Apple's new iPad
Without a doubt, the new iPad's headline feature, the retina display, makes a modest first impression. I was hoping for a mind-blowing experience -- I remember being seriously impressed the first time I clapped eyes on the iPhone 4's pixel-packing display. The new iPad doesn't make that kind of impression. While it’s unlikely to drop your jaw, this is undoubtedly still a fantastic screen.Boasting a mammoth 2,048x1,536-pixel resolution, detail on icons and text is incredibly clear, and you may well spend your first few minutes of ownership peering gormlessly at the pre-installed app icons, all of which look gorgeous. Expect photos and HD movies to look a dream.
Examining the new iPad alongside the iPad 2, there is a visible difference in the quality of the display. But that's not to belittle the previous iPad's screen, which is still great. The new tablet looks better, but not to the degree that the iPad 2 looks ugly and dated by comparison.
Feast your eyeballs on the new iPad's retina display, top, and compare it to the pixelated icons of the iPad 2.
Colours are bright and natural, and the viewing angle is impressive, making it easy to crowd several people around a single tablet without anyone missing out on visual detail. The display's close proximity to the top of the screen is another plus, and lends the tablet a luxurious look.
The screen is still intensely reflective though. Stare into the new iPad while the screen is switched off and it may as well be a mirror. As such, you may find your fun hampered by overhead lighting while sat indoors. If you take the iPad outside, you'll have to contend with the biggest overhead light of all -- the sun.
For the most part, the screen is bright enough to compensate for these reflections. But if you're watching a moody movie with lots of scenes set in the dark, expect to spend some time looking up your own nose.Exploring the App Store, there are already a decent number of apps that have been given a retina makeover. It's a good thing too because anything on this screen that's not been tailored for the tablet's high-resolution display sticks out like a sore thumb.
Blurry, unattractive apps and icons were an issue when the iPhone 4 was released, with the device's hi-res screen making apps built for previous iPhones look extremely ugly. That's no longer an issue, but expect a transitional phase in which you'll occasionally be confronted with unsightly, blocky apps.To sum up, this display is excellent. It hasn't rocked my world, but it has massaged my eyeballs with its clarity and colours. It's not hugely better-looking than older iPads though.
Camera
The iPad 2's camera was rubbish, and while it served for taking quick, disposable snaps and concocting moving music videos, a lack of detail in images meant it was unsuitable for capturing half-decent photos. The new iPad sports a beefed-up 5-megapixel snapper that packs fancy-sounding tech like back-side illumination and a 5-element lens. But could the new iPad replace your digital camera?
This snapper is a massive improvement on the iPad 2's effort, as our comparison photos confirm. If you check those pictures out, you'll see that the new iPad particularly excels at capturing close-up shots and far exceeds its predecessor's abilities in low-light conditions. Shots in less-than-bright lighting will still feature lots of noise though.Pictures are reasonably clear if your subject is perfectly still, but it doesn't take much movement to leave your pictures looking decidedly blurry.
Outside shots are balanced, with our shots of a cloudy London day not too plagued by blown-out whites in the sky. There's not a huge amount of detail captured here -- zooming in a little on pictures I'd taken quickly left them looking unclear, with people's faces in crowd shots resembling blobs.
These outdoors shots show the improved performance of the new iPad, top, over the iPad 2, with a well-balanced shot, although it lacks detail when zoomed in .
The new iPad, top, produces far better results close-up than the iPad 2 .
Again, the new iPad's camera's results, top, will show up better than its predecessor's in low light .
Video capture isn't terribly smooth, and once you start moving the tablet, the video is liable to succumb to blur. It's also worth mentioning that the tablet itself is quite cumbersome to hold up in a photography-ready position. Doing so in public will also make you look rather ridiculous.
There are benefits to using the iPad camera. The software is ludicrously simple, and once you've taken a picture, there are loads of apps like iPhoto with which to edit them. It's also dead easy to upload pictures to Facebook or Twitter. But those after a decent snap will find the actual image quality sub-par.
To conclude on cameras, this snapper is a massive improvement over the iPad 2 and will nab a decent photo. The new iPad isn't a suitable replacement for a decent compact digital camera, or a particularly good smart phone camera.
Performance
There's a new processor lurking inside this brand new tablet, dubbed the A5X chip, providing a step-up in power from the A5 chip powering the last iPad.
It's worth mentioning that there's nothing wrong with the iPad 2 in terms of speed. One year on, it's still a very capable device, and feels every bit as slick to use as the new model. The power boost present in the new iPad is necessary though, because powering the high-resolution screen is a demanding process.In everyday terms, you're unlikely to notice much difference in speed between the new iPad and the iPad 2 -- moving through the interface feels just as swift, and apps spring open with little loading time.
There also seems to be little improvement here in terms of graphical clout. The new iPad ran the GLBenchmark 2.1.2 Egypt Standard test at 59 frames per second, compared to 58fps when we ran the same test on our iPad 2.The 'Offscreen' test, which is part of the same suite, showed more improvement -- 140fps for the new iPad versus 89fps on the iPad 2. The GLBenchmark 2.1 Pro test running on high showed remarkably little difference between the two tablets though, with the new slate running the test at 59fps, and the original iPad mustering 58fps.
The SunSpider JavaScript benchmark test, which helps evaluate a browser's speed, again showed very similar scores -- 1,890.9 for the new iPad and 1,884.6 for the iPad 2. Lower is better in this test so the older iPad actually performed better, but only very slightly.
Our scores using the Geekbench app were also similar -- 760 for the new iPad compared with 756 for the new iPad. Interestingly, this test revealed that the new iPad offers 988MB of RAM and is clocked at 1GHz.
The benchmark tests show that in practical terms, you're unlikely to see a great deal more grunt with the new iPad. The A5X chip may make your tablet more useful for longer as new and exciting apps are created, but for now, the practical performance benefits of the new processor appear to be slight. The speed boost moving from the iPhone 4 to the 4S was much more striking.
The snapper on the iPad 2 was rubbish, so the boost to 5 megapixels and its improved camera tech is welcome.
Design
This iPad looks essentially the same as its predecessor, but that's no bad thing. This device is all-over luxury, with the curved metal casing feeling pleasant in the hand. Build quality is excellent, and while this tablet is unlikely to survive a drop onto a tiled floor, you won't notice the casing creaking at all while you hold it -- it's very well put together indeed.
Buttons and ports remain minimal -- there's the home button beneath the screen and volume keys on the right, along with a switch that either locks screen rotation or mutes the volume, depending on the option you select in the settings menu. On the bottom there's a slot for the charger, and at the top you'll find a headphone port and lock switch. Like the iPad 2, the new iPad comes in both black and white options.
There are some differences between the new iPad and the iPad 2. This tablet isn't as thin -- measuring 9.4mm thick compared to the iPad 2, which was 8.8mm deep. It's heavier as well, tipping the scales at 652g for the Wi-Fi only version, compared to the 601g Wi-Fi-only iPad 2. The SIM card-carrying version now weighs 662g.
One of our gripes with the original tablet was that it was too heavy at 680g, which made the slimmed-down, lighter iPad 2 feel like a significant change for the better. I think that while the new iPad is a comfortable weight and still pleasingly thin, it's edged dangerously close towards too-heavy territory.
It's perfectly comfortable to hold with two hands, and I reckon you could easily enjoy a long train journey glued to this device without feeling the dreaded ache creeping into your wrists. But it's probably slightly too unwieldy to hold in one mitt for long.
The extra bulk will be a consequence of the components that Apple's chosen to occupy this tablet's innards. The camera, processor and screen all offer better performance, but the slight extra bulk is the price you pay. If you'd rather own something as thin and portable as possible, then the iPad 2 is still on sale at a reduced cost.
The new iPad, top, is noticeably thicker and heavier than the iPad 2, piling on 51g for the Wi-Fi-only version.
Software
The new iPad's focus may be on swanky new components, but it's Apple's iOS software that has made its tablets so successful. Buttery smooth menu navigation and an intuitive interface make gliding through the iPad's software a pleasure, and you'll rarely struggle to find what you're looking for.
Double-tapping the home button to bring up the apps you've already got running quickly becomes second nature, and multi-touch gestures are in place too. Pinching the screen with four or five fingers to return to the homescreen and swiping left or right with four fingers to switch between running apps are perhaps the most useful digit-induced shortcuts.
The iOS software does have its pitfalls. The 'settings' menu is still a confusing maze of options, making it time-consuming and frustrating to perform a simple task like adjusting brightness or turning Wi-Fi on or off. Options for customisation are also extremely low. Don't expect the dynamic home screen widgets you'd find on Android devices, and in terms of the tablet's display aesthetics, things like icons and fonts can't be changed.
In spite of Apple's restrictive approach, iOS is the best operating system for tablets right now because it has an absolutely vast catalogue of downloadable apps. The iPad's popularity has caused newspapers, broadcasters and games publishers to flock to the platform, so you can expect a near-endless supply of games, digital magazines, music and video applications, as well as all the multimedia offerings through Apple's own iTunes app. Garageband and iMovie, the music and movie editing tools made by Apple, are especially noteworthy.
Most apps are reasonably priced (expect to pay a few pounds at most), many are free, and because Apple enforces a strict approval process, the apps to be found on the App Store are generally polished and of a high quality. The retina display may be the shining face of Apple's new toy, but the App Store is its lifeblood.
4G, but not in the UK
The Wi-Fi + 4G option for this iPad offers LTE connectivity for those using the version that takes a SIM card, but that's not something that'll work in the UK, as our fragile networks don't support 4G yet. Even when they do, this particular model won't work on the spectrum bands we'll be using.
If you buy an iPad in the UK, you will be able to take it to the US or Canada and use the 4G networks over there, though you will need to buy a SIM card for one of those local networks. The tablet still has some speedy connectivity tech including HSPA+ and DC-HSDPA that work in the UK, so as long as you've got decent network coverage, you should find mobile Internet is reasonably rapid.
Battery life
Apple's estimate for the new iPad's battery life is 10 hours, though in practise it's extremely hard to gauge what kind of survivability tablets will offer unless you have a very clear idea of what you're going to be doing with them. Left alone overnight, our model dropped a mere 3 per cent battery charge, which is promising.
Once we started downloading tonnes of apps and running gruelling graphics tests, however, the available charge started melting away. That's to be expected though, and it's not what I'd call typical usage by any stretch. I'll be updating this article if I notice any battery quirks, but my impression so far is that the new iPad will likely be as capable away from the mains as its predecessors.
The iPad is one of the very few gadgets out there to offer battery life I'd actually call impressive, so this is a good thing. Those of you looking to use the iPad primarily as an ebook reader, take note -- the Kindle's battery life is fantastic.
Apple iPad mini
Whether or not you think it's too pricey, the iPad mini feels genuinely luxurious to hold. Its 7.9-inch front is dominated by a single piece of glass with the small, round home button sitting at the bottom.It measures 200mm long and 135mm wide. That's exactly the same length as the Nexus 7, but adds 15mm onto the width. We found we were just about able to slide the Nexus 7 into our jacket pockets, but we're not convinced you'll be able to do the same with the iPad mini -- it's more of a purse or small bag-sized device.
At 15mm wider than the Google Nexus 7, it's going to stretch your coat pocket to tearing point.
The mini has a much slimmer bezel than the Nexus 7, or even the larger iPad, so the bigger screen hasn't pushed out the size of the chassis any more than is necessary.We worried that the slim bezel would cause us to accidentally start an app or turn a page, but Apple has baked in some finger-rejection tech that seems to counter this problem. When reading books, holding onto the side of the tablet wasn't a problem, but when we started typing, the entire edge-to-edge surface became sensitive to our touch.
The iPad mini takes design cues from the new iPod touch, down to the curved wrap-around aluminium casing and flat back. The white model has an aluminium rear, while the black version has a slate-coloured anodised-aluminium back, like the black iPhone 5.
Apple's non-iPhones from left to right: iPad, iPad mini, iPod touch.
It's only 7.2mm thick, making it thinner than the iPhone 5. The Nexus 7 is 10mm thick, which seems positively portly by comparison -- indeed, this is the slimmest and lightest small-size tablet around. It also weighs around 310g, making it about half the weight of the iPad 3.
Construction feels solid, and the mini is fun to wrap your mitts around. The home button clicks crisply and despite being cheaper than a full-sized iPad, it doesn't feel any less well-built.
The smaller Lightning dock connector sits at the bottom, and although it's easier to connect than the earlier 30-pin charger, it won't fit with any of your existing iPad speaker docks and peripherals unless you buy an adaptor.
Typing on the mini's screen is a little more cramped than the iPad -- you might find one-handed prodding more comfortable.
The iPad mini's neatest trick is that it handles all the larger iPad's duties despite the smaller size. In CNET's tests, ebooks and magazines, media-editing apps, virtual board games with tiny buttons and games that have on-screen touch controls were all usable and comfortable.
To type, you can hold the mini in portrait mode and use two thumbs, as you would on a smart phone. Typing in the traditional style works better than expected in landscape, but takes some getting used to, as the 7.9-inch display isn't as wide as your average laptop keyboard.
Camera
At the top of the mini you'll spy an HD camera for FaceTime and there's a 5-megapixel camera around the back, which can shoot video in 1080p.
You get an HD camera for video calls on the front and a 5-megapixel effort around the back.
We found this snapper is an improvement on the dodgy camera inside the iPad 2, but doesn't measure up to the lens on the latest iPod touch. Photos snagged using the mini are better than most budget tablets can muster, and the small size makes this gadget more practical (read: less embarrassing) than the larger iPad for taking photos in public. Be aware that some features are curiously absent however, including HDR and iOS 6's new Panorama mode.
The mini's 5-megapixel rear camera is more than adequate for the occasional snap.
Screen
The iPad mini's 7.9-inch display offers a resolution of 1,024x768 pixels. That's the same resolution offered on the old iPad 2, although its smaller screen size means its pixel density is higher, at a middling 168ppi -- significantly less dense than Apple's retina displays.
Based on CNET's experience, how you feel about the mini's screen will depend on how many retina displays you've been exposed to. In other words, if you've spent much time with a recent iPhone or third-generation iPad, you'll think the mini's screen is blurry.
It's a lower resolution than the Nexus 7 and Amazon's Kindle Fire HD, despite being slightly larger than those tablets. Competition aside, this is the least impressive screen in Apple's clutch of iOS gadgets, with the iPod touch, iPhone 5 and latest iPad all brighter and crisper to look at. The viewing angle is impressive though, so you'll be able to crowd more than one person around this tablet.
The iPad mini's 4:3 screen ratio makes ebooks more book-like than on other 7-inch tablets.
Like the iPad 3, the mini has a 4:3 aspect ratio, rather than a stretched 16:9 display like the iPhone 5. That means all the 275,000 iPad-specific apps on the iOS app store will fit perfectly on screen.It may have the same aspect ratio as the larger iPad, but thanks to the slim bezel the screen feels extra-wide. We found the mini was at its best when tested with ebooks, magazines or textbooks, which are rendered without being unduly compacted.
The bookish dimensions and access to lots of different digital shops make the iPad mini a strong ebook reader, even if it's not the best for pure text. In CNET's tests, magazines and books were enjoyable to read on the mini, even if a sharper resolution would have helped -- especially with comic-book apps.
The iPad mini packs 168 pixels per inch onto the screen -- lower than the Nexus 7's 216ppi.
Ebooks may get a pass, but the 4:3 aspect ratio is a stumbling block for video. Movies and TV shows will be displayed with large black bars at the top and bottom -- something that affects 16:9 gadgets like the Nexus 7 or the iPhone 5 much less.
We found most TV programmes looked okay, and the lower resolution is slightly balanced by the fact the iPad mini has access to so many video-specific apps. Indeed, if anything gives the mini an edge, it's the wealth of apps, services and software it has access to. Two speakers on either side of the charging port pump out a decent amount of noise. We think they're good enough to listen to music or hear video through.
Specifications
The little chap is running on a dual-core A5 processor -- the same chip you find inside the iPad 2. It's disappointing not to see the A5X processor unveiled in the iPad 3, or indeed the A6 chip from the iPhone 5. It's therefore miles behind the A6X processor in the latest iPad, which delivers stonking performance.
With the same processor as the ageing iPad 2, the iPad mini's performance is hardly mind-blowing.
In CNET's tests, apps loaded and operated at the same speeds you'd get on the iPad 2, and generally started a few seconds slower compared with the latest iPad. Similarly, Web pages loaded several seconds slower than the most recent iPad devices.
The iPad mini scored 752 in the Geekbench performance-testing app, compared to the iPad 2's 755. The mini's score pales next to the iPhone 5, which managed around the 1,600 range, while the fourth-generation iPad scored above 1,700. The difference in actual app performance isn't so dramatic, but the mini is no speed demon.
Software
The mini is running on the latest version of Apple's mobile software, iOS 6, which debuted on the iPhone 5. It brings the ability to tweet and post Facebook updates from all over the interface, an updated notifications bar and various other tweaks -- including a Maps app so bad it forced Apple boss Tim Cook to issue a public apology. The Nexus 7, by contrast, has the latest Android Jelly Bean software and Google's own excellent maps.
The iPad mini largely lives up to Apple's 10-hour battery life claim.
In terms of battery life, Apple reckons you can get around 10 hours of use from a single charge. We always take battery claims with a fistful of salt, but CNET's tests saw the mini surviving well beyond a full day's use, even with games, streaming video and downloads in the mix.
4G connectivity
The iPad mini will be offered in Wi-Fi only and 4G versions. It uses the 1,800MHz band for 4G, which is only used by EE. That means if you want mobile Internet on your tiny tab, you'll have to go with EE.
Although other networks are yet to announce their plans for 4G, we do know they won't be using this part of the spectrum. So if you buy an iPad on EE now, you won't be able to use it on a different 4G networknext year.
Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1
The original Galaxy Note was primarily designed to be a smart phone which, given its 5.3-inch size, we all thought was a joke. It certainly blurred the line between a phone and tablet to the point of ludicrousness. The Note 10.1 might share the same name, but there's no confusion over in which camp this new chap stands -- at 10.1-inches, it's unmistakably a tablet, so you're going to look particularly foolish clutching it to the side of your face. The only reason to do that would be if you're using your facial hair to remove a stubborn grease mark from the screen.
The Note 10.1 borrows nearly all of its looks from Samsung's own Galaxy Tab 2 10.1. Both slates are the same size and both have slightly extra space to the left and right of the screen (when held horizontally). It isn't the most luxurious of designs and I don't think it will be troubling the iPad's edge-to-edge glass front in the style stakes. Still, the bezel's hardly an eyesore and at least there's space to house front-facing speakers.
Around the back is a large expanse of white plastic that's been given a pearlescent sheen to stop it from being too boring. Sadly, this panel feels rather cheap and easily picks up dirt and scuffs, quickly turning your shiny new slate into a grubby paving slab. It doesn't offer much flex, so it feels like it could take the odd bump inside a bag, but I wouldn't advise carrying it too far without a decent amount of padding.
The chief difference between this Note and the Tab 2 10.1 is that the Note also comes with a stylus for writing or doodling on the screen. It fits securely in the bottom right of the tablet, which is a slightly awkward place to put it as it's easy to drop when you're removing it. You can't get it out if the tablet is sat in a docking station either.
The S Pen stylus is a unique feature among the tablet hordes.
The Note 10.1 measures 8.9mm thick, which is par for the course for most 10-inch slates, as is its 600g weight -- the iPad comes in at a slightly heavier 635g. If you already own a tablet like an iPad or Samsung's earlier Galaxy Tab, then you won't struggle to carry it around and it should fit snugly in any sleeves or bags you already own.
Around the edges you'll find a power button, a volume rocker, a microSD card slot (for expanding the internal 16GB of storage), a 3.5mm headphone jack and a dock connector. Annoyingly, there's no micro-USB slot, so if you ever want to transfer files to and from your tablet, you're going to need to make sure you have the dedicated cable with you. Woe betide you if you lose that cable -- it gives the Note power as well as data so it would be rendered useless.
At 8.9mm thick, it's as slinky as you'd expect of a top-end tab.
S Pen stylus
What separates the Note from the raft of other full-size tablets is the addition of a stylus. The ability to scribble like a toddler after a triple espresso will no doubt draw the eye of creative artsy types who want a digital canvas for their sketches, notes and designs. It'll also come in handy if you own a toddler (with or without espresso, your choice), as they can use the S Pen -- or their finger if it's clean -- to doodle to their heart's content. Your days of worrying over felt-tipped pens making their way onto your wallpaper could be over.
The pen's been redesigned since the original Note, with the bigger tablet size affording a longer, thicker stylus. The squared-off sides will prevent it from rolling down the side of your desk to be lost forever in a tangle of cables, fluff and 2p pieces. The button on it has also received some grooves, to make it easier to find -- although it's also easier to press by mistake.
Drawing lines with the S Pen is pretty accurate, due to the stylus tip, which is pointier than fatter-tipped ones made for use with touchscreens.
I was impressed with the accuracy of the lines I was able to draw on the screen, helped by the very narrow point of the stylus. Some styluses designed to work with capacitive touchscreens have quite fat, spongy tips, which reduce accuracy. But the S Pen is more akin to a Biro, making it very easy to quickly sketch or doodle aimlessly while on the phone to your parents.
Samsung reckons the stylus can recognise 1,024 levels of pressure, which is a significant improvement over the 256 levels the original Note's stylus could detect. Having said that though, I can't really say I noticed a benefit of having 1,024 levels. When sketching and shading in Photoshop Touch, I could perhaps visually identify 10 different shade strengths.
The screen is also apparently able to tell when your palm is pressed on the screen when you're busy sketching with the S Pen. I found this to be somewhat hit and miss, with my doodles going sometimes uninterrupted and awkward blotches appearing on my beautiful artwork on other occasions.
Samsung says the stylus will recognise up to 1,024 levels of pressure, but that's not obviously apparent in use.
If you dive into the settings, you can configure a bunch of apps like S Note, Polaris Office or PS Touch to load up automatically when you take the stylus out. That could save you valuable seconds when you absolutely must sketch something as quickly as possible.
The S Pen improves precision in certain apps and can speed up note taking. But if you prefer typing out missives, it doesn't offer any real benefit. In day-to-day tablet use, jabbing away with your finger will prove better. Unless you have a pressing need for an electronic pen, such as if you're an architect or artist who regularly sketches, the S Pen is not enough reason in itself to buy the Note over other tablets.
Still, Samsung's bundled in some decent doodling software. An app called S Note lets you join images and videos together with your own scrawlings to make your memos that bit more artistic, although the clunky interface and obscure icons are not the easiest to figure out. It's not even clear how to open a blank sheet of paper and the pre-saved S Note document entitled 'S Note Tips' is a one-page document with the single instruction of 'Tap a template and begin'. Super helpful.
Bizarrely, it's not obvious how to open a simple blank sheet to doodle on when you load up the S Note app.
The gem for the artsy types will no doubt be the aforementioned Adobe Photoshop Touch -- a pared-down version of Photoshop that includes layers and some effects. It's relatively easy to open existing images to draw over or simply open a blank document for sketching. There's a lot more functionality here than just the basic crop and rotate tools found on Photoshop Express on phones.
The pared-down Photoshop Touch is a great tool if you want to visually recreate a migraine.
Unfortunately, not every app uses the S Pen as you'd hope. S Note and Photoshop Touch make best use of the technology, but the Email app doesn't allow you to write emails with the pen, only to draw in the body of the email, which is a big oversight.
The purpose of the S Pen is to offer an alternative to digit prodding. While the stylus feels fine for navigating menus and swiping through pages, when it comes to typing, you'll almost certainly feel more comfortable using both hands with the on-screen keyboard. If you're going to be hacking through some long emails, you might be better off looking at the Asus Transformer Infinity, with its handy keyboard dock.
Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich
The Note 10.1 arrives running Ice Cream Sandwich, the latest-but-one version of Android. ICS, or Android 4.0 if you prefer, brings a slew of features and interface tweaks to Google's mobile operating system. Oh, and the nifty ability to unlock your device using your face. It's recently been superseded by Android 4.1 Jelly Bean though.
While Samsung reckons the Note will get a Jelly Bean update by the end of the year, if you're after the very latest software out of the box, you won't be best impressed -- and Samsung doesn't have a shining track record when it comes to bringing updates to its devices.
Having Google's Android software means you can get onto the Play store and start filling your boots with apps.
Despite this, ICS is still a slick operating system. Having Android on your tablet grants you access to Google Play, which is crammed full of apps to download. The Note also features Samsung's TouchWiz interface -- familiar to anyone who's used Samsung devices -- that's been toned down with a quieter aesthetic. It offers a mini apps tray that now supports limited customisation, allowing you to swap out apps from the tray.
Samsung wants to entertain you with its own games, video and music hubs.
Samsung has bundled some of its own apps too like its music, video and games hubs, which you might find useful if you're a serial media addict. For the most part though, you're more likely to stick to Google's Play for books, films, apps and games.
Android Ice Cream Sandwich lets you customise your home screens with widgets galore.
A useful feature Samsung's added is the ability to run apps side-by-side on screen. It's effectively the same as the window 'snapping' feature in Windows 7 and works pretty well on a 10.1-inch space. Multi-tasking is given a boost because of this, although the list of supported apps is pretty short -- limited to just six -- so it's questionable as to how useful it will be.
You can open up two apps side by side, which is handy, but the number of supported apps is limited.
I was able to simultaneously look at the web browser and photos in the gallery and you can do the same with videos (although not using YouTube). Hopefully, more apps will allow for this functionality.
There's also a feature called Pop Up Play, which lets you playback videos in a small, adjustable window, while you carry on operating the tablet as normal. I found this worked pretty well and it's a handy way of checking your email, without having to miss a moment of your film. It's already in use on the Samsung Galaxy S3, so if you've found it useful there, odds are you will on the Note.
I've seen the future: watching a film while browsing the web.
Screen
The Note 10.1 has -- you'll be shocked to learn -- a 10.1-inch screen, shovelling in a fair 1,280x800 pixels. While that resolution will do the trick for most purposes, recent Android tablets like the Asus Transformer Infinity and Acer Iconia Tab A700 trounce it with sharper 1,920x1,200-pixel resolutions. If it's really intended to appeal to creative types with a focus on images, a higher resolution would have been particularly welcome here -- especially since the iPad crams in 2,048x1,536 pixels.
The screen is still pretty sharp, with the flurries of snow in my favourite YouTube clip displayed well. Some icons can look a little rough around the edges though, and small text on web pages isn't always as sharp as it could be, which might make reading for longer periods uncomfortable.
The screen looks great, but it should really be matching the higher resolutions of competitors if it's to truly appeal to creative types.
Still, it's at least very bright and rather bold too, with colours that stand out well and satisfyingly deep blacks. If you're keen on your movies and regularly spend evenings sitting around watching YouTube clips, you'll be satisfied.
Performance
Inside that slim white jacket is a quad-core processor clocked at a meaty 1.4GHz, along with a very impressive 2GB of RAM. The most RAM I've come across in a tablet so far is only 1GB, so I was very keen to see what it was capable of.
To begin, I booted up the Geekbench benchmark test and was very impressed at the 1,828 score it achieved. By comparison, the Toshiba AT300, which also packs in a quad-core chip, managed just 1,400 on the same test and I found that slate to be extremely competent.
That score tops the performance of the Toshiba AT300.
In fact, the only tablet that's produced a better score than that is the Asus Transformer Infinity, which totalled a little over 1,900 (the best score I've ever seen on an Android tablet). In practice, I wouldn't think you'd ever notice the difference. The Note performed similarly well on the Quadrant benchmark, scoring 5,422, casually beating the powerhouse HTC One X's .
The Note 10.1 fared better on the Quadrant benchmark test than the mighty HTC One X.
It's not just about straight-line power though. That 2GB of RAM will lend a serious hand when it comes to multi-tasking. Considering the Note has multi-tasking features like split-screen and Pop Up Play, it's really going to be putting that RAM to good use. Indeed, I found it remained very responsive to my swipes and pokes, even when watching a video at the same time.
That RAM also helps the tablet switch effortlessly between open apps, although I did notice that swiping through pages and some menus wasn't as buttery smooth as I'd like. The 7-inch Google Nexus 7 packs a quad-core chip too, and although it achieved a slightly lesser score on the benchmarks, the Jelly Bean software on board does some wizardry with the frame rates, making everything seem much more fluid.
That power under the hood helps the Note with gaming. It doesn't use the Nvidia Tegra 3 chip found on tablets like the Toshiba AT300 or Nexus 7, which means some glossy titles like Six-Guns aren't available, but there's still an ever-expanding line-up on the Google Play store designed for dedicated gamers.
I tried out the zombie shooter Dead Trigger and was pleased with the smooth gameplay. The tablet's reproduced the demanding graphics without so much as a hiccup.
Splatter the undead without getting the jitters, with the Note 10.1's smoothly rendered gameplay.
Camera
Around the back is a 5-megapixel camera, which is a step up from the 3-megapixel efforts on previous Tabs. The results from the camera are pretty much what I'd expect from most tablets. The images are fairly sharp but aren't particularly vivid. I've seen better results from the Transformer Infinity and the iPad, but there's not a huge amount in it.
The Note 10.1's camera packs in an extra 2 megapixels over the Tab 10.1.
It's certainly good enough for a Twitter update (no doubt with some artsy Instagram filter applied), but you're unlikely to want to take it anywhere for proper photography -- and given that it's a big tablet, not a camera, that's to be expected.
The camera's results are underwhelming, but that's to discourage you from making a fool of yourself by holding it aloft at a gig .
You'll spy a 1.9-megapixel snapper on the front too, which should make you look good on video calls, or make you look ridiculous as you pose for a Myspace-style self portrait.
Conclusion
The Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1's screen resolution may be trounced by the iPad, but it features a powerful quad-core processor and the S Pen sylus will appeal to creative types. Even if you have no use for the pen, the Note 10.1's fast overall performance, sensible design, decent screen and useful features make it the best 10-inch Samsung tablet yet.
However, the potential of the S Pen is not fully mined here, and unless you have a specific purpose for it such as regular sketching, its usefulness is arguably limited. If you're looking for a powerful 10-inch tablet, it's definitely worth considering. But if you hanker after the latest Android software and want to save yourself a couple of hundred quid, the Google Nexus 7 offers a similar helping of power, albeit from a smaller body.
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