Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 hands-on impression

We’ve had several encounters with the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 before but this time, we actually have a review unit in our hands (and I know a lot of people are eagerly waiting for this tablet to be released in the Philippines).

After unboxing the 10.1″ Galaxy Tab yesterday, the very first thing you’ll notice with the tablet was how thin and light it is. In fact, it’s as thin but much lighter than the iPad 2. Of course, all of that can be attributed to the plastic construction of the tablet, compared to the aluminum of the iPad 2.

The variant that we have here is the 3G + WiFi model (with the SIM card slot easily accessible from top right side of the device).

Here are some things I observed from my initial tinkering with the device:

The display is bright and crisp; the colors are vivid and vibrant. The black bezel isn’t that much thicker compared to the iPad 2.
The back panel is made up of pearly white plastic, has a glossy finish and is accented with silver lining on the sides and around the camera.
Speaking of the camera, I was hoping it would be just half as good as the Galaxy S or S2 but the one they had on the Galaxy Tab 10.1 isn’t any good — still grainy even on well-lit conditions.
The rear camera is only rated at 3.2-megapixels (2048×1536 pixels) and the video recording is only up to 720p (1280×720 pixels). The front-facing camera has a resolution of 1600×1200 pixels (around 2MP). There’s an LED flash beside the rear camera.
There’s no external microSd card slot but system info says it has 16GB internal storage and another 16GB of internal SD storage giving it a total of 32GB.
The charging port uses some sort of a proprietary USB (similar to that of the Dell Streak 5 and iPad/iPhone).
I got a Quadrant benchmark score of 1367, almost half the score of the Galaxy S2 (2622) but still better than the Galaxy S (962). I guess the high screen resolution made it harder to get a higher score.
Samsung used some sort of tablet-friendly TouchWiz UI for the Galaxy Tab. It’s not much of an eye-candy but is functional. Besides, it really didn’t change much what Honeycomb offered out of the box.

Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 GT-P7500
10.1″ display @ 1280Ã—800 WXGA screen
NVidia Tegra2 1.0GHz dual-core processor
724MB memory (actual)
16GB/32GB internal storage
3.2 megapixel camera with LED flash
720p video recording
2 megapixel front-facing camera
WiFi 802.11 b/g/n
Bluetooth
3G/HSDPA
6850 mAh battery
GPS w/ aGPS support
Android 3.1 Honeycomb

Those who were asking earlier, the P7100 model (the earlier one) is 10.1v while this review unit is the P7500 model (v10.1 only). It’s likely the 10.1 will be the one that will be released in the Philippines.

There are two important things we still don’t know exactly: when is the release date of the Galaxy Tab 10.1 (sometime in August) and how much will it be priced (somewhere around Php30k – Php35k). Full review should be out next week.

Abe Olandres

Abe is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of YugaTech with over 20 years of experience in the technology industry. He is one of the pioneers of blogging in the country and considered by many as the Father of Tech Blogging in the Philippines. He is also a technology consultant, a tech columnist with several national publications, resource speaker and mentor/advisor to several start-up companies.

https://www.yugatech.com

23 Comments

mark says:

13 years ago

Rey, did you get the 10.1 V version?
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Rey says:

13 years ago

Yes I have a Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 I also bought an Acer 10.1 Tablet. The flash player run so smoothly.

Rey says:

13 years ago

I bought a Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1. There were so many features lacking compare to to Galaxy Tab 7â€³.It has no expandable memory slot, no phone function, no readers hub, no media hub and the flash player doesnâ€™t work. So dissapointing and waste of money.
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Edge says:

13 years ago

To those Apple fans with issues on Honeycomb’s status bar, save your words, sabihin niyo nalang yan pag nag-release na ang Apple ng borderless iPad.
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jm says:

13 years ago

merun sa sa pinas nito?? nagtatanung kac aq sa mga mall wala pa daw
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dicky says:

13 years ago

Being a samsung tab 10.1 user i would like to praise the superb sound of samsung tab 10.1.
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Mike M says:

13 years ago

I checked Rockwell yesterday and tried both the 8.9 and 10.1 units, both have a MicroSD slot naman.
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Iyan Sommerset says:

13 years ago

No external microSD slot…boooo.
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Apache says:

13 years ago

Honeycomb ROCKS!.

Status Bar is not a problem you just need to be more creative than ever of cause you will get annoyed because you have play often in iPad/iTouch/iPhone so you sometime forget to be aware of what you play and common the MOST AWESOME PART OF HONEYCOMB IS THE STATUS BAR!. I really can’t express the Experience i have but using it feels more like a Desktop Tablet got use in Windows OS so its kinda perfect for me easy to go in different apps and you are always aware of the status of your tablet. But i cant really say for your part i think if you really hate the status bar of the Honeycomb just wait for other updates or for sure a program that removes the status bar of honeycomb.
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ocommon says:

13 years ago

30-35k? ang mahal! sa december 2011 25k na lang yan. Sa 2012, 20k na lang.
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LilBoyBlue says:

13 years ago

no one’s forcing you to buy bro :)

aira says:

13 years ago

ipad wanna be’s
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cass says:

13 years ago

Iha ang spelling “wannabes”….ooopps ipad user ka nga pala –beauty but no brains

Joel says:

13 years ago

All of you people planning on buying a Honeycomb tablet I have two words for you: STATUS BAR!

You can’t hide it whatever you do so you can’t get a fullscreen app at all. Not for videos, not for photos, not for games.

You will be annoyed by it when you accidentally press it while playing games.

Pretty stupid design if you ask me! I would advice against buying one until this issue is fixed by Google.
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alain says:

13 years ago

No one’s asking you. J/k. :)

Although, that back and home button does become annoying at times but that happened only 1-2x for me and I’ve been using it intensely for month now. It just takes getting used to, I guess.

Messie says:

13 years ago

Whoah! Now that you’ve had the chance to play with the galaxy tab 10.1 boss abe, may we request for a 1v1v1 among 10″ Honeycomb tablets? A summarized table showing specs, features, price, pros, cons, etc. will be great. It will be something like Galaxy vs Iconia vs Transformer Free-For-All =D

Oh, I almost forgot, weight and thickness will play a big factor too (for the tablets’ portability). It will be really nice to see a local take on these three. =D

Thanks!!
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Jonaflormicfren says:

13 years ago

I like the look and its size.
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roiji says:

13 years ago

saw ads of a samsung galaxy tab 10.1 event on rockewell on estrella st while on my way to edsa..
they are 2 ads on the center aisle..
didn’t see when the event will be held..
basta something like tab life at the rockwell..
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arnold says:

13 years ago

Been using the P7510 model (wi-fi only) for almost a month now. In fact, I’ve been using it more often than my iPad 2. I used to bring my iPad 2 everyday but not anymore now. I used it more for gaming na lang most of the time.

Here’s my full review: http://www.androidnewshub.com/2011/07/05/samsung-galaxy-tab-10-1-review/
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Arnold says:

13 years ago

@messie – unit price + Php2.5(JAC charges) = Total price. That’s all. Ops, factor in the Amazon tax pala which is very minimal, $5-10.
Messie says:

13 years ago

Hi, I’ve read from your post that you bought it from Amazon, may I ask if you’ve had difficulty in buying and shipping the galaxy tab?
I was also not able to find the price in your post. May I ask how much it took you (unit price + shipping charges) to buy the wi-if version of this galaxy tab?
Thanks arnold!

bern says:

13 years ago

I still prefer ipad2 or the one (ipad3/ipad hd) that coming on this October, hopefully. :)

If your prediction is right for the price it will be pricey for tablet though it has nice specs.
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russ_85 says:

13 years ago

speaking Samsung Galaxy S II, watch this nice link (official France advertisement of Galaxy SII: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zyMfpJh3h4A&feature=player_embedded
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