ISSUE386|COMPUTER SHOPPER|APRIL2020 43
The question is,does DeXmake theTab S6
practical to use as alaptooopreplacement?As
withiPadOS,theanswertothatis‘mostly’.
OnesmallhitchisthatAndroidappsdon’t
alwaysworkperfectlyintttheDeXenvironment
anddon’tbehaveinthewwwayyoumightexpect.
It’snotpossible,forinstaaance,toedittext
withintheChromeaddreeess bar,and selecting
text in Google Docs is fiddddly,too,becauseyou
havetodouble-clickthennndragahandleto
resize yourselection, as iiifyouwereusing
yourfingeronthescreennn.
Scrollingworksinconsssistently,too.Some
apps can be scrolled by uuusingan
externalmouselikea
finger–holddownthe
leftbutton and flick up or
down to scroll –while
others requireyou to useeethe
scrollwheeloratwo-fingggered
dragonthetouchpad.
TUNNELVISION
Anotherissueismultimooonitorsupport.Thisis
somethingthatApplehaaasseeminglyrefused
to implement properlyonnnttthhheeeiiiPPPaaadddPPPrrrooo,aaannnddd
sadlySamsunghasn’tmanagedtogetitright
here,either.Plug the Galaxy TabS6intoan
external monitor and, as you’d expect, you
get aDeX desktopdisplayedonthe screen.
At the sametime, however,the tablet display
snaps back to theregular Android UI:you
can’t have DeX on both.
What’s more,while it’s possible to move
the mouse pointer between displays, and to
drag itemsfromone to theother,the Galaxy
TabS6only supports side-by-side
arrangements. That’safiddly irritation if you
have your desktopmonitor positioned above
your tablet display, as many userssurely will.
The final problem forthe GalaxyTab S6
isn’t Samsung’sfault:it’s simply to do with the
rangeofquality tablet-focused softwareon
the PlayStore.Althoughthe app selection is
better than it once was, iPad owners stillhave
afar greaterrangeofserious toolstochoose
from, especially forcreativetaskssuchas
photoand video editing.Adobe Lightroom for
Android does its job,but it’s notapatch on
the fully featuredSerifAffinity Photo.
REFINED PALETTE
One area where the GalaxyTab S6 really
excels is its display. WhileApple reliesonIPS
panels forits tablets, Samsung here usesa
10.2in AMOLED screen, which provides
perfect contrast andvivid colours that are
easily amatch forthe iPad Pro’sdisplays.
It’s beautifully sharp,too,withacrisp
resolution of 2,560x1,600.
Imagequality is alsoexceptional.Likemost
currentAndroid devices, the TabS6gives you
aselection of colour profiles to choose from,
which tune the displayfor different colour
spaces. TheNatural option deliversacolour
rangethat’sslightlywider than sRGB(offering
102.1% gamut coverage), while Vividgets
closer to the DCI-P3 gamut with an impressive
106.9% sRGB coverage.
OOOuuurrrooonnneeecccooommmppplllaaaiiinnntttiiisssttthhhaaatttbbbrrriiiggghhhtttnnneeessssssiiisssaaa
touchlimited.Howlimiteddependsonthe
content:acompletelywhitescreen comes out
withamaximumbrightnessof307cd/m^2 ,but
if there’s justawhitepatch covering 10%of
the screen this rises to apeak of 486cd/m^2.
The display recognisesHDR content, too, but
it won’t hitanywhere near the HDR10
standard’s requirements of 1,000cd/m^2.
What all this boils down to is ascreenthat
looks great and beatsmost laptop andrival
tabletdisplaysfor accuracy,but whichcan’t
quite match the brightness levels of the best
mobilephones.
Thescreenalso responds verywelltoboth
fingerand stylus input.The feel of the SPen’s
nib on thescreen is even moresatisfying than
the Apple Pencil:there’s slightly morefriction
and giveinthe nib and, therefore,more
feedback. If youlose your SPen, theTab S6 is
also compatible withthe much cheaper
Staedtler Noris Digitalstylus.SPEEDFREAK
The Samsung Galaxy TabS6ispoweredbya
2.84GHzocta-coreQualcomm Snapdragon
855 processor,partnered with 6GBofRAM.
It’sacombination that drives the TabS6to
excellent levels of performance: according to
Geekbench5,amore taxing benchmark than
Geekbench4,itscored 732inthe single-core
test and 2,542 in the multicore test. That
makes it not quiteasquick as the iPad Pro
12.9in (Shopper373), but it outperforms the
standard 10.2in iPad (Shopper384) by some
distance. It’s alsoalotfaster than the
Microsoft Surface Go (Shopper379), which
only managed409 and 943 in thesame tests.
Given the price,the Galaxy TabS6delivers
roughlythe performance you’dhope for. In
day-to-dayuse it feels ultra-responsive,and
–impressively –wenever once managed to
makeitstutterorlag,nomatter how many
browser tabs and applications were open.BBBaaatttttteeerrryyyllliiifffeeeiiissssssiiimmmppplllyyyeeexxxccceeelllllleeennnttt,tttoooooo:::ooonnnaaafffuuullllll
chargewewereabletoplayavideofromlocal
storage, with thescreen brightness set to
170cd/m^2 and flight mode engaged, foran
enormous 15h6m. That’s better than any
recent iPad or iPad Pro and, again, wayahead
of the Microsoft Surface Go.HIT FOR SIX
The GalaxyTab S6 is afantastic tablet. It’s
powerful yet terrifically lightand portable,it
offersgreat battery life,and it works out
cheaper than the equivalent 11in iPad Pro.
The bigquestioniswhetherthe software
supportissufficient foryour needs. To be
sure,Samsung’s DeX desktop environment
works better than regular Androidfor
productivity,and you can do alot with apps
like AdobeLightroom Mobileand Photoshop
Express.Even so,there’s nothing likethe
power available to iPad users from apps such
as Affinity Photo,and if it’s video editing you
need, theselection is even slimmer.
Still, theSamsung Galaxy TabS6is
arguably thebest Android tablet out there.
If you’re an Androidfan looking fora
super-lightweight laptop replacement for
medium-dutydocument editing and creation,
there’s no doubt that this highly capable and
desirable device will do the jobinstyle.
JonathanBrayBattery life
0% -50 Reference + 50 + 100
See page 84 forperformancedetailsPROCESSOROcta-core2.84GHzQualcomm Snapdragon 855•
SCREENSIZE10.5in•SCREEN RESOLUTION2,560x1,600•
REAR CAMERAS15 megapixels,3megapixels•STORAGE
128GB•WIRELESSDATANo•NFCNo•DIMENSIONS
245x160x5.7mm•WEIGHT420g•OPERATING SYSTEM
Android 9.0•WARRANTYOneyearRTB•DETAILS
http://www.samsung.com/uk•PART CODESM-T860NZAABTUSPECIFICATIONS
15h6mThe Samsung GalaxyTabS6 is afantastic tablet. It’spowerful yetterrificallylightand portable,and it offersgreatbattery life