Samsung Galaxy Tab S 8.4

Review in pictures

Plastic can be sexy too

• The Galaxy Tab S features a dimpled back panel like the Galaxy S5, and is housed in a plastic body

• It boasts a skinny 6.6mm frame and weighs in at just 298g

• The home button incorporates a fingerprint sensor

• With its gold edging and details, it looks and feels very premium

Stunning is an understatement

• The tablet’s 8.4-inch display bears a resolution of 2,560 x 1,600 pixels, resulting in a pixel density of 360ppi

• The display is sharp, and with its Super AMOLED tech, is vibrant and bright. It’s visible even in sunlight

• The Adaptive Display setting adjusts the colour scheme depending on ambient light

Several modes and effects to choose from

• The tablet features an 8MP primary camera with LED flash, and a 2.1MP front camera for video calls and selfies

• The camera app offers various manual controls, effects and supports voice capture too

• There are several modes on offer, including a Dual-Camera mode which uses the front and rear cameras

Fast to focus, with pleasing results

• The primary camera is surprisingly fast to focus, and produced good daylight shots

• Images tend to appear more vibrant on the tablet’s display though, and look a bit washed out when transferred to a computer

• Low-light images are predictably grainy

• The front camera isn’t too bad for selfies when there’s ample lighting

Magazine UX feels a tad crowded

• The Tab S runs Android 4.4 KitKat, layered with Samsung’s custom TouchWiz skin. It also incorporates Magazine UX, as seen on its other tablets

• TouchWiz has been considerably toned down, but is still fairly crowded

• Magazine UX provides a tile-based interface with widgets, and displays news and social feeds Flipboard-style

TouchWiz tweaks are still around

• The usual TouchWiz additions like Smart Stay, Smart Pause and Direct Call are present

• Multi-Window, which lets you run two apps at once is also available

• Toolbox is a floating button that brings up five app shortcuts when pressed

• Private mode lets you restrict access to pre-selected files when enabled

Modes for everyone

• There’s an interactive Kids Mode which allows access only to pre-selected apps, and can be exited only by entering a PIN

• Multi-user mode lets you configure up to seven user accounts, each with their own settings and passwords

• Ultra Power Saving Mode changes the display to greyscale and limits access to apps and data

Did we mention the freebies?

• Pre-installed apps include Smart Remote, SideSync 3.0, WebEx, Chrome, Hancom Office Viewer, Dropbox and Flipboard, to name a few

• Samsung has packed in several freebies, like 48GB worth of Dropbox storage, 100 free Hollywood movies, and a bunch of free apps via Galaxy Gifts

It’s powerful and smooth (mostly)

• Powering the tablet is Samsung’s own Exynos 5 Octa processor, paired with 3GB of RAM and a Mali T628 MP6 graphics

• Performance was fine on most counts, including heavy gaming, watching 1080p videos and multi-tasking

• There were some noticeable lags and app closes on occasion though

Fingerprint sensor isn’t flawless

• The fingerprint sensor can recognise up to three fingers, but wasn’t consistent, requiring a few tries to register on several occasions

• Out of the 16GB of internal storage, a little under 11GB is available to the user. The tablet accepts microSD cards up to 128GB in size

• The Tab S is fine for voice-calling, with users reporting no disturbance on the other end

A battery that won’t let you down• The Tab S offers good

battery life, thanks in part to its Super AMOLED display which is surprisingly energy efficient

• With typical use involving around 5-6 hours of screen on time and Wi-Fi enabled, it easily lasted us two days

• You can turn on the Power Saving mode to conserve battery when you need it

At a glance

• 8.4-inch, 2,560 x 1,600 pixels, 360ppi

• Exynos 5 Octa processor (1.9Ghz quad-core + 1.3GHz quad-core)

• Mali T628 MP6 GPU• 3GB RAM• 16GB inbuilt storage with

microSD slot• 8MP primary, 2.1MP front camera• Android 4.4 KitKat with TouchWiz

and Magazine UX• 4,900mAh battery• LTE/3G, Wi-Fi, Wi-Fi Direct

Bluetooth, GPS, MHL

-• Plastic construction

tends to scratch easily• Fingerprint scanner is

temperamental• The combination of

TouchWiz and Magazine UX can be overwhelming

Pros and cons

+• Super-slim, elegant

design with quality build

• Stunning display• Good battery life• Several useful freebies• Good primary camera• Reliable performance

Rs 37,800

Pricing and verdict

“The Galaxy Tab S is undoubtedly one of the best Android tablets available right now. With its elegant build, brilliant display, commendable battery life and ability to handle intensive tasks, it’s the first formidable Android rival to the iPad Air. Apart from the crowded Magazine UX and TouchWiz, there’s very little to fault the tablet on. If you can handle the price tag, this is the Android tablet for your money.