It is usually interesting to meet two people who have contributed to a cause up to such extent that their individual contributions account for a turning point in the history. It is even more interesting if these two entities are two big organizations that are filled with smart and innovative people. Today we are going to talk about two such organizations and their respective products. Apple is well known for their innovative approaches in computing environments and to be precise, mobile computing environments. They transformed the meaning of smartphone to a whole new level with the introduction of iPhone. Apple iPad convinced the consumers that there is a lot one can do with a carefully designed tablet. These two events have changed the track of the technology for good.
Google is another company that transformed the way we use the internet. They emerged as a search engine at first, and now they have grown in to one of the biggest service providers in the internet. Their dominance ranges from simple applications to much more complex applications that need complex computations. Googling was added to the dictionary back in early 2000s, and that shows how much they have influenced the world and internet. Their influence on the mobile computing market starts with the introduction of Android operating system. In a market where iOS dominated and other operating systems were considered as inferior, Android made a change and turned the technology to their favor effectively urging the customers to change their preferences and switch to Android. The decision to make it open source was one of the best decisions Google took since that boosted the growth of the operating system as well as it created the opportunity to have a wide variety of devices that run on Android. This was the next turning point in smartphones and mobile computing platforms. Yesterday (27 June 2012), they introduced a high end tablet that only costs an acceptable amount which is bound to be another turning point in the direction of consumers switching to tablets more. Hence we thought of comparing these two products that changed the shape of the market.
Asus Google Nexus 7 Review
Asus Google Nexus 7 is known as Nexus 7 in short. It is one of Google’s very own product line; Nexus. As usual, Nexus is designed to last till its successor and that means something in the rapidly changing tablet market. Nexus 7 has a 7 inch LED backlit IPS LCD capacitive touchscreen that features a resolution of 1280 x 800 pixels at a pixel density of 216ppi. It is 120mm wide and 198.5mm in height. Asus has managed to make it thin as much as 10.5mm and rather light with a weight of 340g. The touchscreen is said to be made from Corning Gorilla Glass which means it would be highly scratch resistant.
Google has included a 1.3GHz quad-core processor on top of Nvidia Tegra 3 chipset with 1GB of RAM and a 12 core ULP GeForce GPU. It runs on Android 4.1 Jelly Bean which would make it the first device to run on this newest Android operating system. Google states that Jelly Bean is specifically developed to enhance the performance of the quad core processors used in this device and hence we can expect a high end computing platform from this budget device. They have made it their mission to eliminate sluggish behavior and it seems the gaming experience is highly enhanced, as well. This slate comes with two storage options, 8GB and 16GB without the option to expand storage using microSD cards.
The network connectivity for this tablet is defined by Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n only which can be a disadvantage when you can’t find a Wi-Fi hotspot to connect. This won’t be much of a problem if you live in a country that has a wide Wi-Fi coverage. It also has NFC (Android Beam) and Google Wallet, as well. The slate has 1.2MP front facing camera that can capture 720p videos, but it doesn’t come with a camera at the rear, and which may disappoint some. It basically comes in Black and the texture on the back cover is developed specifically to enhance the grip. Another attractive feature is the introduction of enhanced voice commands with Jelly Bean. This means Nexus 7 will host a Siri like personal assistant system which can answer your question promptly. Asus has included a 4325mAh battery that is guaranteed to last over 8 hours and that would give it enough juice for any general use.
Apple iPad 3 (The new iPad) Review
Apple tried to revolutionize the market again with the new iPad. The new iPad (iPad 3) comes with a 9.7 inches HD IPS retina display that features a resolution of 2048 x 1536 pixels at a pixel density of 264ppi. This is a huge barrier that Apple has broken, and they have introduced 1 million more pixels to the generic 1920 x 1080 pixels display which used to be the best resolution a mobile device provides. The total number of pixels adds up to 3.1 million, which is actually a monster resolution that hasn’t been matched by any tablet currently available in the market. Apple guarantees that iPad 3 has 44% more color saturation compared to previous models and, in fact, photos and texts look wonderful in the big screen.
That’s not all about it; the new iPad has 1GHz ARM Cortex A9 dual core CPU with quad core SGX 543MP4 GPU built into the Apple A5X Chipset. Apple claims A5X to offer two-times the graphic performance of an A5 chipset used in iPad 2. It is needless to say that this processor will make everything work smooth and seamlessly with 1GB of RAM. The new iPad (iPad 3) has three variations based on internal storage, which is enough to stuff all of your favorite TV shows.
The new iPad runs on Apple iOS 5.1, which is a great operating system with a very intuitive user interface. There is a physical home button available at the bottom of the device, as usual. The next big feature Apple introduces is iSight camera, which is 5MP with autofocus and auto-exposure using a backside illuminated sensor. It has an IR filter built into it which is really great. The camera can also capture 1080p HD videos, and they have smart video stabilization software integrated with the camera which is a good move. This slate also supports the best digital assistant in the world, Siri which was supported by iPhone 4S only.
The new iPad also comes with 4G LTE connectivity apart from EV-DO, HSDPA, HSPA+21Mbps, DC-HSDPA+42Mbps, though 4G connectivity is region based. LTE supports speeds up to 73Mbps. Apple has built separate LTE variations for AT&T and Verizon. The LTE device makes the best use of LTE network and loads everything super-fast and handled the load very well. Apple also claims the new iPad is the device that supports most number of bands ever. It is said to have Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n for continuous connectivity, which was expected by default. Fortunately, you can let your new iPad share your internet connection with your friends by making it a wi-fi hotspot. The new iPad (iPad 3) is 9.4mm thick and has a weight of 1.44-1.46lbs, which is rather comforting, though it is slightly thicker and heftier than iPad 2. The new iPad promises a battery life of 10 hours on normal usage and 9 hours on 3G/4G usage, which is another game changer for the new iPad.
The new iPad is available in either Black or White, and the 16GB variant is offered at $499 which is rather low. The 4G version of the same storage capacity is offered at $629 which is still a good deal. There are two other variants, 32GB and 64GB which comes at $599 / $729 and $699 / $829 respectively without 4G and with 4G.
A Brief Comparison Between Google Nexus 7 and iPad 3 (Apple new iPad)
• Asus Google Nexus 7 is powered by 1.3GHz quad core processor on top of Nvidia Tegra 3 chipset with 1GB of RAM and 12 core ULP GeForce GPU, while Apple new iPad is powered by 1GHz dual core ARM Cortex A9 processor on top of Apple A5X chipset and PowerVR SGX543MP4 quad core GPU.
• Asus Google Nexus 7 runs on Android OS v4.1 Jelly Bean while Apple new iPad runs on iOS 5.1.
• Asus Google Nexus 7 has 7 inch LED backlit IPS LCD capacitive touchscreen featuring a resolution of 1280 x 800 pixels at a pixel density of 216ppi, while Apple new iPad has 9.7 inches LED backlit IPS TFT capacitive touchscreen featuring a monster resolution of 2048 x 1536 pixels at a pixel density of 264ppi.
• Asus Google Nexus comes in either 8GB or 16GB storage with no option to expand, while Apple new iPad comes in either 16GB or 32GB or 64GB storage variations without the ability to expand the storage.
• Asus Google Nexus has 1.2MP camera that can capture 720p videos while Apple new iPad has 5MP camera that can capture 1080p HD videos.
Conclusion
These two tablets are both state of the art tablets, and the differentiating factor is certainly the associated cost. When we look at Google Nexus 7 tablet, it provides an admirable user experience and a performance intensive system for a low cost. On the other hand, Apple new iPad is a fully fledged tablet that has everything you need and costs almost thrice compared to Nexus 7. Nexus 7 lacks the versatility of the HSDPA connectivity, and it also runs low on memory and optics. Further, the resolution is also low compared to the monster resolution offered by new iPad. On the other hand, it is rather light and small, but does everything that can be done with a new iPad and probably will score more in the benchmarks as well since the processor is way better than iPad’s dual core one.
Because of these reasons, the choice again becomes your personal preference and your personal preference would be somewhat affected by cost as well since it’s almost thrice of Nexus 7 cost. Thus, think about it and make your call for both of these tablets will serve you loyally and fully.