Difference Between Android Honeycomb Tablet Motorolo Xoom and Apple iPad

Android Honeycomb Tablet Motorolo Xoom vs Apple iPad

Motorola Xoom and Apple iPad both are most competitive tablets in the market powered by Android and Apple iOS respectively. Android tablets and phones took the centre stage of the CES 2011 this week at Las Vegas. The first Android Honeycomb Tablet introduced to the market was Motorola XOOM. While Apple iPad was the first ever tablet to be introduced; Apple in fact has a legacy in turning the market trend in a new directions, first with iPhone then the iPad.

Motorola Xoom

The Motorola Xoom, which was rated as one of the best device at CES 2011 is a large 10.1-inch HD Tablet with Dual-Core Processor and sailing on Google’s next generation OS Android 3.0 Honeycomb and support 1080p HD video content.

This is the first device to run on Google’s next generation mobile operating system Android OS 3.0 Honeycomb, which is entirely designed for tablets. The device is made more powerful with 1 GHz dual core NVIDA Tegra processor, 1GB RAM and comes with 10.1″ HD capacitive touch screen with higher resolution 1280 x 800 and 16:10 aspect ratio, 5.0 MP rear camera with dual LED flash, 720p video recording, 2 MP front camera, 32 GB Internal memory, extendable up to 32 GB, HDMI TV out and DNLA, Wi-Fi 802.11b/g/n. All this is supported by Verizon’s CDMA Network and upgradeable to 4G-LTE network, proposed in Q2 2011. The device has built-in gyroscope, barometer, e-compass, accelerometer and adaptive lighting for new types of applications. The tablet can be a mobile hot spot with the capability to connect up to five Wi-Fi devices.

The Android Honeycomb has attractive UI, gives enhanced multimedia and full browsing experience. The Honeycomb features include Google Map 5.0 with 3D interaction, Tablet optimized Gmail, Google Search, redesigned YouTube, ebook and thousands of applications from Android Market. The business applications include Google Calendar, Exchange Mail, opening and editing documents, spreadsheets and presentations. It also supports Adobe Flash 10.1.

The tablet is slim and light weight with a dimension of 9.80″ (249mm) x 6.61″ (167.8mm) x 0.51(12.9mm) and only 25.75 oz (730g)

Motorola Xoom Promotion Video

Apple iPad

Apple iPad is also a large sized tablet with 9.7” Multitouch LED backlit display using IPS technology that enables wide viewing angle (178 degrees) and the screen is Oleophobic coated to resist fingerprint marks. The display is designed to show the content in any orientation, in portrait or landscape. The device is powered by Apple’s own propriety operating system, the latest version upgrade is 4.2.1. Initially when the iPad was released it was running on iOS 3.2 with the upgradeable capability.

Some of the special features of iOS 4 and above are the Multi-tasking, AirPrint, AirPlay and find myiPhone. Also it support for display of multiple languages simultaneously. The mail application is optimized for larger screen, in landscape orientation you can view the opened message and the inbox mail description side by side in split screens. Also you can open different mail boxes in multiple screens or can have everything in a unified mailbox. Using AirPrint you can print the message through wi-fi or 3G.

Apple Safari browser used in iPad is amazing on the large screen with the multi touch interface redesigned for large screen, you can simply double tap a section on a page to enlarge or shrink it. There’s also a handy thumbnail view that shows all your open pages in a grid, so you can quickly move from one page to the next.

Another notable feature of iPad is its battery life, it is claimed to be 10 hours while surfing the web on Wi-Fi, watching videos, or listening to music and on 3G data network, it is up to 9 hours.

Access to Apple Store which has around 300,000 applications and to iTune are attractive features of iPad.

Apple is planning  to release a new version of iPad which could be named as iPad 2 with more features and functionalities than iPad in mid of 2011.

Apple iPad Demo I

Apple iPad Demo II

Difference between Android Tablet Motorola Xoom and Apple iPad

Both Android and Apple claim that all of their built-in applications are designed from the ground up to take advantage of the large Multi-Touch screen. Both tablet and pad can work in any orientation.

Motorola Xoom has integrated the phone feature in to the tablet. The absence of this feature may be seen by users as a drawback in Apple iPad. With Xoom, you can either use speaker phone or Bluetooth to talk.

Motorola Xoom runs on Google’s new technology Android 3.0 and Apple iPad runs on proprietary operating system iOS 3.2, iOS 4.1 and upgradeable to iOS 4.2.1.

On the Application side Android 3.0 has the advantage of being the latest entrant and comes with many advanced features such as 3D transition, bookmark syncing, private browsing and pinned widgets for individuals from the contact list. And with 3D interaction the holographic UI looks awesome. The home screen is scrollable and customizable.

Another missing feature in iOS is the support for Adobe Flash; Apple iPad does not support Adobe Flash.

Content wise Motorola Xoom has full access to Android Market and allows unrestricted access to external applications. Apple iPad has access to Apple Store which has more than 300,000 applications, but it has restriction on access to open market applications.

On the hardware side of the devices, the dimensions and the weight are almost same for both Motorola Xoom and Apple iPad.

Motorola Xoom is very powerful with dual core tegra2 processor, which virtually makes the speed to 2 GHz and 1GB RAM which is four times the size of iPad’s. Apple’s iPad processor is 1 GHz Apple A4 with 256 MB RAM.

Internal storage capacity is almost same for both. Apple iPad has got 3 options; 16GB, 32GB or 64GB. Motorola Xoom offers 32GB. But the Motorola Xoom supports up to 32GB of expandable storage. iPad’s limitation to internal space only will certainly be viewed by users as a disadvantage.

Another added feature of Motorola Xoom is its two cameras; a rear-facing 5.0 megapixel camera and a front-facing 2.0 megapixel camera for video chatting. Apple’s current iPad models do not have cameras.

When it comes to batteries, Apple has a longer life time; Apple claims that its iPad can last up to 10 hours of video playback on Wi-Fi model and 9 hours on 3G model. Information on Xoom battery is not available yet.