The Samsung Galaxy Tab S2 Review
by Brandon Chester on October 15, 2015 8:00 AM ESTSystem Performance: GPU
While CPU performance characterizes one part of an SoC, GPU performance characterizes another. Tablets have long been a form factor where GPU performance can be pushed much further than in a phone due to the larger chassis of a tablet having far fewer size and thermal limitations. While some tablets elect to use specialized SoCs with more powerful GPU hardware than smartphones, the Tab S2 uses the same ARM Mali T760 GPU used in the Galaxy Note 4 Exynos.
To characterize the Tab S2's GPU performance I've run it through our standard GPU benchmarks. First up is 3DMark which actually has both a CPU and GPU component, followed by BaseMark X and GFXBench which focus more strongly on the GPU alone.
In 3DMark all of the Tab S2's scores are roughly equivalent to the Galaxy Note 4 Exynos which is not unexpected. Unfortunately, it's clear that Mali T760 can't keep up with NVIDIA's mobile Kepler implementation or Apple's custom 8 core PowerVR 6XT part. While the Nexus 9 and iPad Air 2 both fall short in the physics sub test their scores in the graphics sub test are in a completely different league than the Tab S2.
In BaseMark X we again see the Tab S2 sitting fairly far behind the iPad Air 2 and Nexus 9. If I was considering the Tab S2 8.0 which retails for $399 these results would be perfectly fine, as the major competition at that price point is the iPad Mini 4 which has Apple A8 SoC. At $499 the GPU performance simply isn't competitive, and it outlines the issues with trying to make one SoC fit many different devices.
In GFXBench the Tab S2 is in the same situation as the previous tests. GPU performance is right around where the Galaxy Note 4 and iPhone 6 are, and it's just not good enough to justify the $499 price tag of the Tab S2.
Like I said on the last page, the fact that most Android tablet OEMs aren't providing CPU and GPU performance that is anywhere near competitive with the iPad Air 2 is a very bad thing for the entire tablet industry. Apple decided to not even update the iPad Air 2 despite it being a year old, and it's hard to blame them when nobody is close to them as far as performance is concerned. Having various manufacturers pushing each other to constantly improve is one of the primary drivers behind the advancements made in the mobile space, and I'm concerned that this no longer exists in the tablet market as the only tablets that come close are ones with NVIDIA's SoCs which also happen to be tablets that don't ship in very great volume.
System Performance: NAND
While it's still not advertised in specifications like on laptops, a mobile device's internal storage is now being recognized as a highly relevant part of overall system performance. Internal eMMC NAND solutions have traditionally had very poor storage performance, and different vendors have done different things to address the problem.
Both sets of read and write results are right around what you'd expect. Random writes in particular are very fast, and all the other results are fairly similar to those of the Galaxy Note 5. I don't expect internal NAND speeds will be a bottleneck on the Galaxy Tab S2, which is expected and fitting of a flagship tablet.
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
162 Comments
View All Comments
poopsmith - Wednesday, October 21, 2015 - link
I have, and regularly use, the previous Galaxy Tab S.There have been a lot of problems with it, I think fundamental design issues with either poor components or poor cooling. I basically only use it for Netflix and occasional browsing, so I am not pushing it heavily or anything.
But it crashes surprisingly often, and you have to get familiar with the methods to hard reset it (hold power and volume down button) which are obscure given how often they are necessary.
Lately I had an issue with the screen flickering and then it freezing after unlocking and I have had to factory reset it twice. (hold power, volume up, and home button on boot).
The initial user experience is 15 minutes of dodging email signups for creating accounts for the bloatware they install that I have gone through three times now. They also don't let you uininstall much of it. All this mandatory bloatware is probably why it crashes so often in the first place.
elindalyne - Thursday, October 22, 2015 - link
Grab a Surface 3... Not a Surface 3 Pro, not a Surface 4 Pro but a 3. Great battery life and you still get full blown Windows 10. You don't even need to get a cover or pen, but having the option is still fabulous. Not to mention the same price as the larger Tab.Also, once you use a device with a kickstand, you'll never want to go back.
UtilityMax - Sunday, October 25, 2015 - link
I have never seen my Tab S 10.5 crash. I use Netflix, Uverse, and Mx Player regularly. I am guessing you have some kind of hardware issues. I'd recommend to wire cache and return all to factory state, reinstall Netflix and see how it goes.R. Hunt - Thursday, November 26, 2015 - link
I've had my Tab S for about two months now, it's yet to crash on me. Battery life is not bad at all either. As for the bloatware, it can't be uninstalled but it can be disabled easily.UtilityMax - Sunday, October 25, 2015 - link
Once again Samsung and its mediocre tablets. Poor performance, poor battery life. Highly inconsistent benchmarks. The only positives are a good screen, an sd card slot, and a discounted price. However, don't fool yourself into thinking that you're getting some kind of a diamond in a rough type of tablet. With this one, you're getting what you're paying for.ayejay_nz - Friday, November 6, 2015 - link
I bought a Tab S 8.4 about 6 months ago and have been really disappointed with the performance. Not as disappointed as I am with myself for not researching the purchase properly though. This new generation looks just as bad on the performance front : lolibill - Saturday, December 19, 2015 - link
I have a Galaxy S2 10 and every time I plug in the original charger I get a message saying "Device charging slowly. To charge faster, use original charger " !! Does anyone know why this is, or what I can do about it?Thanks a lot.
Nightsd01 - Wednesday, January 13, 2016 - link
I've been an Apple guy for a long time. I have been using iOS since before it was even called iOS (first iPhone in 2007). I recently purchased the Galaxy Tab S2 8.0" and it is an amazing tablet. I absolutely love it. The display is stunning and the performance is snappy and fast.I purchased it so that I could have an Android device for writing Android apps, as up to this point I've been an iOS-only developer. But I'm ending up using it way more than my iPad, because it's simply more useful. There's just so much more I can do on it than on my ipad. The software isn't so strict and locked down. For example, let's say I want to scan my house WiFi to see what channels my neighbors are using (to avoid interference). On ios the WiFi hardware is very locked down and developers don't get access to it. But on android I can use WiFi scanner apps just fine. I can torrent, etc. And I am loving every minute of using this tablet. Subjectively, the display in my opinion just looks better.
Nightsd01 - Wednesday, January 13, 2016 - link
But most important of all, the storage. I bought the 32GB version for $350. Applet is still selling 16GB tablets in the year 2016, which is a JOKE. If Apple had moved to 32GB I might be a little bit less angry. But as it stands, there is NO excuse for Apple to gimp their tablets with ano unbelievable 16GB storage. It's just inexcusable.Thinkubuntu - Thursday, April 28, 2016 - link
Bought this tablet to watch HVEC encoded movies, despite the CPU ostensibly being capable of doing so it isn't implemented. As a result it struggles to decode even 720p x265 encoding and forget 10 bit! All decoding had to be done in software which kills the battery really quickly.For such a otherwise decent tablet this makes it a waste if money and a huge missed opportunity.