The Wait is Over: Samsung Announces the Galaxy Tab 8.9
by Anand Lal Shimpi on September 26, 2011 6:15 PM ESTWhen I first met the Galaxy Tab 8.9 in Florida earlier this year I felt like it may be the perfect tablet form factor: small enough to be really portable, while large enough to really be a tablet. Our own Jason Inofuentes is live at Samsung's press event where the company just announced availability of the 8.9-inch Galaxy Tab. The new tablet will be available nation-wide starting October 2nd in 16GB and 32GB configurations for $469 and $569, respectively.
The specs of the Galaxy Tab 8.9 are virtually identical to its bigger brother. You still get a 1280 x 800 PLS display, just in a smaller form factor. NVIDIA powers the tablet, Samsung lists the SoC as a dual-core T250S, presumably running at the same clocks as the Tegra 2 in the 10.1.
The weight also drops a bit to 447g. The 8.9 features two cameras (2MP front facing and 3MP rear facing), is WiFi-only and ships with Android 3.1 with Samsung's TouchWiz UX. Battery capacity is listed at 6100mAh. Jason should be getting our review sample in the next hour, expect a quick preview in the next day followed by our usual in-depth treatment next week!
| Samsung 2011 Tablet Comparison | ||||||
| Samsung Galaxy Tab 8.9 | Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 | |||||
| SoC | NVIDIA Tegra 2 (Dual ARM Cortex A9 @ 1GHz) | NVIDIA Tegra 2 (Dual ARM Cortex A9 @ 1GHz) | ||||
| GPU | NVIDIA GeForce | NVIDIA GeForce | ||||
| RAM | 1GB | 1GB | ||||
| Display | 1280 x 800 PLS | 1280 x 800 PLS | ||||
| NAND | 16GB | 16GB | ||||
| Dimensions | 230.9 x 157.8 x 8.6mm | 256.6 x 172.9 x 8.6mm | ||||
| Weight | 447g | 565g | ||||
| Price | $469 | $499 | ||||
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sprockkets - Monday, September 26, 2011 - link
$99, and it's a POS. Not sure why you expect a high quality tablet to somehow be $99. Show me a netbook too that has a HQ screen and build quality for $500 too.http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N8...
coder543 - Monday, September 26, 2011 - link
I long to see your $99 tablet that has a 1280x800 screen and isn't a piece of junk. The only reason ANY halfway decent $99 tablet has been seen is because HP is remarkably dumb and ousted their great tablet. They were just recouping losses as best they could at $99... the tablets themselves cost much more than that to make, because they were quality.pcgeek101 - Monday, September 26, 2011 - link
@lurker22: Agreed -- the price is way too high for the unrefined Honeycomb OS and lack of tablet apps. Manufacturers need to get serious about price drops. I only got a Samsung Galaxy 10.1 because I got a really reasonable price on it. I refuse to pay full price, and wish others would do the same.wpwoodjr - Monday, September 26, 2011 - link
However I hope you will finish the Droid Bionic review first before reviewing this in depth. :-)PatrickFromSC - Monday, September 26, 2011 - link
That's 9" x 6.2". I measure my cargo pocket to be 8" x 7". I need a high quality tablet that'll fit there.MadMan007 - Monday, September 26, 2011 - link
Get a bigger cargo pocket. Voila!steven75 - Tuesday, September 27, 2011 - link
this doesn't fix the main problem with Android tablets in that there are basically no Android Tablet apps?And they're going to price it against iPad with it's 100,000+ apps and iOS 5 in 2 weeks? Ok then...
techiecop - Friday, September 30, 2011 - link
whats the difference only weight & price that too 30$ difference..i doubt who's gonna buy this..