iPad 2 competitor?

First thing I want to say- Sorry for the long gap between this post and the last. Exams are a bitch. 😡
Coming back to the topic- a brand, new competitor for the iPad 2.

Samsung just announced the sexy new successors to the original Galaxy Tab- the Samsung Galaxy Tab 8.9 and its elder and more powerful brother, the Galaxy Tab 10.1

Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1

The engineers at Samsung took their job pretty seriously this time & churned out not one, but two tablets that could be possible competitors to the iPad 2 in the ongoing tablet wars.
Taking a look at  the hardware of the brand new Tabs-

• Screen- The Galaxy Tab 8.9 has a 8.9 inch WXGA screen with a resolution of 1280 X 800 pixels. Meanwhile, the Galaxy Tab 10.1 has a 10.10 inch WXGA screen with the same resolution as its sibling(i.e. 1280 X 800 pixels).
  The iPad 2, meanwhile has a screen resolution of 1024 X 768 pixels. *smirk* 
  

  Galaxy Tab 8.9, Galaxy Tab 10.1 & iPad 2

• Camera- The Galaxy Tab 8.9 has a camera of 3 megapixels & an additional camera of 2 megapixels. The Galaxy Tab 10.1 has a camera of 8 megapixels & an additional camera of 2 megapixels. The cameras on the back of both Tabs are capable of  1080p HD video capture. On the other hand, the iPad 2 has a back camera of merely 0.9 megapixels & a front-facing VGA camera which is capable of video-calling only with other Apple products.
  & oh by the way, did I mention, that both the Tabs will have LED flash along with the back-facing camera?
  So, no more ‘in-the-dark’ pictures! 😀
• Weight– The Galaxy Tab 8.9 weighs 470 grammes(3G and wifi) and the Galaxy Tab 10.1 weighs 599 grammes(3G and wifi). The iPad 2 weighs 613 grammes(3G and wifi). Samsung’s helping us get rid of those back-aches, FanBoys. What’s Apple doing? Supplying Iodex with every purchase? 😆
• Storage– The Apple iPad 2 takes this one away in the case of internal storage. The iPad 2 is available in three different variants- 16 GB, 32 GB and 64 GB. This is the most a manufacturer has been capable of producing. No tablet in the market has an internal storage space of 64 GB. The Galaxy Tab 8.9 and the Galaxy Tab 10.1 are available only in 16 GB and 32 GB variants.
  Now’s the part where it gets better- external storage. The Galaxy Tab 8.9 & the Galaxy Tab 10.1 both, have external memory card(microSD) support of up to 32 GB. So, if you get the 32 GB variant & you have a 32 GB memory card, you have 64 GB of data. Not to forget, you can take out the memory card & put it into any other device & transfer your data. Let me see you do that with your iPad 2.
• Thickness– The iPad 2 is 8.8 mm thick. The Galaxy Tab 8.9  is 8.6 mm. But, the Galaxy Tab 10.1 is 10.9 mm. The only positive result of this is the gaming and document-editing experience, that’s it. 
  

  Thickness. Or rather, thinness of the tablets

• Processor– The Galaxy Tab 8.9 & Galaxy Tab 10.1 come fitted with a dual core 1 GHz processor. And, so does the iPad 2. So, no competition here.
• Battery Life– The iPad 2 comes with a battery life of 10 hours with its 6000 mAh. The Galaxy Tab 8.9 has the same and promises the same amount of usage. The Galaxy Tab 10.1, on the other hand has a 6800 mAh battery which just might give a better performance. It depends only upon the usage of the customer.
• Operating System– Here’s where things get complicated. Both Galaxy Tabs come pre-loaded with the latest iteration of the Android Operating System i.e. Android 3.0 a.k.a HoneyComb which has been specifically designed for tablet usage.
  The iPad 2 has an Operating System which was ported from the iPhone and the iPod Touch i.e. iOS 4.3
  Samsung has introduced a brand new version of TouchWiz with the Galaxy Tabs. It looks brilliant and is much better than the previous versions.
  While Android has been known for its open-source nature, Apple has been known for its applications…which brings us to the next category. 

  

  TouchWiz UX

• Applications– This is where Apple wins hands-down(Don’t laugh, FanBoy!). The App Store for the iPad 2 has over 65,000 applications.
  The Android platform has just 100 applications for itself as of now. The number is bound to increase as soon as people start buying these tablets.
  The iPad applications have basically, just been ported from the iTouch/iPhone App Store. But, most people(read- FanBoys & FanGirls) don’t realize that.
• Flash Support– Steve Jobs doesn’t seem to realize that by not adding support for Flash, they’re losing out on a huge market. Thankfully, Andy Rubin does. Android supports the latest version of Flash, HTML and RSS while iOS supports only HTML and RSS. *cough cough*
• USB support– Both the Galaxy Tabs have support for USB devices(I wonder how they did it!). The iPad 2 seems to fall far, far behind in this category. A typical example of having USB support is that of someone who wants to view data from his friend’s USB. He can just copy the content onto his tablet & view it whenever he/she wants to.
• Cost– This is THE deciding factor for most customers. The wifi version of the iPad 2 sells for $499, $599 and $699 for the 16 GB, 32 GB and the 64 GB models respectively.
  The 16GB wifi version of the Galaxy Tab 10.1 will cost $499 and the 32GB version will cost $599. The Galaxy Tab 8.9 will be $469 and $569 for 16GB and 32GB, respectively. Prices for the 3G + wifi have still not been announced.

Samsung have introduced a deadly competitor into the market. People will flock to buy these tablets. But, will the sales be better than that of the ‘oh-so-mighty’ iPad 2 and the Motorola Xoom?
That can only be seen in the near future!