As much as I love the iPad, iPhone, and iOS, I have to admit that I have become intrigued by some of the new and exciting features offered by some of the competing Android phones and tablets. I do appreciate how easy iOS is to learn, use, and set up. I still feel that iOS is the most user friendly mobile operating system and is still the operating system I would recommend to family members and friends. I think iOS is especially a good choice for those who are new to smartphones and tablets. However, I sometimes wish for some of the more advanced features now being offered on some Android phones and tablets such as an integrated stylus, the ability to run multiple apps on the screen at once, and all the neat things that you can do with live widgets on your app screen and lock screen.
I made the decision to go and see for myself if the grass was greener on the Android side. In order to do this, I picked up the Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1 tablet and Samsung Galaxy Note II phone to give them a try. I chose this specific tablet and phone as I believe Samsung is Apple’s closest competition at this point for the phone and tablet market. Many reviews are available for these two Android devices online, so I won’t write another review of these two products. Instead, as an iPhone and iPad user, I will share what I feel the iPhone and iPad do better than the Galaxy Note 10.1 and Galaxy Note II and where I feel the iPhone and iPad have fallen behind Samsung’s offerings. This article will focus on the Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1 vs. the iPad, and next week I will take a look at the Samsung Galaxy Note II phone vs. the iPhone 5.
The Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1
The Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1 is an Android tablet currently running the latest version of Android – Jellybean. It features a 1.4 GHz quad core processor, Samsung’s special S Pen stylus built in, and a 1280×800 screen. It is available in both white and deep gray with 16GB or 32GB of storage.
I purchased the white 16GB version for my comparison with the iPad. After using the Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1 as my main tablet for a week, I now have a good grasp of what this tablet is capable of, how useful its features are, and how it compares with the iPad.
What the Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1 Does Better than the iPad
App Multitasking
I love what I can do with multitasking on the Note 10.1. This feature, alone, is enough to tempt me to use this tablet over my iPad. In my daily workflow, I do a lot of internet research to put together presentations, write documents, and get my work done. I gave up doing this type of work in the iPad long ago due to how tedious it is to constantly switch back and forth between apps on the iPad. Pulling information from the Web was just not something that could be done very quickly when the Internet cannot be open and on the screen at the same time as your word processing software.
The ability to have multiple apps open on the screen at the same time on the Note 10.1 works incredibly well. A multitasking pop-up shortcut is always available on the bottom of the screen. Clicking on this shortcut brings up a menu of all the apps that support multi-screen viewing. Apps that support this feature include the Internet browser, S-Notes App (Samsung’s handwriting & note taking app), calculator, email, calendar, twitter, Polaris Office, and more. While very few 3rd party apps are available for this feature, all the apps that I felt were needed to get work done were available…
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