Samsung Galaxy Tab 2 10.1 preview: First look

Introduction

The 10-inch form factor is the corridors of power in tablet terms, but the ones that won't turn your wallet inside out are hard to come by. In the Galaxy Tab 2 10.1, Samsung seem to have a reasonably-spec'd Android tablet, which might be the answer to that particular problem.

Samsung Galaxy Tab 2 10.1 official pictures

The Galaxy Tab 2 10.1 isn't a radical departure from the original Tab 10.1, but builds on the company's tablet know-how (they must have redesigned the original a dozen times) and launches with Google's latest Android version, Ice Cream Sandwich.

Let's go over the specs before moving on.

Samsung Galaxy Tab 2 10.1 at a glance:

• Form factor: Tablet
• Dimension: 256.6 x 175.3 x 9.7 mm
• Weight: 588g
• Display: 16M-color 10.1" PLS LCD capacitive touchscreen of WXGA resolution (1280 x 800 pixels)
• OS: Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich, TouchWiz UI
• Chipset: 1 GHz dual-core processor
• Camera: 3.2 MP autofocus camera with 1080p video recording; VGA front-facing camera
• Memory: 16/32GB of inbuilt storage, expandable via a microSD card slot
• Connectivity: Voice and data connectivity with quad-band GSM/GPRS/EDGE and quad-band (850/900/1900/2100 MHz) UMTS, 21 Mbps HSDPA and HSUPA 5.76 Mbps support, video calls, dual-band Wi-Fi a/b/g/n, Wi-Fi Direct, Assisted GPS, Bluetooth 3.0, 30-pin connector
• Battery: 7,000mAh
• Misc: Gyro sensor, accelerometer sensor for automatic UI rotation, ambient light sensor, Adobe Flash Player 11 support, DivX/XviD support, TV-out (adapter required), USB host (via an adapter)

If you were expecting the Tab 2 10.1 to take charge of Samsung's Android tablet lineup, you'd probably be disappointed, but there's little to cast doubt on its ability to handle daily tasks with ease.

Samsung have also enabled 1080p video recording (like in the Tab 2 7.0), but to us photography on a tablet shouldn't be a priority.

Things like web browsing, watching videos, gaming and document editing are well within its reach, the only area where the Tab 2 10.1 is likely to fall short (besides synthetic benchmarks) is high-end gaming.

Samsung Galaxy Tab 2 10.1 live pictures