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Samsung's New Galaxy Tab S5e Is Its Lightest and Thinnest Tablet Ever (theverge.com)

Posted by BeauHD on from the new-and-shiny dept.

Samsung has unveiled the Galaxy Tab S5e, its lightest and thinnest tablet ever made. "At $399, it's not only far more affordable than the flagship $649 Samsung Galaxy Tab S4, it's arguably surpassed it in some ways," reports The Verge. From the report: For starters, the Tab S5e has the thinnest and lightest metal unibody of any Galaxy Tab, measuring 5.5mm thin and weighing just 400 grams -- even compared to the 11-inch iPad Pro at 5.9mm thick and 468 grams, the Tab S5e is both lighter and thinner. The company also claims they've maximized space with the Tab S5e's massive 81.8 percent screen-to-body ratio, which on paper, is an improvement over the Tab S4's lower 79 percent ratio. It's also right on the heels of the 11-inch iPad Pro's ~82.9 percent screen-to-body ratio.

And unlike Samsung's previous attempt to make its 10.5-inch tablet more affordable, this slate doesn't skimp on the screen and not nearly as much on the processor. Samsung's Tab S5e is a 10.5-inch Super AMOLED device with a 16:10 aspect ratio and 2560 x 1600 resolution, while its octa-core Snapdragon 670 processor should provide solid mid-range performance. Samsung's also promising up to 14.5 hours of battery life. The Tab S5e is also the first tablet from the Korean tech giant to ship with Pie, the latest version of Android, along with the new Bixby 2.0 virtual assistant and information tool. Samsung is also carrying features like Dex, a desktop-style Android environment, over from other Galaxy devices, like the Note 9 and Tab S4. It allows users to interact with their device using the screen, a mouse, keyboard, or all three. Other features include AKG-tuned, quad surround sound speakers, 64GB of internal storage (microSD expandable to 512GB), with 4GB RAM (upgradable to 6GB RAM/128GB storage), and 13-megapixel back and 8-megapixel front-facing cameras. Cellular models will follow the Wi-Fi versions later this year.

24 of 46 comments (clear)

  1. I'd like it by Vinegar+Joe · · Score: 3, Insightful

    If I could completely uninstall Bixby.

    --
    "The average reporter we talk to is 27 years old......They literally know nothing." - Ben Rhodes
    1. Re:I'd like it by Dutch+Gun · · Score: 2

      Also, the phrase comes in three “millennial friendly” colors seems expressly designed to irritate old curmudgeons like me.

      --
      Irony: Agile development has too much intertia to be abandoned now.
    2. Re:I'd like it by Pseudonym · · Score: 2

      Let me guess: Rose gold, cosmic purple, and fairy poop.

      --
      sub f{($f)=@_;print"$f(q{$f});";}f(q{sub f{($f)=@_;print"$f(q{$f});";}f});
    3. Re:I'd like it by AmiMoJo · · Score: 2

      To be fair to Samsung almost everything is an optional install these days. Bixby is one of the few exceptions, although it can be disabled completely. All the other crapware they used to bundle in now has to be installed manually from their app store though.

      The more annoying thing is that one devices with a Bixby button it can't be repurposed without hacking.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    4. Re:I'd like it by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      I'd like it if it's more durable than the embarrassingly flimsy iPad Pro.

  2. Steve Jobs Tried to Warn Ya! by SuperKendall · · Score: 1

    See, the MOMENT Apple releases a tablet with a chunky USB-C connection, people are releasing thinner tablets!

    --
    "There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
  3. Upgradeable? by Luthair · · Score: 1

    I'm going to go out on a limb here and suggest you probably can't upgrade the RAM or storage in the tablet. Its more appropriate to say also offered as....

    1. Re:Upgradeable? by Krishnoid · · Score: 2

      You can add a MicroSD card. It makes sense for them to offer that, considering Samsung is a major manufacturer of MicroSD cards as well.

  4. Missing disclaimer by Lohrno · · Score: 2

    This is clearly an ad not an article, sorry.

  5. Can I root it and have a custom ROM installed by Mr.+Dollar+Ton · · Score: 2

    but "officially", with Samsung's leave and support?

    If not, it is just a piece of electronic junk that can gather all the dust it wants in the warehouse.

    1. Re:Can I root it and have a custom ROM installed by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      but "officially", with Samsung's leave and support?

      If not, it is just a piece of electronic junk that can gather all the dust it wants in the warehouse.

      So you want to be able to root your tablet and get product support from Samsung when you encounter problems with whatever custom ROM you go for such that Samsung's tech support is stuck with ironing out the bugs/problems/missing features in your custom ROM for you? That is not likely to happen, ever.

    2. Re:Can I root it and have a custom ROM installed by Mr.+Dollar+Ton · · Score: 1

      So you want to be able to root your tablet and get product support from Samsung when you encounter problems with whatever custom ROM you go for

      No, I do not want support of the ROM, I want support for flashing the rom. Learn to read, smart boy. Support for running whatever OS you want on the hardware you own has been the tradition with general purpose personal computers since they began selling. Fuck Samsung and fuck you for trying to subvert that.

  6. Re:Same as iPad Pro for weight by Luthair · · Score: 1

    Thats an interesting contortion.

  7. Other features... by Sooner+Boomer · · Score: 2

    Other features include AKG-tuned, quad surround sound speakers

    Surround Sound? How the fuck do you have surround sound with a tablet? Wear it on top of your head?

    --
    Chaos maximizes locally around me.
  8. Re:Same as iPad Pro for weight by thegarbz · · Score: 2

    So the screen size to weight ratio is identical. Yes, it is thinner but no, it is not lighter.

    Please stop abusing the English language. Why are you even here on Slashdot? With that level of logic you should make a great politician.

  9. Oh, for Gods sake ... by Qbertino · · Score: 3, Informative

    ... would manufacturers finally please quit this bullshit already.
    Tablets are thin enough, thank you very much.

    Just build one that a) doesn't need an extra hardcase to prevent it from breaking when I drop it and b) has a longer battery life.
    This is so tedious and annoying.

    --
    We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
    1. Re:Oh, for Gods sake ... by itsme1234 · · Score: 2

      Yea, especially the high end Tab Ses from Samsung were a total ergonomic disaster. It was a whole ordeal to just to pick the tablet from a flat surface, even with both hands - usually it involved dragging it to the edge of the table (and good luck trying to get it off the floor; to make it worse the glass from the back would scratch even if you looked at it wrong).

      Other than that generally Samsung dropped the ball for the last quite a few years, at least for the high end tablets. SOCs that were 1.5 generations behind for very premium prices, all kinds of nasty software bugs (that were leading to battery not lasting overnight if you left wifi on and stuff like that) updates all but non-existent (even for big security issues) and so on.

      Maybe they want to come back in the game; this tables somehow seems to be in the right direction. No more glass back (I wish really bad things to happen to everybody who ever thought it's a good idea to have both sides and very often the edges of a portable device made of glass, like a fragile screen is not enough), a decent 16:10 aspect ratio (I don't know why they insist on 4:3 for premium tablets while for good monitors or laptops it's almost impossible to find one that's 4:3 anymore). A probably (hopefully) decent amoled display (by the way Apple left everybody in the dust with the super-bright + 120Hz iPad Pro display, too bad that was 4:3 too, it would be ironic if it was produced by Samsung while Samsung had something decent but not great for their best tablets) and now it seems a lower starting price for these S5es. Who knows, maybe they have something going here.

  10. Re:Same as iPad Pro for weight by AmiMoJo · · Score: 1

    Exactly half the price of the iPad Pro 11" 64GB too.

    On the plus side there is a Micro SD card slot and it runs Android. On the negative side there is no support for Samsung's rather good S-Pen stylus.

    --
    const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
    SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
  11. Re:Same as iPad Pro for weight by azcoyote · · Score: 1

    So the screen size to weight ratio is identical. Yes, it is thinner but no, it is not lighter.

    56.83/468 = 0.121432; 49.6/400 = 0.124. So, not identical. Samsung apparently gives more screen for the weight.

    --
    Incipiamus, fratres, servire Domino Deo, quia hucusque vix vel parum in nullo profecimus.
  12. Great! by cascadingstylesheet · · Score: 4, Funny

    Because I know that what was holding me back from buying a tablet was the massive weight and thickness. Finally!

  13. No headphone jack by guacamole · · Score: 2

    Samsung, what's gonna be your excuse now? I was in the market fo exactly this type of tablet, but I guess I'll pass...

  14. Hasn't Android development for tablets stopped? by rainer_d · · Score: 2

    At least, that's what I read.

    --
    Windows 2000 - from the guys who brought us edlin
    1. Re:Hasn't Android development for tablets stopped? by Tough+Love · · Score: 2

      You read it where? Not anywhere that I know of. Android tablet product lines have not been refreshed lately, mainly because Google (with its typical Apple envy) artificially restricts Android to be somewhere between awkward and useless for productivity applications because it only wants them to be media consumption devices. Consumers rightly perceive that tablets are not very useful, and so after the first wave, stopped buying them. Manufacturers moan about it but don't do anything about it.

      This situation will not change as long as Android devices remain rom-locked with software fully under Google's control.

      --
      When all you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a thumb.
  15. Headphone jack by Tough+Love · · Score: 2

    Yes! It has one.

    --
    When all you have is a hammer, every problem starts to look like a thumb.