Software: Android on Tablets Revisited

The Galaxy Tab S2 comes pre-loaded with Android 5.0.2 and a tablet version of Samsung's TouchWiz peel. While TouchWiz has improved from previous tablet versions to be less annoying and less aggressive, information technology remains substantially a large version of TouchWiz on the Galaxy S6, for better or worse.

If you've used TouchWiz on the Galaxy S6 or Note v, many of the Tab S2'southward software elements volition be familiar to you, such as the basic lockscreen with weather, time and notification info, and the notification pane with its quick setting toggles. The homescreen has been enlarged to a 6x5 grid with five apps in the dock, and many of the widgets included have only been slightly modified for a tablet interface.

Personally I find the overall interface slightly too large for a 9.vii-inch tablet, and I wish some of the UI elements were smaller so that the reasonably big brandish could show more information at any i time. The app grid, for instance, could easily be 7x7 or 8x8 without losing much usability, and that would allow pretty much every app I want to use, along with some widgets, to occupy a single homescreen panel.

Many of Samsung's included apps, such as the Contacts browser and South Planner, feature updated interfaces that work better with large tablet screens. Often these apps utilize two-column designs in mural, portrait, or both, which helps show more data on the screen at any 1 time. Unfortunately, some of the simpler apps haven't received this treatment, such as the Gallery, which leaves these apps with a basic, enlarged smartphone experience.

I was more impressed with Google and Microsoft's tablet apps that are pre-loaded on the Tab S2, as clearly these 2 companies have put more fourth dimension and effort into their development than Samsung has with their included apps. Gmail, YouTube and Chrome, for example, are three apps with excellent tablet experiences, adequately using the infinite available to them on a ix.7-inch tablet rather than simply enlarging the smartphone UI.

From the Microsoft army camp, the full Part suite (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and OneNote) is pre-loaded on the Tab S2. These apps are surprisingly well featured on Android, and are a great way to edit documents and spreadsheets on a mobile device. The familiar Office interface has translated extremely well to a sub x-inch form factor, and with a keyboard the Tab S2 could become a great productivity tool.

While Microsoft'south apps were impressive on the Milky way Tab S2, there is withal a collection of 3rd-party apps in the Play Store that aren't optimized for tablets, many of which are from pop brands and services. The Twitter app, for example, is bloodcurdling on a 9.vii-inch screen, as is Facebook Messenger and Instagram, while the standalone Facebook app is but decent in landscape mode.

However, the good news is that the collection of unoptimized apps has shrunk since the final time I used Android on a tablet. There is now a sizable drove of well-fabricated apps, spanning everything from news services (Feedly runs smashing on the Tab S2) and productivity tools (such as Office, Photoshop, Lightroom, etc.) to video services (Netflix, Plex) and a whole ton of games.

The quality of apps all the same isn't as good as what y'all'd get on iOS, but the gap has closed over the past few years to the betoken where Android tablets can be a viable (and often cheaper) culling to an iPad.

As for features included with the Tab S2, at that place's really only one thing I want to highlight: Samsung's custom divide-screen manner. Like with previous implementations of this feature, information technology just works with some apps, which is still a massive disappointment. However, it does work well with the apps it supports, and it can make multi-tasking on this entertainment-focused device a little easier.

The Tab S2 also supports things like a reading mode, which alters display qualities to make reading books more pleasant, only this isn't new or unique to this product. You tin can brand and receive calls on the tablet if you have an LTE version, though, which is an interesting characteristic yous'll probably never apply.