Lenovo IdeaTab S6000 vs HP Envy X2
We have been talking about recent advances towards an integrated mobile computing platform. This convergence takes various forms; for instance the laptop and tablet market is converging, the smartphone and tablet market is also converging. Sooner or later, the smartphones, tablets and laptops would converge to a common point like a 8.9 inch tablet that can make calls and runs on Windows 8 with a keyboard dock. In the meantime, we are more interested in what we have at hand right now, and that is a tablet offered by Lenovo along with a tablet laptop hybrid offered by HP. Both these manufacturers are giants in the laptop market and not so much in the tablet market. HP’s realization of tablet didn’t triumph although Lenovo kept pushing some tablets to the market. Lenovo tablets weren’t super sellers although they weren’t particularly frowned upon either. Because of that reason, we chose Lenovo IdeaTab S6000 for this comparison. On the other hand, since HP didn’t succeed in the tablet market, they’ve come up with a tablet laptop hybrid that just might be successful. HP Envy X2 is more of a tablet than a laptop with a keyboard dock, so we expect to compare it against Lenovo IdeaTab S6000.
Lenovo IdeaTab S6000 Review
Lenovo IdeaTab S6000 is known as the Mobile Home Entertainment center by Lenovo ensuring that you have all the mainstream options provided by a tablet. It’s not a hybrid and IdeaTab S6000 doesn’t feature a lot of twists either. It is a plain ten inch tablet like any other tablet you can have. It is powered by 1.2GHz Quad Core processor on top of MediaTek 8389 / 8125 chipset with 1GB of RAM. The operating system it ships with is Android 4.2 Jelly Bean. It’s not a super-fast tablet, but it doesn’t do badly either. The user interface is buttery and responsive obviously thanks to the Quad Core processor although we do feel bad about the decision on only including 1GB of RAM. We have no information about the GPU used in the chipset as of yet. The display panel measures 10.1 inches featuring a resolution of 1280 x 800 pixels at a pixel density of 149 ppi. It is an IPS LCD display that has a viewing angle of 178 degrees, which is very good. Lenovo IdeaTab S6000 also provides a micro HDMI connector for TV out.
The internal storage is either at 16 GB or 32 GB with the ability to expand using microSD cards up to 64GB. Lenovo is offering an optional 3G HSDPA connectivity to constantly stay connected to the fast moving internet. It also has Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n with the ability to host a Wi-Fi hotspot to share your internet connection just as easily. IdeaTab S6000 has 5MP rear camera that can capture 1080p HD videos @ 30 frames per second while the front facing VGA camera enables you to have video conferences with your friends. The cameras included are not superb, but they do the job satisfactorily for a tablet. It is not hefty, but you can certainly feel the weight at 560g. We certainly liked Lenovo for keeping it rather thin at 8.6mm. This tablet is expected to be released in the end of the second quarter of 2013 and Lenovo assures that it can do 8 hours Wi-Fi browsing with the built-in 6350mAh battery.
HP Envy X2 Review
HP Envy X2 can be perceived in two perspectives. One could consider it as a laptop where you can separate the display panel easily. On the other hand, one could also consider it to be a tablet with a keyboard dock in built. We prefer the second definition because the keyboard is just a dumb device while the tablet or the display panel has all the nuts and bolts of the device. In fact, the keyboard dock only has two USB 2.0 ports, one HDMI port, a charger port and a SD card slot which is quite basic. The keyboard is pleasant and usable, and we particularly admire the touchpad which is quite spacious and ultra-responsive. HP Envy X2 has two cameras; one in the back having 8MP and LED flash along with a front facing camera that can capture 1080p HD videos @ 30 frames per second. Both cameras were more than great for a tablet-laptop hybrid although the existing operating system doesn’t work with the rear cameras as much as we want it to. That gets us to the whole point about the underlying hardware elements of HP Envy X2 which we’ll talk about in the next section.
HP Envy X2 is powered by Intel Atom Z2760 processor clocked at 1.8GHz which features dual cores and 1MB of L2 cache. Intel Atom only supports 32bit, so the operating system is Windows 8 32bit. The maximum memory supported by Intel Atom is included in HP Envy X2 which is 2GB LPDDR2 memory with a maximum bandwidth of 6.4 GB/s. The GPU is inbuilt to the chipset and doesn’t come as a dedicated device. All these indicate a low power laptop that is very conservative on the battery. However, compared to the existing tablets, HP Envy X2 is more or less a high end tablet providing you the harmony of using Windows 8 straight from the tablet. In fact, common tasks like web browsing, reading and movies are buttery fluid in HP Envy X2. It also boots up very quickly thanks to Windows 8 and the 64GB SSD included. When it comes to storage, HP Envy X2 obviously lags behind at 64GB given the OS itself would take more than 50% of the storage leaving only a meager amount for user specific applications. You shouldn’t forget that we are going to install fully fledged Windows 8 applications which take up a lot of space and so, our recommendation is to go for the 128GB version. Battery life is also acceptable at 4 hours as the tablet or 7.5 hours with the keyboard dock.
HP doesn’t provide Ethernet connectivity with the keyboard dock although it has Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n to stay connected. You can also purchase a USB 2.0 Ethernet connector and use it if you must. HP Envy X2 also provides NFC connectivity and Bluetooth v4.0, as well. They are also bragging about the Beats Audio included inside Envy X2, which performs quite well. The sounds in the laptop mode may be a bit too over reliant on the tablet speakers, but as a tablet and when using the headphones, Beat Audio really kicks in. We’d prefer if HP Envy X2 has more touch centric apps because Windows 8 only offers a few apps optimized for touch as of yet compared to Android and iOS. For instance, apps like Instagram, Google Earth etc. are not available as native applications like they are available in the other tablet operating systems. However, there are Windows apps, which would be more productive in the touch paradigm like Internet Explorer and Office suite along with the metro style live tile interface.
A Brief Comparison Between Lenovo IdeaTab S6000 and HP Envy X2
• Lenovo IdeaTab S6000 is powered by 1.2GHz Quad Core cortex A7 processor on top of MediaTek 8389 / 8125 chipset with 1GB of RAM while HP Envy X2 is powered by 1.8GHz Dual Core Intel Atom Z2760 chipset with 2GB of RAM.
• Lenovo IdeaTab S6000 has 10.1 inch IPS LCD capacitive touchscreen display panel featuring a resolution of 1280 x 800 pixels at a pixel density of 149 ppi while HP Envy X2 has 11.6 inches LED backlit IPS display featuring a resolution of 1366 x 768 pixels.
• Lenovo IdeaTab S6000 runs on Android OS v4.2 Jelly Bean while HP Envy X2 runs on Windows 8.
• Lenovo IdeaTab S6000 has 5MP rear camera and VGA front camera while HP Envy X2 has 8MP rear camera and 1080p front camera.
• Lenovo IdeaTab S6000 can browse the internet through Wi-Fi for 8 hours continuously while HP Envy X2 can only do that up to 4 hours in the tablet mode.
• Lenovo IdeaTab S6000 provides optional 3G HSDPA connectivity while HP Envy X2 only offers Wi-Fi connectivity.
• Lenovo IdeaTab S6000 doesn’t offer a keyboard dock while HP Envy X2 offers a keyboard dock along with few extra ports.
Conclusion
It’s apparent that these two devices belong to two different categories. One is a laptop tablet hybrid while the other is a pure tablet. If you are in to hybrids, obviously HP Envy X2 can be a good choice. The cherry on top for that is the Windows 8 fully fledged operating system instead of the Android, iOS or Windows RT operating systems. That enables you to run almost any Windows native app right from your hybrid device. On the contrary, Lenovo IdeaTab S6000 runs on Android enabling you to have a wealth of touch optimized apps from the Google Play Store which is not a luxury included in HP Envy X2. So all things considered we think this decision lies entirely on your hand and depends on what exactly you would need.