Nexus 7 (2013) - Mini Review
by Brian Klug on July 27, 2013 12:54 AM EST- Posted in
- Tablets
- Snapdragon
- Qualcomm
- Android
- Mobile
- APQ8064
- Nexus 7
- Android 4.3
The lack of a rear camera on the original Nexus 7 was always a bit of a downer. It clearly had the space for a module inside, but including a camera didn’t align with the efforts to drive that device into the price point that made it successful. With the new Nexus 7 we finally get a camera, and a 5 MP one with autofocus at that. Inside the camera is an OV5693 sensor, which best I can tell is a 1/4" format sensor with 1.4 micron pixels. It might not be the world’s best camera, but it’s no slouch either.
I took a handful of photos and videos with the Nexus 7 (2013) to gauge camera quality, and even if this isn’t necessarily a device with focus on imaging it’s not bad at all. I came away pretty pleased for what kind of camera it is. Even though I still strongly believe that you shouldn’t be using a tablet to take photos you intend on using for anything more than sharing on social networks, in this brave new era of mobile devices it’s a feature every tablet and smartphone does need.
I’ll save you the discussion once again about how the Android 4.3 camera UI continues to present a 16:9 aspect ratio crop of the 4:3 image captured by the sensor, which results in a smeary looking, inaccurate preview.
Video on the Nexus 7 (2013) is 1080p30 at 12 Mbps, H.264 Baseline with 1 reference frame, and 96 kbps 48 KHz single channel AAC audio. I've uploaded a sample I took in SF to our servers as well as YouTube. Again I’m dismayed why more OEMs don’t use the full encode capabilities of APQ8064 (20 Mbps H.264 High Profile) but that’s what it is by default on the new Nexus 7.
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KDOG - Saturday, August 3, 2013 - link
Aaaahh ... SlimPort. Nevermind....KDOG - Saturday, August 3, 2013 - link
Still don't like the fact that they don't have mSD slots....piroroadkill - Tuesday, September 3, 2013 - link
milliSD? I didn't know there was such a thing.The only correct abbreviation is surely µSD.
d14b0ll0s - Saturday, August 3, 2013 - link
the specs chart is wrong for the old N7 -- I am a happy owner of a 32GB version, as it was '16 or 32' with the 2012 model as welljcsweeney - Sunday, August 4, 2013 - link
Brain, great review as usual, just wondering about the GPS performance.I just received my new nexus 7, and the GPS is not functional. If >1 app tried to use the GPS it looses lock, and won't regain lock until after a reboot. After searching a bit, this seems to be a common issue.
Did this show up during the time you were doing your mini review, or is it a new issue, potentially introduced with new software updates.
In any case, please cover the GPS performance in the full review.
darwinosx - Tuesday, August 6, 2013 - link
GPS is a known issue that Google is working on.jcsweeney - Wednesday, August 7, 2013 - link
I agree this is a known widespread issue. It's just that the review process missed it, and declared that the GPS worked great.Anandtech does the best reviews, benchmarks in the industry (IMO), and they seem open to updating the benchmarking process, hence the suggestion.
PointTruth1 - Thursday, August 15, 2013 - link
Great Article Brian, thanks for writing it. Wow there are so many different opinions on this forum! This is helpful. But I also feel overwhelmed when I try to identify just the main strengths and weaknesses. I just googled around, and found this page:http://productsummaries.com/Asus-Google-Nexus-7-Ta...
It claims that it parsed through hundreds of Asus Google Nexus 7 Tablet reviews and distilled a short list of dominant pros and cons. It helped me choose 7, hope it helps you as well.
lookit77 - Wednesday, August 21, 2013 - link
I believe that the USA version supports lte band 3.lookit77 - Wednesday, August 21, 2013 - link
From: https://support.google.com/nexus/7/answer/3248332?...North America:
GSM: 850/900/1800/1900 MHz
HSPA+: 850/900/1900/2100/AWS (1700/2100) MHz (Bands: 1/2/4/5/8)
LTE: 700/850/1700/1800/1900/2100 MHZ (Bands: 1/2/3/4/5/13/17)