Nexus 7 2 vs. Galaxy Tab 3 7: 3 Reasons to Skip the Cheap Samsung Tablet and Wait out for the Vanilla Android Slate
Samsung officially confirmed that the 7-inch Galaxy Tab 3 will land on early July and pre-orders of the small and affordable will commence on June 25, first in the U.S. with the rest of the world to follow shortly.
Gleaning the specs, which reside in the entry-level bracket, Samsung thought it wise to paste a $US199 price tag with the Wi-Fi only Tab 3.
Seems bargain enough? A deeper look, however, will prove otherwise and here are main arguments that should consumers to hold out for a bit more and wait for Google instead to release second serving of its Nexus 7.
Anaemic CPU and other specs
In less than $200, Samsung undoubtedly offers a decent device in the Tab 3 7, which replaces the moderate performing Galaxy Tab 2 7 last year. But when compared to the Nexus 7 2 or even the first Nexus 7, it becomes a gross mismatch.
The Tab 3 7 will be powered by a dual-core chip with a max speed of 1.GHz tapping on a 1GB of RAM. The camera mix is 3MP on main and 1.3MP for the front. When it tussles with Nexus 7 2, it will have to deal with a quad-core CPU at the very least or a Snapdragon 600 kind if analysts' projections prove right.
For buyers to fork out $US199 and make to choose between the mediocre Tab 3 7 and the powerful Nexus 7 2, the choice is obvious.
Low display screen resolution
Tablet use is now defined by extensive media playbacks, online and offline, and long-hours of gaming plus some e-book readings. Such experiences will be far from immersive on the new small Galaxy tablet as Samsung evidently scrimped on the screen hardware, affording only a 1024 x 600 pixel resolution for would-be buyers.
Looking at Nexus 7 2, the Tab 3 7 will be dwarfed by the former's Retina-like display screen attributes, boasting off more than double screen resolution plus a higher battery rating for extended tablet hours.
Android showdown
It is Jelly Bean 4.2 that will run the whole Galaxy Tab 3 7 show, likely a great portion of its 8GB internal memory, leaving users little room for app installations. Sure, the microSD card slot welcomes up to 64GB of extra space but it serve mainly as a digital locker as Android beyond 4.0 has eliminated the option to move applications from the device to the card.
Then the OS support question, which for the Nexus 7 2 being a stock Android version bearer, will be more timely, leading to a more stable and exciting tablet life. The exciting comes in the manner that Nexus devices allow limitless possibilities of modifications whereas Samsung, no thanks to TouchWiz, prohibits OS experiments.
The Tab 3 7, of course, can be rooted top solve this issue but in the end, the Nexus 7 2 will come as the better hardware and better buy for the average and advance Android tablet users.