New tablet research

[Whoey]

I got a cancellation email 24h after my refund which was 72h from my order that was meant to be delivered within 48h.

I complained on Facebook and they replied, I haven't gotten back to them with the details, I'm tempted to just order off amazon and wait the estimated 2-4 weeks for the same price. I do not care to give El Corte Ingles any more of my time or business if that is how they treat customers, IE cancelling without explanation. However it is also apparently illegal for them to offer something and not fulfill the order. They would normally have to fulfill it with an equal or higher value item, in this case, I just want what I ordered at the price it was.

The sale actually ended yesterday. I've just looked at their website, and it's actually now on offer for more than it was previously. 

regular price: 399
previous sale: 309
current: 299

I'm going to reorder at 299, but this time it actually has home delivery as an option. If they screw me this time, I will make a huge fuss.

[Whoey]

So this order is due before the 6th, not holding my breath, but even with the 5.90 home delivery shipping added it's less than the previous attempt.

If they do not honour this purchase I plan to make a big stink about it.

[Grant Lamontagne]

Absolutely you should. 

I hope it works out for you.

Def

[Whoey]

Add that in a local superstore (different chain) I spotted three on a shelf, and they seem to be appearing everywhere at random prices.

It's only a matter of time.

[Mr. Whippy]

With a lot of hassle (OLD XP PC, not up to date), I used NRT to downgrade to Kitkat 4.4.4 and now my N7 is FINALLY acting normal, with normal battery life.  I'm hoping to get another couple years out of it. 

[Whoey]

Mine definitely runs better on 4.x but I'm feeling a lack of horsepower/responsiveness for my needs.

My new replacement is apparently being prepped for shipping, so tomorrow or the following day with any luck...

[Grant Lamontagne]

With a lot of hassle (OLD XP PC, not up to date), I used NRT to downgrade to Kitkat 4.4.4 and now my N7 is FINALLY acting normal, with normal battery life.  I'm hoping to get another couple years out of it. 

I could easily see getting another couple of years with the N7 after downgrading to 4.4.4.  It was perfectly functional for things like Netflix, ebooks, web surfing and so on, which is basically all I used a tablet for in the first place.  If I hadn't gotten a new one I could see me using mine for quite some time yet.

I see no reason it couldn't last a while longer.

Def

[Mr. Whippy]

With a lot of hassle (OLD XP PC, not up to date), I used NRT to downgrade to Kitkat 4.4.4 and now my N7 is FINALLY acting normal, with normal battery life.  I'm hoping to get another couple years out of it. 

I could easily see getting another couple of years with the N7 after downgrading to 4.4.4.  It was perfectly functional for things like Netflix, ebooks, web surfing and so on, which is basically all I used a tablet for in the first place.  If I hadn't gotten a new one I could see me using mine for quite some time yet.

I see no reason it couldn't last a while longer.

Def

Exactly what I use mine for.  When my Macbook pro died, I picked up a Galaxy Tab S (10 inch) as a laptop replacement and have been generally very happy with it.  10 inch screens are just too big for a paperback replacement

[Whoey]

My Tab S 8.4 is here!

Installing/configuring/updating...

[Grant Lamontagne]

Congratulations!

Looking forward to hearing your thoughts!

Def

[Grant Lamontagne]

With a lot of hassle (OLD XP PC, not up to date), I used NRT to downgrade to Kitkat 4.4.4 and now my N7 is FINALLY acting normal, with normal battery life.  I'm hoping to get another couple years out of it. 

I could easily see getting another couple of years with the N7 after downgrading to 4.4.4.  It was perfectly functional for things like Netflix, ebooks, web surfing and so on, which is basically all I used a tablet for in the first place.  If I hadn't gotten a new one I could see me using mine for quite some time yet.

I see no reason it couldn't last a while longer.

Def

Exactly what I use mine for.  When my Macbook pro died, I picked up a Galaxy Tab S (10 inch) as a laptop replacement and have been generally very happy with it.  10 inch screens are just too big for a paperback replacement

I agree, but only sort of.  I bought a few magazine subscriptions through Google Newsstand and I kind of wish I'd gone to a ten inch tablet as magazine articles seem a bit cramped.  For ebooks though, yeah, I can't help but think that a ten inch screen would be a bit too big to be worthwhile.

Def

[Whoey]

It's done 2 system updates/reboots (now it says 5.0.2) and a bunch of app updates... also the Google backup/sync appears to have installed a bunch of my other regularly used apps I have on my Nexus 7.

Also they upped my Dropbox by 48gb for the next 24 months.

It's charging now, find it odd that despite being the brown/bronze model the power adapter/cable are white, I would have expected black, not that it matters to charge. My (matching) book cover is pretty decent although it does suffer from the typical "holding up a book" (you cannot have it folded back) to use the main camera issue which annoys me, but a minor issue overall.

I haven't messed too much with settings but I think the autobrightness may be going off pretty quick as it always seems to be wrong.

[Whoey]

as for the Flipboard/widget left screen:

http://forums.androidcentral.com/samsung-galaxy-tab-pro-8-4/382548-possible-delete-widget-screen.html#post4573288

Yes, this is how:

1. Press and hold down on the home screen until three icons appear on the bottom of the screen. They should be Wallpapers, Home Screen Settings and Widgets.

2. Select "Home Screen Settings".

3. It should read "Content Home Screen". Simply uncheck the box. Return to your home page and that annoying widget page should be gone.

Hope this helps,

Lucky.

That worked for me

[raistlin65]

My Tab S 8.4 is here!

Installing/configuring/updating...

I'll be curious to see what you think of it for ebook reading. I really like the larger screen of my LG Pad 8.3 over my N7 I used to have for the larger screen, and an iPad 10" which I tried for six months, but felt too awkward in size for my reading.

[Grant Lamontagne]

as for the Flipboard/widget left screen:

http://forums.androidcentral.com/samsung-galaxy-tab-pro-8-4/382548-possible-delete-widget-screen.html#post4573288

Yes, this is how:

1. Press and hold down on the home screen until three icons appear on the bottom of the screen. They should be Wallpapers, Home Screen Settings and Widgets.

2. Select "Home Screen Settings".

3. It should read "Content Home Screen". Simply uncheck the box. Return to your home page and that annoying widget page should be gone.

Hope this helps,

Lucky.

That worked for me

Worked for me too. That may be a more recent thing as the only way to remove it that is ever found involved rooting.

Def

[Whoey]

most of what I found also said rooting... It took some digging to find that one. IMHO it's not particularly clear about what it does, nor is the widgets window itself very obvious what it's controlled by.

I think I'll be hunting for a new launcher, and a lot more new widgets. I love the resolution on this tablet, but can't help feeling they allow a little too much gap between app icons and some widgets render small within the allowed space. On a high resolution tablet like this the icon grid should allow a lot more on it.

[Grant Lamontagne]

I agree. I also found this device to be very long and quite skinny compared to the N7.

Going back the N7 seemed very squat and fat.

Def

[Whoey]

considering from a 7inch to 8.4inch screen, whereas the resolution has pretty much doubled.

1600 x 2560 pixels vs 800 x 1280 pixels

Also I noticed in a comparison that the tab s 8.4 actually weighs less than the Nexus 7. 

[Mr. Whippy]

as for the Flipboard/widget left screen:

http://forums.androidcentral.com/samsung-galaxy-tab-pro-8-4/382548-possible-delete-widget-screen.html#post4573288

Yes, this is how:

1. Press and hold down on the home screen until three icons appear on the bottom of the screen. They should be Wallpapers, Home Screen Settings and Widgets.

2. Select "Home Screen Settings".

3. It should read "Content Home Screen". Simply uncheck the box. Return to your home page and that annoying widget page should be gone.

Hope this helps,

Lucky.

That worked for me

Worked for me on my big Tab S.  Great tip.  Flipboard is a PITA.

[Grant Lamontagne]

Absolute pain in the arse.  I'm so glad to be rid of it.

Def

[Whoey]

[Whoey]

So after some time using my new tablet regularly, this is my opinion:

It's a very snappy quick tablet for everything I've thrown at it so far. The battery life has been decent enough, and I've rarely run it down completely. I have a plug always available next to the couch where it lives primarily. I despise the entire Samsung menu systems, I have 4 screens of apps, not entirely sure how they are organized, I was so used to the Vanilla android on my nexus devices that has everything alphabetically (which I'm also not entirely a fan of) but at least it's consistent. Also the auto screen brightness is epic fail and either too bright or too dark. As mentioned before flipboards are gone via the above fix. I like my cover in general, but it has one flaw, in order to take a photo I have to have it open like a book, which makes holding the tablet steady more difficult, there also seems to be a delay in the press and actual picture. Since the cover studs actually pressure fit to the back divots on the tablet I have not popped it off since first installing it. I'm not sure if it will become loose or if the build quality is intended for it to be inserted/removed several times before that happens. It works well enough to protect and auto unlocks when opened (since it stays at home I don't have a code/pattern to unlock) also has 2 stand modes which work well enough if you want to watch something in landscape mode. At times when using in portrait for reading or similar I noticed the edge is particularly sensitive vs my old Nexus 7. Also some apps I had before that were forced portrait on my old tablet are now forced landscape on the Tab S 8.4

Overall it's been a good experience and I'm glad I picked one up. Wish I had done the research earlier and paid a bit more attention in Canada as I may have gotten it cheaper than what I paid here... but I was on a mission to find the Lenovo tablet which I didn't find in the end, neither here nor there.

I'm tempted to root and install a vanilla android rom if one exists for this model... I might find it a lot less annoying vs the samsungification of android.

[Grant Lamontagne]

I'm really surprised to see Samsung producing all of the premium Android devices and not a peep from Motorola.  There's a new Moto X phone but no new tablets.

I would have thought I'd be Motorola all the way when Google bought them out, but there hasn't really been anything at all from them.

Def

[raistlin65]

I'm really surprised to see Samsung producing all of the premium Android devices and not a peep from Motorola.  There's a new Moto X phone but no new tablets.

In 2011, Google bought Motorola. Then something must not have been working out right, because they sold it to Lenova in 2014 for a lot less than they paid for it. Some people have speculated that Google bought Motorola for its huge patent portfolio (which I would imagine that they kept most of). That would tend to explain why Motorola never did anything with tablets.

[Grant Lamontagne]

I wasnt aware they sold Motorola off afterwards.

I guess that explains wh we aren't seeing new Motorola stuff, Lenovo is probably using all the best ideas in their own tablets.

Def

[raistlin65]

I would expect it would probably take at least year for a tablet to go through design and testing and make it to market. So we may nor may not be seeing the influence of Motorola personnel yet.

I am curious as to whether or not Lenova will release a phone under the Motorola brand.

[Grant Lamontagne]

The new Moto X looks nice.  If I recall, the first one was sold largely due to it's customization although the phone was somewhat underpowered.  I wonder if they will continue the customization options with better electronics from Lenovo?

Remember when Lenovo was the discount brand?  Now they are doing nicer stuff than a lot of the old premium brands.

Def

[raistlin65]

Definitely seems like it took Lenovo awhile to establish themselves once they stopped with relying on the Thinkpad identity after when they bought the laptop division from IBM.

[Whoey]

My Tab S 8.4 is here!

Installing/configuring/updating...

super thread necro!

So a few years down the road, I have just swapped the battery and it seems to have given it a new lease on life... it was getting painful to use lately and I was seriously considering buying a new tablet. New battery cost 17 euro off amazon, and wasn't too bad to change. We'll see if it holds a charge now or I am searching for a replacement

[Grant Lamontagne]

That's pretty cool.  I am looking forward to hearing how that works out.

Def