Android may have been giving Apple's tablet
a tough fight, but now the iPad also gets a surprisingly strong competition
from Windows 8.
Our test device, the Samsung XE700 Tablet
PC, was always installed with Windows 7. For our test purposes, we installed
the consumer preview of Windows 8 on it, in order to find out whether the
glitzy new interface will go well with the device. The result should make even
the most die-hard Apple fans sit up and take notice: Windows 8 is a true
threat, supporting a lot more hardware, starts faster and offers more online
storage, not to mention better connections to social networks like Facebook,
Twitter and Google+.
The
author puts operating systems through their paces. He has been following the
development of Windows 8 since the first milestone.
However, Samsung's device does cost about
twice as much as an iPad. It is also heavier. The XE700 lets you watch in 16:9
rations, while Apple banks on its fanless technology, which makes it impossible
for the device to generate noise. On the other hand, Samsung provides more
powerful hardware that totally eclipses Apple's A5 dual-core CPU. No surprises
for the XE700's high benchmark scores.
Tablet-Hardware is fully exploited
Windows 8 makes good use of the available
Sandy Bridge components - an Intel core ¡5 CPU with two cores, an integrated
graphics processor (Intel HD Graphics 3000) and a 4GB RAM. The current Windows
applications and the programs from the App Store support them, too. Apple, on
the other hand, is still waiting for Apps, which are supposed to fully exploit
the four graphic cores in the ¡Pad3. In case of Samsung, in spite of the
powerful hardware, the heat generation has been kept under control. After
playing video files for ten minutes, we recorded a temperature of 44 degrees
Celsius at the hottest point, which is higher than the temperature of the
hottest point on the iPad, namely, 32.3 degrees.
On the software side, Apple's iPad store
currently offers about 200,000 apps. The competition, on the other hand, can
access the entire breadth of the Windows world. However, special metro apps are
quite rare, least until the official launch of Windows 8.
Works like a PC
In
Windows, you can transfer files with a few simple clicks, but the iPad needs to
be synchronized before each copying process.
Need to move a document from A to B? It can
only be done in Windows, since the iOS doesn't let you access the file system.
That's why the iPad doesn't have a file manager. If you want to move your
documents, you will require ¡Tunes to synchronise with the device, which is
inconvenient and time-consuming. If your Tablet uses Windows, you will be able
to do everything that you do with a PC.
Windows
8 gives you lots of freedom
Even if it's running on a tablet, Windows 8
gives you full access to the system. And if you want to, you can even
manipulate the registry. Furthermore, compared to the ¡OS, Windows is a lot
more flexible and more varied. The concrete example: you decided to attach a
picture to an email you're composing. All the mail programs available in
Windows feature a button that can be used to attach a file to the mail. On the
iPad, however, you'll have to close the mail program, launch the Photo
application and attach the image from there.
Windows
8 on Tablet
In Apple's case, you can only acquire
programs from the App Store, and movies and music can only be acquired over
¡Tunes. Windows 8 will also be featuring an application marketspace, which apps
can be installed in a manner identical to the iPad's. You can use the classic
desktop to install and use any of the many programs that the Windows world
contains. The Samsung device also works with a keyboard and mouse, and is
therefore the perfect substitute for a notebook.
More
memory and a better address book
Tablet users want to be able to access
mails quickly and check what's new on Facebook and Twitter. Consequently, a
strong connection to the Internet is a characteristic feature of tablet PCs.
Windows 8 uses the SkyDrive app to provide
free access to a 7GB online memory, as opposed to the 5GB memory that the iPad
offers. However, the ¡Cloud service can only be used in conjunction with the
apps that are connected to an online memory. Only Windows 8 allows you to
configure the online hard drive as a normal drive, in order to view the files
saved on it. Both systems use online memory to synchronise various devices.
The "Contacts" app is one of the
biggest advantages of Windows 8. In addition to listing the friends that you
have entered into your address book, it also displays a list of the people you
know from Facebook, Twitter, Linkedln and Google+. You can use the
"Contacts" app to get in touch with friends or check their status. In
fact, the latest Facebook updates in real time and makes the iPad's contacts
app look antiquated. The iPad's contacts app does allow you to enter a friend's
Twitter name, but it cannot display his stream or followers.
