Android @lemmy.world Margot Robbie @lemmy.world 12 mo. ago

What's your favorite Android tablet?

Previously on Lemmy: Asus

Android tablets are devices that I don't know a lot about. I've seen plenty of them around, but I haven't seen many people actually use them, but I've seen plenty of iPads and sometimes Surfaces out in the wild. Many large Android manufacturers have tried, like Samsung and Huawei, but reception to them seems lurkwarm at best.

Tablets, to me, are more of media consumption devices than productivity devices. So, I guess the questions of the week would be, what is your experiences with Android tablets, and what are some features you are looking for in an Android tablet to make it worth buying?

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39 comments

These are not "normal" tablets, but Boox's line of ePaper-based readers are the only Android tablets that distinguish themselves sufficiently in my already-large family of devices. I've used "normal" tablets with full-color LCD/OLED displays, on both the Android and iPadOS side, but I rarely find a good use for them. I've found them to sit in an awkward space with neither the convenience of my phone, nor the utility of my laptop.

The ePaper-based tablets are ideal for reading, but I do not relegate them merely to the "e-reader" category because they allow you to install Google Play and run basically any Android app. This makes them more flexible and powerful than most e-readers.

It comes with a built-in browser optimized for monochrome, and you can also install third-party alternatives like EinkBro.

That said, it's only for advanced users, and it's not a perfectly smooth experience. Just getting Google Play running on it requires jumping through some hoops, and you will find that most Android apps simply don't work well on a monochrome display (though Boox does offer color models, I have not used them myself).

I was hoping, for example, to use my Boox tablet to play Go, but despite the fact that Go is very much a "black and white" game, most of the apps use shading and colors that look like absolute ass on a black and white display. Some of them do not properly support the 4:3 aspect ratio either. So I don't want to set unreasonable expectations here. These are niche devices.

Despite these drawbacks, I really appreciate having an ePaper device. It complements my device family (phone, laptop, etc.) in a way other tablets do not.
- I'm glad to have read this. I've been really curious about that line of readers.
- I have a Boox Nova 3 Color. What its good for is 3 things.
  
  reading books
  
  taking notes with its included stylus
  
  Good enough software to run normal apps well enough.
  
  But what it is not is a Good Android Tablet. Its a typical 1 Android update Chinese tablet. Forever stuck on Android 10 (I think), with no expansion.
  
  And for an E-Reader that's more than enough, but if you want to watch video? Its bad. Read a webpage that's scrolls? Be prepare to manually refresh a lot to read what's there. Install Google Play? Good luck (it's doable just annoying).
  
  However compared with a Kobo or a Samsung and my most used Android Tablet I ever owned. I even made an e-reader case for it since the original disintegrated on me.
- As an avid reader of comics in digital form, I would love to try one of the color e-ink displays. But with the Boox Note Air3 C starting at $500 it is nowhere near what I would consider worth it just yet.
My Galaxy Tab S7+ is very good.
Lenovo's ones win for bang-for-your-buck. Not great for gaming or the like but for simple reading comics and watching videos you can't beat the price for a big device like that.
- Do you know the model for this Lenovo tablet?
  
  I have an Tab4 10" which I think is now the M10. The 3rd Gen M10 is around $140.
  
  I have the newer M9. Really nice size for reading books and comics. I got the folio cover as well so I'll just walk around and watch movies/shows while doing chores. It's definitely not a fast tablet, but isn't terrible either. Browsing the web is fine, but it feels faster using my pixel 6a instead. Best part, it has a micro SD card slot. I've loaded it up with books, comics, shows, and movies. Going on airplanes is great with it.
I’m in an interesting camp because I mainly reside in apple land, except for my desktop and tablet. I have the galaxy tab s7 plus and that thing is all I could ask for out of a tablet. As a media consumption device it does one thing well and that’s emulation. I love using an 8bitdo controller with it too.
- Oh, right, emulation is another big thing to do on Android tablets. However, I still feel that Windows tablets would be better for gaming tasks though.
  
  Steam deck kinda takes the crown for that now.
Nexus 7 (FHD, the better model) was the best tablet I've had. I used it even as a phone replacement for a couple of years.

Now I'm using a Galaxy Tab Active 3 as a chartplotter on the boat. Also quite nice, but would be too slow for a "main device". Not to mention camera quality.
- Kinda surprised the Tab Active 3 is slow, because it uses the same internals as the Galaxy S9, which still runs quite well. I would guess then that the 4GB of RAM are the problem.
  
  Out of curiosity, what Android version are you running?
- Care to elaborate on your chartplotter setup? I've bought a boat and it has a GPS system in it but they don't make the maps cards for it anymore so it's kind of just a really fancy screen that tells me how fast I'm going
  
  I have a Raspberry Pi running Signal K on the computer. This transmits all boat sensor data (depth, wind, GPS, AIS targets, etc) to the tablet. On tablet I can then run a chartplotter app, for example Navionics, SeaPilot, OpenCPN, or my current option, Orca CoPilot.
Honestly might be a bit of a "shill" moment, Grabbing windows 2 in 1 and flashing bliss to it. Currently have a chuwi hi10x which can boot into Bliss and it's nice.
- this works well? Wow, I was thinking about doing the same but thought : "Nah its probably gonna be a pure jank and not run that well"
  
  Do you know, does this work with any Windows 2 in 1 machine or only specific ones?
  
  I wont say there is no jank, there is certainly a degree of it, particularly around arm apps due to needing libhoudini or libndk for arm translation (some games, not all with pick these up as "emulators" and block you or simply not work on a couple games) but generally most arm apps work fine. if you are living with a fully x86 ecosystem like myself, I have zero complaints, everything works fine and dandy. that I myself have tested. but ofc, bugs do exist and we try to help out as much as we can on the bliss telegram or matrix as it is an actively developed project.
  
  It only really works well with 2 in 1 machines that have decentish linux support. there are specific builds for some surface devices. however if your device like mine has decent linux support, it's pretty much a plug and play solution. Bliss uses a the android common kernel which has very little modifications to upstream kernel so typically support for hardware is simply dependant on how new the kernel is.
  
  Bliss also relies on mesa for graphics, so intel and AMD have great support, and Nvidia is quite lack luster, but this may change with the new foss nvidia driver stuff.
So because I play a lot of games and read a lot of eBooks then I would say getting my first tablet was pretty great, even though it was a midrange one that was just thrown in to the deal when I was upgrading my phone and I probably wouldn't have bothered otherwise

It was a Samsung A8 from 2019, had about an 8" screen and I used it mainly as a kindle and games device. The games I play are mainly strategy or board games, but there were certainly some games that you wouldn't necessarily think would cause a problem (Wingspan?) that would lag or crash. Since I review games it helped to have a second device to check things on, and a bigger screen is better.

Last year I upgraded it to a Samsung S8 which is a flagship. It's a 10 or 11 inch screen which felt more unwieldy though I'm used to it now. It can run more things. It's a really nice device. The screen isn't actually OLED but feels like it, the quality is amazing. It actually came with a stylus which was a neat touch. The screen is good enough that yes I have found myself watching more TV on it.

However, when people say 'productivity', I don't know really know what they mean by that tbh. I've got a work laptop for work. I've got my own laptop for other stuff. Do people mean drawing and things on tablets but that?
My Galaxy Tab S8+ is definitely the best tablet I've ever owned. I just wish there were custom roms for it.
- Really? My Galaxy Tab A was slow as crap right out of the box. Even removing the bloatware didn't help too much, and it's new enough to get forced updates that reinstall the bloatware. It's so bad that simply swiping between home screen panels can take several seconds.
  
  Also, the digitiser seems to shut off if it's not used for a few seconds, then takes a second or two to start receiving input once touched again. It also has accuracy issues at regular intervals, almost like a few of the contacts didn't make contact.
  
  Is the S supposed to be better than the A? Either way, very disappointed.
  
  Oh yes it is. Especially these days the gulf between Samsung's Premium S Line adn the S FE, and A line is huge.
The Galaxy Tab S series
- Same -- I have a Galaxy Tab S7+, and I love it for media consumption and note taking/drawing. I've also taken it in lieu of a full laptop for short work trips.
  
  My only other experience with Android tablets is the Nexus 7. I also used a Windows tablet (Surface 3) in my last job, but rarely used it in tablet form.
I have a couple of Android Tablets in rotation. Right now my favorite would probably be the Mediapad M5 8.0". I just really love that small tablet formfactor - great to just toss into a backpack and forget.

The being said, the Galaxy Tab S line is also great, especially because of their great OLED Screens. I still would like however to see them offering a smaller verison (like they did with the Tab S and S2) but I understand that there probably isn't a big market for it.

Only tablets I generally avoid are stock Android ones, because Stock Android on tablets, quite frankly sucks as it lacks many features that make use of a larger screen. Maybe that has gotten better with recent versions, but older versions are really just large phone UIs unfortunatley.
Recently got the pixel tablet and put GrapheneOS on it. I've been quite satisfied with it so far.
I've tried Android Tablets for 15 years now, And the best Tablet I've ever used is my iPad, it has more power than I'll ever know what to do with with software support that I could only dream of.

However there are things I still can only do on Android, and for that I am using my trusty and slowly dying Samsung Galaxy Tab s5e.

What I love about it as a regular user is

light weight for it's size

Good Speakers

FireFox + Ublock origin

some Advance user features I love are

USB-C Video out for those apps I want on the big screen

AMOLED for those inky blacks. Watching streaming content on it is a dream

Side loading support, like apps that let me force the display to a 16:9 aspect ratio for my TV

My only complaint is that the Power is not enough for modern day content consumption. And that it doesn't have a headphone jack.

The only reason I prefer my iPad is that the software support for the official apps I use like Disney Plus and Kobo are better supported and run better on it. However until Apple allows side loading or lets FireFox to actually use anything other than webkit, I will probably have a tablet like this near by when I want a screen without a keyboard.

I feel if I had to buy a new one and I didn't care about the some of my advance user features the FE edition of the Samsung Tablets seem like a good deal.
- Xiaomi Pad 6 Pro, it is a very good tablet
Lenovo Tab P11 Plus. Pixel Tablet.
Good timing, my Mum wants a new tablet for Christmas.

I was thinking of going with the Xiaomi Pad 6, but mostly because I've always had pretty good luck with the brand.
- I like their hardware, but MIUI is a bit too much bloat for a UI for me. Different strokes for different people.
It's depressing how bad Android tablets are right now. Both iPad and Android tablets suck to repair and take a lot of user control out of your hands, but iPads are ridiculously more powerful, have better "official" software support in the world, and age a lot more gracefully.

I'm increasingly tempted to drop my Android tablet altogether - the only thing stopping me at this point is the support for "non-official" apps distributed outside of the play store that I enjoy so much.
Its a stupid expensive option but wireless charging is such a great convenience I have to have it.

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