The Samsung Galaxy Tab S 8.4 ($399, 16GB) is the best
small tablet on the market right now largely because of its screen, a
shimmering Super AMOLED panel that makes your Web pages, videos, and
games look positively glorious. It's a crowded field out there right
now, and you may be able to find a small tablet that's better for you
and your specific uses. But at the moment, the Tab S 8.4's expandable
memory and multimedia prowess make it best for the casual browsing and
media playback most small tablets are used for.
The Galaxy Tab S 8.4 and
are extremely similar tablets, just with different-sized screens and a
$100 variance in price, so much of this review will be the same as our
review of the 10.5. We did test both tablets separately, however.
Physical Design and Screen
The Galaxy Tab S 8.4 has a design similar to the ,
but manages to look classy rather than chintzy. A big part of it is
getting rid of that ridged, chrome bezel around the edge in exchange for
a more subtle band. The 8.4 comes in Titanium Bronze, which is a dark
gold color, and Dazzling White, which is white. It's stunningly thin and
effortlessly light—at 8.38 by 4.24 by 0.26 inches (HWD), it's thinner
and lighter, Samsung would have you know, than the . (10.3 ounces vs. 11.6 ounces.)
The back is slightly textured, soft-touch plastic, with
the same stipple effect you see on the S5; there are also two circles
that Samsung's line of cases snap on to. Stereo speakers on the top and
bottom edges suggest that you watch video on landscape mode; ditto for
the IR emitter, which is on the right side. I'm amazed that Samsung got a
microSD card slot into something this thin, but there it is.
The screen, though, is the real reason you're here. It's a 2,560-by-1,600 panel like the one on the , but it's a different technology: AMOLED. This turns out to be a big deal.
All you have to do is load a video. The Fire HDX 8.9 has a
great LCD screen, laminated for lower reflectivity and better blacks.
But colors punch well above their weight on the Tab S 8.4, and outdoor
visibility, especially, is kicked up a notch.
I remember Samsung's previous AMOLED tablet, the
Galaxy Tab 7.7,
and that one went a little too far—colors looked genuinely lurid there.
Just like on the Galaxy S5, Samsung has used smart software to dial
back the color saturation and keep things looking realistic.
The AMOLED screen also sips, rather than gulps, power.
This combined with the 4,900mAh battery yields terrific battery life. I
was quite surprised to pull 11 hours, 52 minutes of video playback with
Wi-Fi enabled and the screen set to maximum brightness. Far better than
the results I've seen from Amazon, Apple, or Google tablets recently.
Performance and Networking
The Galaxy
Tab S uses a custom Samsung processor, an "octo-core" Exynos with four
1.9GHz Cortex-A15 cores and four 1.3GHz cores that it switches to when
it wants to save energy. On benchmarks, it's a notch behind the latest
chips, like the Nvidia Tegra K1 in the
and the Qualcomm Snapdragon 805 in the Amazon Fire HDX. Compared with
the Apple iPad mini line, it holds its own on productivity, but falls
well behind on GPU performance.
That's my main concern with the Galaxy Tab S: Low graphics
frame rates made screen transitions a little gummy and meant this isn't
the ideal tablet for high-end gaming. Where the Galaxy Tab S gets 14fps
onscreen with the GFXBench T-Rex benchmark and 2.9 fps with the
Manhattan benchmark, the , Shield Tablet, and all double or triple those results.
Android 4.4 KitKat is
on board, with some useful extensions. I love Samsung's dual-paned
multitasking mode, which really amps up productivity. Samsung's software
sits a little more lightly on the S tablets than it did before. Yes,
you can swipe left to get to Samsung's confusing Magazine UX, but you
don't have to. Unfortunately, Samsung hasn't announced a Lollipop
upgrade for this tablet yet, so don't count on it. But Lollipop's most
tablet-friendly feature, multiple user profiles, is already present and
supported.
You'll also get some so-called gifts, but they're optional
rather than mandatory downloads. The best teasers include three months
of Marvel Unlimited comics and three months of Evernote Premium.
Mandatory preloads include Samsung's redundant music
player, which has no advantages over Google Play Music; Samsung's video
player, which is much easier to navigate than Google's video gallery;
Paper Garden, an e-magazine app to add to every other e-magazine app in
the world; and Samsung's very own app store.
There's one software glitch that concerned me: The tablets
perform poorly with Google's Chrome browser. I found complex pages
stalling in Chrome, and I got only an 800 or so in the Browsermark
benchmark—a lower score than you'd get on a Galaxy S4 phone. Benchmark
scores doubled using Samsung's Internet browser instead, so use that.
The Galaxy Tab S models we tested were Wi-Fi-only, with
802.11 a/b/n/ac wireless, GPS, NFC, and Bluetooth 4.0. Wi-Fi performance
was competitive with the iPad mini on distance, but not on speed.
Tested against a Meraki router about 20 feet away, we saw double the
speed on the iPad as compared with either Tab S, 60-70Mbps down as
compared with 20-30Mbps. At 50 feet, the iPad registered 20Mbps as
compared with the Galaxy Tab S with around 10Mbps. Only at 75-100 feet,
where speeds were low for everyone, did they even out.
The only LTE model available is with AT&T, and it
costs $529. The AT&T model supports all of that carrier's LTE bands,
including the new band 29 for enhanced downloads. In theory, it'll work
decently on T-Mobile's network and with very limited success on
Verizon's, but it's locked to AT&T.
Camera and Multimedia
The Galaxy Tab S 8.4
comes with 16GB of storage, of which 11.5GB is user-accessible; you'll
fill that up pretty quickly with media, so it's good that the tablet
supports microSD memory cards.
The 8-megapixel main camera and 1-megapixel front camera
are surprisingly good, for tablet cameras. Outdoor shots were quite
sharp, and the LED flash lit up a dark room. The UI and special modes
match the Galaxy S5. Both cameras had no trouble achieving 1080p video
at 30fps indoors or outdoors, although indoor 1080p videos were a bit
noisy. I'm no fan of tablet photography, but these tablets will get the
job done.
Video playback, on the other hand, is the Galaxy Tab S's
specialty. The tablets have no problem playing H.264, Xvid, or DivX
content, and there are plenty of other video playback apps for watching
various kinds of files. The Tab 8.4 is also the perfect size for
e-reading and digital comics, and it comes with a three-month Marvel
Unlimited subscription. Comics, whether through Marvel Unlimited or
ComiXology, look gorgeous here.
The dual stereo speakers are loud enough to fill a room,
although there's basically no bass. Headphones and Bluetooth speakers
also work well here.
Comparisons and Conclusions
Android tablets
have certainly grown up. For the past few years, we've recommended
tablets like the Nexus 7 because they're less expensive than iOS and
Windows alternatives. But the Galaxy Tab S 8.4 isn't less expensive; at
$399, it costs more than the iPad mini 2 and the . And those tablets have strengths that the Tab S doesn't, most notably better collections of games and productivity apps.
But I see small tablets primarily as lean-back
entertainment devices, so screen, weight, and storage rule supreme. (If
you're looking for a productivity tablet, you'll want a larger model
like the or .) And the Tab S 8.4 outmatches all comers in those key small-tablet strengths.
If you have a large library of music and video files,
Android is the superior platform. The Tab S's microSD card slot lets you
easily transfer files and expand the tablet's capacity, the open
Android platform lets you transfer and play a wide variety of media
without having to deal with iTunes, and nothing beats this screen.
There are other good Android tablet choices, as well. It's a crowded field. The
Nvidia Shield Tablet gives
you great gameplay for $100 less, at the cost of significantly
cheaper-feeling hardware. The Fire HDX 8.9 streams Amazon content in a
way the Samsung tablet doesn't, but its lack of Google Play really
hobbles it with productivity apps.
So for this holiday season, I'm happy to recommend the
Samsung Galaxy Tab S 8.4 as our small-tablet Editors' Choice. If you
intend to read, surf, or watch on your pocket-sized tablet, it simply
shines.
