Samsung Kills The Seven-Inch Tablet Category It Created
If you’ve forgotten, they pioneered that size with the original Galaxy Tab.
SamMobile confirmed: Tab 3 7.0” dropped, new tablets upcoming
Samsung is going to drop the Galaxy Tab 3 7.0 and Samsung may bring the Galaxy Tab 3 8.0, but this depends on the sales of Samsung’s new Galaxy Note 8.0 tablet.
If I was Samsung, I’d go all-in with the S-Pen. The multi-windowing feature it offers is, so far, unique and makes it stand out from all other tablets. And given how many styli are selling to iOS tablet users, Samsung is on the right track despite all of the ridicule. (Given a choice between an iPhone 5 and Galaxy Note II, I’d go for the Note.)
What Samsung absolutely cannot screw up with the Note 8.0 tablet is its price. They need to match the iPad Mini or even be aggressive and undercut it and have the courage to make up the initial per-unit thin margins with volume (component prices drop with greater volume and over time — the trick Apple has used very well so far, with supplies from Samsung!).
While it’s true Google could knife Samsung by including its own multi-windowing APIs in Android, it’d still be a victory for Samsung and they wouldn’t lose a thing except their software investment. Their customers would be very happy to get a ROM update with official Google APIs and carry on using their Samsung — not Google Nexus — devices.
Goodbye, seven-inch. It’s time to move on.
Samsung’s not killing the 7″ tablet; they’re just leaving the niche because it’s gotten crowded thanks to all the many decent generic tablets. That sounds like a good thing to me.
Man, do NOT change my damn headlines.
Sorry.
The way I see it, the company that creates a category kills it if they leave it. All the 7-inchers left are now zombies. It’s going to be interesting to see if Google incorporates multi-windowing as a way to fight iPad. They don’t even need to add stylus support to do that, either. Witness webOS and webOSCE.
Anyway, I didn’t think @fakebaldur was right about a 7-inch tablet being more phone-like than tablet like, but in these days of 5-inch-and-above phone screens, he’s now right. A 7-inch tablet is rather pathetic.
“The way I see it, the company that creates a category kills it if they leave it.”
Company that created portable MP3 player, and another that created disk-based portable MP3 player are both gone, but Apple and iPods are alive and well.
“A 7-inch tablet is rather pathetic.”
7″ is the sweet spot – compromise between portability and usability.
All true.
>>>Apple and iPods are alive and well
And I’m going to be mean and say you’ve just proven my point. There is no longer an MP3 category. It’s an *iPod* category. Hello, Zune?
Why a Kindle pic?
Becuase the tablet next to it is the original Galaxy Tab.
So you can compare the Kindle’s size with the orignal tab.
Because the Kindle Keyboard is probably what someone carries around as their e-reader who took this picture.
A back-lit display will never have my money as an e-reader.
Now, I would get a Note 2 as a hybrid phone-tablet combo… I’d be happy to not have to buy a separate tablet.
“Samsung is going to drop the Galaxy Tab 3 7.0”
I didn’t even know a Galaxy Tab 3.0 existed, although I suppose it doesn’t have to be for sale in order to exist.
It was planned. Why go against other 7-inchers? It wouldn’t have had the S-pen or multi-windowing. A non-Note 8.0 is on the drawing board but that might be killed too.
Of course the next version of Android is going to include multi-window support. Do you know how many official Google apps already support Samsung’s multi-window? I know at least 4, all heavy-hitters: Chrome, Gmail, YouTube, Maps. There’s no way Google does that unless multi-window is in the plan.
By the way, multi-window would be particularly awesome on the ultra-high-resolution Nexus 10 made by… Samsung. They’re clearly working together on this. It almost makes me wonder if the Android team slipped their schedule on multi-window and were supposed to have gotten it out with the Nexus 10.
I would be *so* happy to see official multi-window in Android. If I can’t get webOS with Cards and Stacks and the CE enhancements on new hardware, multi-window is better than having to settle for single-pane.
I expect to see a lot of 8inchers in the next few months: a lot of XGA crap-pads and a few SXGA and better (200dpi+) name brand models.
Apple just jumped off a cliff so the rest of the lemmings will follow suit. 🙂
Less snarky view:
7in generic tablets are headed for $99, an equivalent 8incher can easily sell for $200-250 given Apple’s price umbrella. The build cost will be almost the same.
Plus, they get to match or better Apple at a lower price.
Less competition, more money, and a marketting hook for free; a triple-win.
I expect a stampede.
Archos 80 Titanium, dual core CPU, 8GBs storage, microSD card slot, 1024×768 screen, eight-inches, just $169. Hm, didn’t we argue over Archos earlier? They’re listed at J&R now, so they must be coming by end of March, if not earlier:
http://mikecanex.wordpress.com/2013/01/25/new-archos-tablets-listed-at-jr/
XGA screen is pushing it.
I thought we were “arguing” over the 97? 😉
Kinda makes my point that the incremental cost of 8in over 7 in is minimal but allws a higher list price, no?
Leaves the mobility folks to the 6in phablets.
I think availability was the argument? Being listed in J&R is no indication of reality, but often such listings do indicate release within 4 to 8 weeks.
On my phone it just showed a Kimdle unless I clicked on the picture.
The Galaxy Tab became very over priced at Christmas time compared to the competition. Even when they reduced the price to $200 the Nexus 7 was a better deal.
Hmmmm…. here’s an interesting, contradictory development:
Samsung Galaxy Tab 3 Pictured, More Details Surface
Samsung has just gotten weird:
Samsung launches limited edition $220 red Galaxy Tab 2 (7.0), throws in a free case
http://liliputing.com/2013/01/samsung-launches-limited-edition-220-red-galaxy-tab-2-7-0-throws-in-a-free-case.html