Tablets are hot these days and have caught fancy of millions across the globe. A report by Gartner finds that worldwide tablet sales will close to double in 2012, taking the total units to 119 million from 60 million units sold in 2011. Tablets might be a recent phenomenon in India and few might actually own them, but consumers are rapidly adopting these converged devices to stay connected and manage their work while on the move.
There?s no denying it, the South Korean tech behemoth Samsung has emerged as one of the biggest and most influential companies in the Indian technology space. It is a full range player in the market and its portfolio ranges across the essential, multimedia, touchscreen, dual SIM and smartphones to tablets and the Galaxy Note as a new category.
Talking specifically about the Samsung Galaxy Tab 620, a test unit of which was made available to us for a product review, let me describe it in two words? fabulous tablet. Hats off to the R&D folks at Samsung for coming up with this all-rounder. The device is one pretty good looking tablet and is sure to bite off a major chunk of the tablets market in India. Reason being, it is a fine performer and is aggressively priced at R26,690.
I am sure it will appeal to the value-conscious Indian consumer.
By any yardstick, performance compliments the good looks of the Galaxy Tab 620. It boasts an enviably small form factor?it is the size of a paperback book but possesses the computing power of a laptop. It is one of the best looking among the 7-inchers available in the market, mainly due to its sleek 9.9 mm body which has been accentuated by curved and rounded edges. The 345g lightweight and compact tablet can be operated with a single hand?ideal when you are on the move.
Switched on, the Galaxy Tab is powered by a mighty 1.2 GHz dual core processor. This allows seamless multitasking, faster webpage loading, smoother user interface transitions and ultra-fast power-up. The Google Search icon appears on the top left and the apps launcher on the right top. Being a Honeycomb tablet, there are no physical keys. Instead, the touch keys at the bottom are dominated by the back, home and multitasking keys. There is also an up arrow which opens a tray with some apps like messaging, task manager, pen memo, calendar, music player, calculator and world clock.
Not only are more and more tablets coming onto the market, the number of apps is multiplying like crazy. Hence it is imperative for me to mention about Mini Apps in the Galaxy Tab. These allow you to easily access commonly-used features such as voice call, calendar, PenMemo, World Clock, Calculator and Task Manager. They always remain close at hand?ready to be launched as a pop up over full screen applications. It saves the time and effort of needlessly scrolling through a full menu and gives you the chance to experience a new dimension in tablet-based multitasking. In addition, one can do more with Google! familiar applications including Google Talk , Gmail, Google Calendar, YouTube, Google Maps, Google Latitude, Google Places, and Google Maps Navigation work seamlessly on the Galaxy Tab.
Streaming video is another great use of a tablet. And with the Samsung Galaxy Tab, a user can enjoy full high definition video from anywhere at any time! Multi-codec supported, the tablet can play various video formats for full compatibility. Keep your favourite movies on hand by easily storing them on the ample microSD!
The tablet supports rich browsing too. One can browse without limitations. Thousands of top websites use rich Flash applications, so whether you?re browsing the Web or viewing online multimedia content, you?ll be able to see it all with Adobe Flash Player support on the Samsung Galaxy Tab 620. The tablet offers the best connectivity options available, from lightning-fast HSPA+ 21 Mps to Wi-Fi Channel bonding. Wi-Fi Channel bonding technology will let you receive data-rates approximately twice as fast as existing Wi-Fi.
Personally I believe that the tablet offers the convenience of a laptop and mobile in a single package. And a user can do any possible thing, be it video, audio, calls, SMS, games, maps, Gmail, news, shopping or surfing.
Anything you ask and this tablet has it, if not in-built, then you have the Android market. Truly, the Samsung Galaxy Tab offers a more advanced, productive and creative user experience than ever before. Highly recommended for the busy mobile professional.
SPECS
Dimensions: 193.65 x 122.37 x 9.96 mm (H x W x D)
Operating system: Android 3.2 (Honeycomb)
Browser: Android browser
Display size: 17.78 cm
Display resolution: 1024 x 600 (WSVGA)
Camera resolution: 3 MP + 2 MP
Video player: 3GPP/H.263/H.264 /MPEG4/WMV/DivX
Video recording: 720 x 480 (D1)
Weight: 345g
Estimated street price: R26,690
