Samsung Galaxy Note 8.0 Review
by Anand Lal Shimpi on April 17, 2013 11:29 PM EST- Posted in
- Tablets
- Samsung
- Android
- Mobile
- Galaxy Note 8.0
Camera
Although it’s sometimes used as one, I still don’t believe the majority of the population uses a tablet as their primary imaging device. That doesn’t however mean that it can’t be used as as a camera. In fact, I do see an increasing number of situations where tablets are being used as cameras in a pinch. Particularly on the productivity side of things where you may need to take a photo of something you’re studying on site (e.g. insurance adjuster taking photos of a claim). All of this is a long winded way of saying that tablet camera performance matters. It doesn’t perhaps matter as much as it would in a smartphone, but it still matters.
The Galaxy Note 8.0 comes with a fairly standard two camera setup. Around back there’s a raised bump to accommodate a 5MP camera module (2560x1920) with F2.7 lens. Up front there’s a 1.3MP sensor (1280x960) and F2.8 lens. Neither camera has a flash of any sort.
The Note 8.0’s size actually doesn’t make it ridiculous to take photos with. The camera UI is fairly standard for Samsung and includes a fairly typical set of customization options (ISO, exposure adjustment, JPEG compression, etc...). Shot to shot latency is about on par with the iPad mini, but considerably slower than the latest and greatest smartphones like the HTC One.
Camera preview is relatively smooth but clearly not anywhere near full resolution, as a result photos tend to look pretty bad during framing but can come out surprisingly decent once captured.
Samsung integrates optional voice recognition with its camera app. You can say smile, cheese, capture or shoot to activate the shutter. The process works surprisingly well but it does add additional latency to shooting since the voice recognition isn’t instant. Oddly enough some words worked better than others for me, although accuracy improved the closer my face was to the tablet.
Image quality outdoors was surprisingly decent. Both the Galaxy Note 8.0 and iPad mini did relatively well on camera duty. Samsung's auto white balance could definitely use some work, and in lower light scenarios the iPad mini seems to resolve details better than the Note 8.0.
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| Outdoor 1 | Indoor | Outdoor Nature | Macro | Outdoor Low Light | |||||
| Apple iPad mini | |||||||||
| Samsung Galaxy Note 8.0 | |||||||||
Low light performance is horrible on both tablets. In well lit scenarios, the Note 8.0 is a competent shooter though the iPad mini seems to do better overall. I was personally surprised by how well these tablets performed at macro shots. Again, I wouldn't use either as a primary shooter, but if your job requires embedding photos in emails and all you're carrying is one of these tablets you can make it work (assuming there's plenty of light around).
Video recording performance was also surprisingly decent on the Galaxy Note 8.0:
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nerd1 - Thursday, April 18, 2013 - link
Actually S note lags a lot with Ativ smart PC (clover trail) but it's way better with oneNote.Death666Angel - Thursday, April 18, 2013 - link
Display analysis: You only show the contrast ratio for the highest brightness setting. In display reviews, you at least have min/max brightness contrast ratios. That is better, but you should really have a contrast/brightness diagram with at least 11 data points (0% to 100% in 10% increments)."Unfortunately one of the hallmarks of TouchWiz is that all icons and widgets are considerably larger than they are under iOS" -> I don't see that in the picture you posted below that. It looks more cramped because it has more icons in the same space (5 horizontal on a 16:10 display vs. 4 on a 4:3 display and 6 vertical vs 4 vertical). If they are considerably larger, I should see it with my eye. But I don't. Can you provide measurements of the icons?
I agree completely with your tablet size assessment. I've had a 10" Android tablet for about 10 months now. It got used a lot when it was new (as any gadget does). But then the usefulness quickly plummeted and I often found myself wanting to be able to do more with it. Especially shoddy video playback was an annoyance. Any laptop or PC I own that is 5 years old or younger plays anything I through at it smoothly through either MPC-HC or VLC. For Android, I can never be sure until I try and often, even stuff that should play fine (720p downloaded content encoded for iTunes) stutters and has async video/audio on several players. So my 11.6" notebook (Core i3-330UM) took over most travelling duties again and the tablet got used as a toilet device and a portable console for young visitors. Now I have a 11.6" Samsung Core i tablet which I love. Battery life is of course shorter, but I still get through a day of use and that's all I need. If I had to buy a new tablet today, the 7" to 8" form factor would be what I would look at. But personally, I'm looking for a ~6" phone (Note 3 perhaps?) because my 4.7" GN feels positively tiny after a year of use and going to 6" would give me great pocketability, allow me to carry it everywhere while also giving me more real estate and let me stay with 2 portable devices instead of 3. :)
rkcth - Friday, April 19, 2013 - link
I use a jailbroken ipad mini with VLC and it plays anything I throw at it, been watching the whole series of true blood and its awesome. The only issue I ever have is with audio syncing after pausing, I usually have to click the done button and reclick the video to get it to resync properly, but I'm pretty sure that's a bug in VLC since it only happens after pausing and playing.herts_joatmon - Saturday, April 20, 2013 - link
It may just be the codex. I get the same problem on my android tablet with my true blood ripsTareX - Thursday, April 18, 2013 - link
This is making me even look more forward to the Note 3... Now that's a device that should last a long time before upgrading. Sorry HTC/Sony... you've had your chance to produce a proper phablet but you haven't delivered.FlyBri - Thursday, April 18, 2013 - link
The Note 8.0 is for a niche market at this price to such an extent that I believe sales figures will be considerably lower than Samsung expects. As such, I see a price cut in the near future. I was looking forward to the Note 8.0. While the S pen is a great feature, it's not an absolute must have for me. To me, $399 is WAY too much to ask, and I think the market will reflect this with lower sales numbers. If Samsung even cut $50 off the price they'd be in much better shape...enealDC - Thursday, April 18, 2013 - link
Another Android Tablet that will be useless in a matter of months! They are great to look at and hold and consume content on, but when the novelty wears off and you have business to get to, close the tablet and fire up your laptop (I'm a Transformer Prime owner).The next device I get is going to be a Microsoft Surface Pro for sure!
nerd1 - Thursday, April 18, 2013 - link
Having used win8 tablet for years and now using galaxy tab 7.7 for my main mobile device (including phone!), I cannot disagree more.thesavvymage - Thursday, April 18, 2013 - link
please tell me, which windows 8 tablet have you been using for years? There are NONE that have been out for more than a year. Installing the consumer preview on something else i guess was possible a year agonerd1 - Friday, April 19, 2013 - link
W8 developer preview was available july 2011, and I've been using EP121, W500, slate 7.