Dug up a relic this morning and charged it up after several years. It took a charge too. Woohoo.
A Samsung note 8.0 from 2013.
I used to use it for viewing repair manuals when my son and I restored a few Honda Preludes. But then I bought a 2n1 Windows number and gave the 8" tablet to Mrs Fixer who also had the 10" version. She didn't use the 8" very often and soon after started using an iPad.
I woke up at 2am this morning wondering whatever happened to that 8" tablet. Mrs Fixer knew where it was so at 6am it went on charge. I did not expect it to charge. It's got a 16 gig hard drive with 2 gig ram. It still has the original 4.1 Android OS.
Soon it will have a 64 gig micro sd card. See, the OS takes up over 6 gigs of the 16gb hard drive space. With all of the old photos and files it currently has it only has a little over 2 gigs space left. I have a project record keeping system folder that's a bit over 3 gigs of spec books, manuals and blank documents.
It has a mali-400mp4 quad core 533mHz gpu. It appears it'll easily run games of that era at about 40 frames a second. Not bad! Opening pdf's and scrolling should be nice and smooth. It has a split screen option so I can be watching a video in the corner while writing a note on the main screen. Great for watching an inspection video while taking notes for reference later. A 10" would be a little better but holding that with one hand while jotting notes is out without a special case for that. Plus a 10" won't slide into a jacket pocket like the 8 can.
The screen is decent. When zooming way in on a pdf it is a bit pixelated but I can tell what info I seek well enough. It's plenty bright outdoors. It's a bit more shiney than I prefer so in bright conditions I see me more than I prefer, especially when wearing Stevie Wonder could see it safety gear. Is it rain proof? I hope I never have to find out.
The "S" pen is the magic of this one. I hardly used it before but after using an iPad for a while I've learned to appreciate the virtues of the S pen.
Anyway, back then it was kinda cool but here in 2023 it seems like a really cool old tablet. It had never received a firmware update that often resulted in a Samsung device having serious issues about 3 weeks after a new version came out. I don't think the Note 8.0 sold all that well so they never really had any upgraded versions, but still firmware updates murdered enough of Mrs Fixers Samsung products to cause her to use iProducts these days. If I can help it, this one will never go on line again.
The camera pretty much sucks. Not because of the 5mp thing, but because in low light it sucks and in bright conditions it blows out bright spots worse than Nikon gear, yet has no useful adjustments to compensate. On a cloudy day outdoors it's great.
Reviews at the time spelled doom for the 'niche' tablet. Most gave it a score of 7 to 8 based on things like battery life and the camera. It was more expensive than a much better iPad mini back then.
Yeah, the gpu is a guzzler and the camera is definitely not up to par. But the one reviewer who looked at it from a "work" perspective said "it's a get things done device for those who get things done". He was speaking of the true multi-task ability and the ability to beam your spreadsheet to a Samsung television (or projector).
Reading a pdf about changing oil and making notes.
Sweet!! If you prefer the "spen" the keyboard disappears revealing more adjustable screen.
Reviews complained of the slick body saying it could easily become slippery and pick up finger prints. Back in the day I opted for the rubbery case for that reason. It is barely noticed due to how thin it is. Some hated the Samsung apps vs google apps at the time. I actually prefer the Samsung music app over the google one. Equilizer is a must. They even complained about the lack of bass from dime sized speakers. Duh! Whathehell do you expect from dime sized speakers?
It uses bluetooth 3.0. Eh, that's ok because I can still listen to music or videos in private. The sound isn't stellar but it will do.
I think I paid $399 plus the case back in 2013. Now that I know what it's capable of it'll pay for itself real quick. Tied to my Alienware the transfer rate is kinda slow due to the usb micro limitations, but I'm used to that anyway.
Overall, not bad for this user. I was definitely considering my own iPad mini to replace the company one but I'll gladly use this instead, I mean since I already have it.
