Difference Between Apple iPad 3 (New iPad) and Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1

Apple iPad 3 (New iPad) vs Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1 | Speed, Performance and Features Reviewed | Full Specs Compared
 

Apple has unveiled the much awaited new iPad (4G) on the 7th of March in San Francisco. The new iPad has breathtaking hardware specs mixed with a magnificently intuitive operating system that will blow the minds of the consumers.

We have picked up the perfect candidate to be compared against Apple iPad 3. Samsung Galaxy Tab line has always been the best competition for Apple iPads in the market and recently they have come up with some great tablets. They may not be the tablet with the best hardware specs on the market, but consumers love these Galaxy tablets and that’s the key to their success. We have picked up their newest 10 inch tablet that falls in Galaxy Note family. If you’ve been reading our comparison, you would know that the Note family means the integrated S-Pen stylus for the purpose of scribbling on your tablet. This is especially important if you’re a busy businessman. Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1 was introduced at the MWC 2012 and while we don’t think it has the hardware specs to match the Apple new iPad, it would still be a worthy competitor and set an initial benchmark for the 3rd generation iPad. We will individually analyze these two handsets and wait for the verification of the information speculated here before concluding the article.

Apple iPad 3 (New iPad 4G LTE)

There have been many speculations about Apple’s new iPad because it had such a pull from customer’s end. In fact, the Giant is trying to revolutionize the market again. Many of those features in the new iPad seem to add up to a consistent and revolutionary device that is going to blow your mind. As rumored, Apple iPad 3 comes with a 9.7 inches HD IPS retina display that features a resolution of 2048 x 1536 pixels at a pixel density of 264ppi. This is a huge barrier that Apple has broken, and they have introduced 1 million more pixels to the generic 1920 x 1080 pixels display which used to be the best resolution a mobile device provides. The total number of pixel adds up to 3.1 million, which is actually a monster resolution that hasn’t been matched by any tablet currently available in the market. Apple guarantees that iPad 3 has 44% more color saturation compared to previous models, and they have shown us some amazing photos and texts which looked wonderful on the big screen. They even cracked a joke about the difficulty of displaying the screens from iPad 3 because it has more resolution than the backdrop they were using at the auditorium.

That’s not all about it, the new iPad has a dual core Apple A5X processor at an unknown clock rate with quad core GPU. Apple claims A5X to offer four-times the performance of a Tegra 3; however, it has to be tested to confirm their statement but, needless to say, that this processor will make everything work smooth and seamlessly. It has three variations for internal storage, which is enough to stuff all of your favorite TV shows. The new iPad runs on Apple iOS 5.1, which seems like a great operating system with a very intuitive user interface.

There is a physical home button available at the bottom of the device, as usual. The next big feature Apple introduces is iSight camera, which is 5MP with autofocus and auto-exposure using a backside illuminated sensor. It has an IR filter built into it which is really great. The camera can also capture 1080p HD videos, and they have smart video stabilization software integrated with the camera which is a good move. This slate also supports the best digital assistant in the world, Siri, which was supported by iPhone 4S only.

Here comes another stabilization for the wave of rumors. iPad 3 does come with 4G LTE connectivity apart from EV-DO, HSDPA, HSPA+21Mbps, DC-HSDPA+42Mbps. LTE supports speed up to 73Mbps. However, currently 4G LTE is supported only on AT&T network (700/2100MHz) and Verizon network (700MHz) in the U.S. and Bell, Rogers, and Telus networks in Canada. During launch, the demo was on AT&T’s LTE network, and the device loaded everything super-fast and handled the load very well. Apple claims the new iPad is the device that supports most number of bands ever, but they didn’t say what bands exactly. It is said to have Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n for continuous connectivity, which was expected by default. Fortunately, you can let your new iPad share your internet connection with your friends by making it a wi-fi hotspot. It is 9.4mm thick and has a weight of 1.44-1.46lbs, which is rather comforting, though it is slightly thicker and heftier than iPad 2. The new iPad promises a battery life of 10 hours on normal usage and 9 hours on 3G/4G usage, which is another game changer for the new iPad.

The new iPad is available in either Black or White, and the 16GB variant is offered at $499 which is rather low. The 4G version of the same storage capacity is offered at $629 which is still a good deal. There are two other variants, 32GB and 64GB which comes at $599 / $729 and $699 / $829 respectively without 4G and with 4G. The preorders started on 7 March 2012, and the slate will be released to the market on the 16th of March 2012. Surprisingly the giant has decided to roll out the device in US, Canada, France, Germany, Switzerland and Japan at the same time which makes it the biggest rollout ever.

Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1

We can start this review by saying that this is more or less the same tablet as Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 with some improvements and the S-Pen stylus. The Galaxy Note 10.1 is powered by 1.4GHz dual core processor and 1GB of RAM. It does sound old school with the Quad core tablets out there in the market, but rest assured, this is one beast of a tablet. Android OS 4.0 ICS is the operating system and it really does justice to this tablet. It has 10.1 inches PLS TFT capacitive touchscreen featuring a resolution of 1280 x 720 pixels at a pixel density of 149ppi. It perfectly resembles Galaxy Tab 10.1 with the same outline and build quality, same dimensions and same colors. The display panel and the resolution is the same as well. The curved edges enable you to hold on to this device for prolonged periods of time and they equally make it comfortable when writing with the S-Pen Stylus.

Unfortunately Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1 is not a GSM device, so you won’t be able to make calls from it. But Samsung has enabled it to connect via HSDPA and EDGE so you can always stay in touch. As a precaution, Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n is also included and it can also act as a wi-fi hotspot and share your internet connection with friends. This handset comes with three storage options, 16GB, 32GB and 64GB with the option to expand the storage using a microSD card. It has 3.15MP rear camera with autofocus and LED flash and a 2MP front camera bundled together with Bluetooth v3.0 for video conferencing. The camera can capture 1080p HD videos at 30 frames per second and it also has Geo tagging with Assisted GPS. The advantage of the S-Pen stylus is imminent in the preloaded applications like Adobe Photoshop Touch and Ideas. The slate has both GPS and GLONASS and comes with Microsoft Exchange ActiveSync and on device encryption along with Cisco VPN capability for the use of a businessperson. In addition, it has the normal features of an Android tablet and comes with a 7000mAh battery, so we are assuming it would score a battery life of 9 hours or more like the Galaxy Tab 10.1.

Conclusion

Samsung Galaxy Note seems to give a challenge to Apple iPad 3(new iPad) due to the fact that Note offers a S-Pen stylus that can be used to scribble on top of your tablet which can be rather attractive among professionals and students. But this is not likely to be a flow of iPad 3(new iPad) for a long time because Apple is bound to change their existing stylus to work with iPad 3 (new iPad). Other than that, iPad 3 (new iPad) has a better screen with ultra-high resolution that hasn’t been matched by any vendor in the whole world, which has good optics and comes with super-fast LTE connectivity and of course it also has a fair price tag on its neck. We wouldn’t be so bald to exclaim that iPad 3(new iPad) is going to surpass the performance level of Galaxy Note 10.1 because we don’t know the exact clock rate of the processor yet, thus it’s only fair to consider both at the same performance level in terms of processing power, but iPad 3 (new iPad) will excel in the GPU. These features will make you overlook the discomfort you’ll have to go through because of the excessive weight of iPad 3 (new iPad) and we can guarantee your investment wouldn’t go in vain if you spend for either of these slates.