Asus Announces ZenPad Z8 for Verizon
by Joshua Ho on June 16, 2016 3:15 PM EST
As a part of Asus’ continued commitment to the tablet market today Asus is launching a new tablet for Verizon, called the ZenPad Z8. There’s really not too much needed in the way of introduction here, so we’ll jump into the spec sheet first and see where we can go from there.
| ZenPad Z8 for Verizon | |
| SoC | Qualcomm Snapdragon 650 2x Cortex A72 1.8 GHz 4x Cortex A53 1.44 GHz |
| RAM | 2 GB |
| NAND | 16GB + microSD |
| Display | 7.9” 2048x1536 IPS LCD |
| Network | 2G/3G/4G LTE (UE Category 6, CA) |
| Dimensions | 205 x 136 x 7.62mm, 320g |
| Camera | 8MP Rear Facing |
| 2MP Front Facing | |
| Battery | 4680 mAh (18.01 Whr) |
| OS | Android 6.0.1 w/ ZenUI (At Launch) |
| Connectivity | 802.11a/b/g/n/ac, BT ?, USB-C, GNSS |
At a high level, right away the use of the Snapdragon 650 SoC is a fairly good sign given its 250 USD price point, as in general in devices we’ve seen that the Snapdragon 650 is a solid balance of performance and power for the mid-range, and in the case of this tablet means that Qualcomm’s modem expertise allows for good feature support, performance, and power on LTE.
Other than the basic specs, the ZenPad Z8 offers dual front-facing speakers which is great to see for media consumption, and VisualMaster display tweaks, which we investigated and found to be fairly disappointing in the ZenPad S, so hopefully there is some way to disable these display alterations.
Overall, the ZenPad Z8 could be an interesting tablet at the 250 USD price point, but without further investigation it would be hard to say. Regardless, the ZenPad Z8 in black is available for preorder today and will go on sale June 23 through Verizon only for 249.99 up-front or divided across 24 months on a payment plan.
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
27 Comments
View All Comments
DanNeely - Friday, June 17, 2016 - link
The last two phone reviews on the site listed full retail prices; as did the Q1 2016 best android phones roundup. The same was true of a review I checked from a year ago.http://www.anandtech.com/show/10217/the-lg-g5-revi...
http://www.anandtech.com/show/10285/the-iphone-se-...
http://www.anandtech.com/show/9770/best-android-ph...
http://www.anandtech.com/show/9525/the-moto-g-2015...
In contrast a pair of mid 2014 reviews didn't appear to mention price at all (on the first/last pages anyway).
http://www.anandtech.com/show/8169/the-lg-g3-revie...
http://www.anandtech.com/show/7903/samsung-galaxy-...
Calista - Thursday, June 16, 2016 - link
My friend as an instructor in the field is using a custom app running on an iPad Mini with LTE making notes and getting those instantly synced. Thinking about it it's really not that hard to find business cases for a tablet with cellular support.mr_tawan - Friday, June 17, 2016 - link
In fact MS OneNote is a killer app for this purpose. I see some people buy a Surface just for taking notes.TheinsanegamerN - Friday, June 17, 2016 - link
I'd much rather be able to take the data from my phone plan and put it on a tablet instead. Better battery life, easier to read, ece.Problem is there are no good android LTE tablets. There is the ipad, and the surface 3 (oddly the surface pros dont have an LTE option) but the only real android options were the now discontinued nexus 9 and samsung's tablets. Since google didnt give the pixel C any LTE capabilities, and nvidia no longer sells the lte enabled shield tablet, we are stuck waiting to see if the new nexus tablet, or pixel refresh, brings back LTE. Or chromebook, even, biggest flaw with the chromebook pixel 2 IMO.
Echo5 - Sunday, June 19, 2016 - link
I've been using a Nexus 7 on Verizon's LTE network for 2 years now. After that the idea of a WiFi - only tablet has no appeal. It spends it's day on my dash mound on my work vehicle and most of the time is my navigator using Google maps. If the screen is a bright and view-able on sunny days, I'm getting one of these. Just wish it had more than 2 GB of RAM.DangItDave - Sunday, June 26, 2016 - link
With the growth of productivity apps for Android, there presently exists a growing nitch for Android tablet users in business. A sure sign of market share draw is Microsoft's release of it's Office 365 software suite for Android. This can't be called a consumption app suite. Further, the Asus ZenPad s 8 seeks in part to tap into the professional user market through inclusion of some if its "value added" features - including 2 years of 100GB worth of Google Drive storage free! Android devices are fast becoming the go to smart device platform of choice for a growing number of tech savvy business professionals and entrepreneurs. Windows is actually behind in the mobile market by a good bit.Surface Pro, huh? Why? Just buy an ultra slim laptop - way more power and functionality for the expense (which is another reason to choose Android based devices - builders are not shelling out millions for the OS and passing the cost on the the "consumer.")
blzd - Sunday, June 19, 2016 - link
Just based off the specs I think this is one of the better new tablet announcements I've seen in a while. I don't need the LTE personally though.