad you can’t see the leaked unboxing videos that were pulled, but in case you’re wondering they didn’t reveal much, since the vids were tilted 90 degrees. What we do know is that there’s a nifty keyboard accessory available and the startup time is quick.
We’ll be back with more details once the BUILD keynote plays out.
After finding out that the Alibaba e-commerce giant from China plans to launch its own tablet, it doesn’t surprise us that Baidu, the Chinese search engine bigshot has similar plans. Teaming up with Dell, they plan to build not only a slate, but also a smartpone or two.
With China being of the quickest developing markets for tablets and mobile devices, it would be a pity not to take advantage of this aspect. The handsets from Baidu will bear the name of the service, one of the largest brands in this country and Dell also jumped on board, hoping to get some appreciation from the public in China. Meanwhile, analysts say that Dell’s attempt is in vain, as Apple remains everyone’s favourite brand locally.
There’s no timeline for the launch of the tablet and smartphone, but Reuters reports that there’s a Chinese outlet announcing the products for November. Dell and Baidu have collaborated on a Baidu-branded Dell Streak 5 tablet previously, so they have the experience and expertise.
If you’re an Android fanboy (like me) there’s probably been a night or two where you kept up late wondering what Google’s name for the next version of Android would be. Well, toss and turn no more! According to a “trusted source” over at ThisIsMyNext, the next version of Android could be named — wait for it — JELLY BEAN. That’s right. Keeping true to Google’s alphabetical order, we’ve seen Android versions Cupcake, Donut, Eclair, Froyo, Gingerbread, Honeycomb, Ice Cream Sandwich and now (possibly) Jelly Bean. Keep in mind it was long rumored that “F” would be Flan before later revealing itself to be Froyo.
If you were expecting some big changes for Ice Cream Sandwich, you may be disappointed. Apparently, some of the more “game-changing stuff” Google was supposed to unveil for Ice Cream Sandwich has actually been pushed back to Jelly Bean says TIMN’s sources. I don’t know about you — but that actually made my stomach sink. This takes me back to when Google said Gingerbread would introduce a “major UI overhaul,” only then to find a black notification bar and new talks that it was pushed back to Ice Cream Sandwich. ICS could be the unifying of their phone, tablet and TV OS’s and little else. But if it’s one thing Android has taught me through the years, it’s definitely patience. Hopefully we’ll hear more on Ice Cream Sandwich and Jelly Bean when the Nexus Prime is introduced in a few more months.
**UPDATE: Like I first suggested, TIMN has another source claiming that the Jelly Bean title isn’t finalized yet but definitely in the running. I mean, it’s not like there are many “J” sweet treats to choose from. Oh — and if you were bummed out about Ice Cream Sandwich’s “game-changing stuff” being pushed back to Jelly Bean, the source went on to say that there will still be some fairly major architectural, functional, and design changes in store for ICS. So, any way you slice it, ICS will still be a major release.
What do you guys think of this news? What would you have named the next version of Android? +100 points if you can come up with some awesome names for the rest of the alphabet!
ASUS has taken the stealth way to release the enterprise tablet Eee Slate B121, that’s shown in the picture below. No bells and whistles or Unpacked events were used for it, maybe because it’s a 12 inch unit that’s designed for professionals, not the general public.
This tablet PC comes with a multitouch display, compatible with a Wacom digitizer pen. Drawing us back from this device is the huge price of $1499 for the device, which is a bit too much, especially if you’re not happy with Windows 7 Professional on it… The B121 comes with enterprise security options, like remote locking, remote data wipe features, locating lost and stolen devices and much more.
There’s also a dedicated recovery team working with the law enforcement to find your device, cool as that may seem. Windows Bitlocker and the Trusted Platform Module are also on board. And finally there’s the specs list of the new model:
Display: 12.1 inch LED backlit screen, 1280 x 800
CPU: Intel Core i5-470UM
Memory: 4GB RAM, 64GB SSD storage
Camera: 2MP front facing
Connectivity: mini HDMI, 2 USB 2.0 ports, SDHC card slot
Will you get one for the hefty price mentioned above?
IFA 2011 was truly a tablet-oriented event and even the famous carrier Vodafone didn’t stay away from this direction. Thus, it doesn’t surprise me that Vodafone Germany unveiled two new tablets with its own branding: Smart Tab 10 and Smart Tab 10. Both run Android 3.2 using a 1.2GHz dual core CPU.
Also, both model support 1280 x 800 pixel resolution and they’ll be available in 16 and 32 GB versions. As far as launch goes, we’ll see this slates debuting n November, at least locally and maybe weeks later internationally. These models shown at IFA are most likely made by a company such as Huawei or ZTE, that usually partner up with Vodafone and provide bare devices to get the carrier’s branding.
As you might have guessed, the Vodafone Smart Tab 7 comes with a 7 inch display, while the Smart Tab 10 uses a 10 inch display and it’s pictured above. They also get 1GB of RAM, a microSD card slot and support for HSDPA connectivity of up to 14.4 mbps (download). Vodafone Smart Tab 7 weighs 391 grams, measures 11.4mm in thickness and is pretty compact. As far as camera go, both slates come with main 5MP cameras and front 2MP cameras. No trace of price yet.
Meizu have long time eliminated the stigma of a company that copied the iPhone (among the first with a successful model actually) and are now into serious business, with a new appealing phone and… according to rumors, a tablet as well. The info leaked on the web after a patent application was made by Meizu.
This application was made public by the Chinese State Intellectual Property Office, revealing both a case accessory and the slate. This looks like a device with a full QWERTY keyboard, most likely Android as the OS (Honeycomb) and surely a dual core (at least) CPU. Last we heard, Jack Wong, the CEO of Meizu promised a glorious future for his company’s smartphones, including a quad core model, but no trace of tablet plans was seen so far.
If the company plays its cards right and reveals a products that resembles the ASUS Eee Pad Transformer even a bit and undercuts its price, it may have a chance. Otherwise… it’s just another failed product, like the Toshiba Thrive. How about launching this tablet with a quad core CPU? That would certainly rock the market!
The 4.3-inch qHD display has 960 x 540 pixel resolution and is pretty darn good. Close inspection will reveal images and videos that seem to have a slight cross-hatched pattern underlayed which might irritate some, but overall I was impressed with the screen quality. The screen is made of Corning’s “Gorilla Glass”, an extra tough material that protects against scratches and broken screens. It’s not indestructible, but it makes an awesome difference.
The Droid Bionic ships with Android 2.3.4, the most recent version of Android (at publication of this review). With a new version of Android expected by year’s end, some might be tempted to wait: although Verizon has promised to support software upgrades for 1+ years, they usually come with a fair delay.
Of all the high-end features of the Bionic I was most disappointed with the camera. After seeing 
