Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 - And What I Like About It

Over the last two weeks I have been finally able to spend some more time with my first Android Honeycomb tablet - the [now banned] Samsug Galaxy Tab 10.1. I posted my first impressions more than two months ago and I have to say it has been consistently exceeding my expectations. So much that now going back to the iPad is like a step back in many areas. Nuff said. Now for the details.

Honeycomb Android supports Adobe Flash Player. Not that I really like flash on web pages, but often I just cannot go without. What is a web page worth when it has the content you look for, embedded as a Flash object, and you are on an iPad. Bad luck. But not on the Android. It plays just about any flash content. Of course including the old fashioned Flash popup ads. By the way they can be easily taken care of - the browser has an option to activate Flash plugins on demand. So it is up to what you click on. An embedded movie will play and the ads will not show.

While I find the built-in browser very good, some people prefer the Dolphin. Dolphin is an alternative to the built-in Android browser and just underlines the beauty of the open system. You are free to plug anything. No Steve Jobs will tell you what is right and what is wrong.

Android Honeycomb has very nice system of notifications. They appear silently on the status bar and when clicked tell you what they have got to tell you. No distracting, very informative, perfectly handled.

As a heavy Google user, another thing I really like is multiple Google account integration throughout the system. I have registered my two accounts - the private @gmail.com and my business account running as Google Apps for Domains service. For each account I can select what gets synchronized to the device. Most applications make switching back and forth between the accounts a snap. Not just email. Everything. Calendar. Picasa albums. Reader. And so on.

Speaking of Picasa albums. I have been using the service since my early days of digital photography. I have all my photos there. So what was my surprise, when after providing the device with my Google account credentials all the photos went automagically down to the Tab. No wires. No iTunes. Nothing. Just the account information supplied once at the beginning of the device setup process.

The Google Reader. It has been my most used application for years, on all laptops and desktops. The personalized information hub. Reader is a joy on the Tab, thanks to the new Honeycomb - optimized application. It works seamlessly. Walking through my feeds by means of the up/down hardware volume buttons is like reading a book on the Kindle. Easy and enjoyable.

All those ohs and ahs still have not been enough for the Tab to replace my faithful Nokia Booklet Windows 7 laptop. The reason? With all the hype about touch screens, they are difficult to work with when you want to share or create content. Typing on a physical keyboard is always faster (less typos) and a mouse cursor is really helpful when you want to select a part of text or a web address. Text selection using even the best finger touch on the planet is a painful and slow task. Easily beaten by even the worst and oldest and dirtiest mouse.

So what was my surprise yesterday, when I managed to pair a Bluetooth mouse with the tablet. And guess what. It has a cursor now!!! A real cursor - an arrow moving around the screen, following the motions of the mouse. Boy, what a difference it makes. Like a turbocharger. I also tried a Bluetooth keyboard, and I can see it works too. The Android Tab + mouse + keyboard is as close to become my next laptop as can be. Productivity restored. I have decided to try adding the keyboard case and try how it goes. With a mouse should make a decent on the road desktop replacement. I rarely need the power of Intel Core to browse the Web or type a message or a blog post. But I do care about battery and weight. Should this setup prove to be right, I would then opt for a bigger laptop (like 15 inch) to use as my primary home machine (plugged to a big screen of course).

The bottom line: with the Honeycomb release and hardware like the Samsung Galaxy 10.1, Android has finally caught iOS. Even more. It has overtaken iOS in many areas. Apple may try to chase Samsung in courts, but this stupid game will not stop the Android army to continue marching. Lenovo, Toshiba, Acer, Asus, HTC... Too many of them. Apple would better start to innovate again, as lawyers alone will not be enough for it to last . Will retina iPad be enough? Well... I would love to have that kind of screen resolution, but it may not be enough. We need more freedom. We don't need no thought control...