Samsung Galaxy Tab S7+ First Impressions - What I Love

**Samsung Galaxy Tab Experience: A Personal Review**

I've had the pleasure of using the Samsung Galaxy Tab, and I must say, it's been a fantastic experience. One of my favorite features is the notification panel, which can be accessed by swiping down from anywhere on the screen. This allows me to quickly check my notifications without having to leave what I'm doing. The Samsung team has done an excellent job in implementing this feature, and it's become one of my go-to ways to stay connected.

The battery life of the Galaxy Tab is also impressive. In my testing, I was able to get through a full day of use without needing to recharge. Even when used extensively, like during meetings or streaming live, it still managed to retain around 40% of its battery life. This level of performance is comparable to that of the iPad Pro, and I'm excited to see how future software updates will improve this aspect even further.

One of the standout features of the Galaxy Tab is its keyboard. The device comes with a solid keyboard that's optimized for Android and specifically designed for the Samsung tablet experience. While it's not perfect – I did find it to be slightly flimsy – it works beautifully, and the key travel is excellent. Another accessory I appreciate is the tablet case, which has a convenient flap that holds the S Pen in place. This feature is particularly useful, especially when using the device for sketching or note-taking.

The S Pen itself is another notable aspect of the Galaxy Tab experience. While it's not a stylus user myself, my daughter and I have both had a blast with it. The app Samsung Notes is also an excellent default app that takes full advantage of the S Pen's capabilities. Additionally, the device comes with features like Auto Transfer, which allows seamless mirroring between devices. However, I didn't find this feature as useful as others.

My only disappointment with the Galaxy Tab was the lack of 5G support on the base model. The only way to get a 5G model is by purchasing it through the carrier's website, and even then, there are limitations due to availability. Fortunately, Samsung offers an alternative – the 256GB model, which comes with 8GB of RAM. This upgrade provides more than enough power for my needs, and I'm grateful that Samsung included expandability options, such as a microSD card slot.

In terms of value, I feel that the Galaxy Tab is more than fair. The price is competitive, especially considering the features and performance on offer. While there are some minor drawbacks – like the lack of customization options – overall, I've been thoroughly impressed with my experience using this device.

As a side note, I will be comparing the Galaxy Tab to the iPad Pro in a separate article. Both devices have their strengths and weaknesses, and it'll be interesting to see how they stack up against each other.

**Conclusion**

Overall, I'm extremely satisfied with my Samsung Galaxy Tab experience. The features, performance, and value have all exceeded my expectations. Whether you're looking for a lighter laptop alternative or simply want a high-end Android tablet, the Galaxy Tab is definitely worth considering. As the market continues to evolve, I'm excited to see how future updates will improve this device even further.

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enhello galaxy i'm chris pirillo and you're watching the locker gnome daily report or tldr for short i'm actually recording this live on twitch i'm there every night at 6 00 pm feel free to join me and the community next time i'm broadcasting live and in recent days and weeks i've been talking about moving on from my ipad pro 11 inch the one with the 5g the one that i got i think earlier this year that i was happy enough with i was thinking of moving from that to another tablet and it really wasn't until very recently that i considered the samsung galaxy tab s7 plus a viable alternative to the ipad although there's not like a direct correlation and i do plan on doing a this versus that video between these two tablets at some point in the very near future as well but uh now that i've been using this uh particular device the samsung galaxy tab s7 plus for a week or so despite this being out for like over a year now it hadn't even been on my radar because i hadn't considered a a an android tablet but after the release of ios 15 after the release of ios 15 i decided that it was possibly time for me to look beyond ios as in the ipad because i just found it to be sub-optimal for an experience that i was looking for so today i wanted to go over things that i love uh tomorrow i'm going to be going over things that i hate about this particular device but let's go ahead and begin with my top uh reason to make any shift or my number one thing that i look for in any device and that is experience specifically in software and the software experience is not perfect with the s7 plus but i am enjoying it in fact i'll go as far as to say is android on this tablet i feel does better than uh ios on the ipad in the sense that you know there are a lot of ios apps out there most of them feel like blown up iphone apps or even when you run iphone apps on the ipad screen it just doesn't feel right uh it feels better android feels better on this tablet that's kind of what i'm saying than than iphone apps feel on uh the ipad pro not perfect but the screen is outstanding uh it's very responsive 120 hertz screen that means things fly along at 120 frames per second samsung's been making constant optimizations in fact i just got one ui 3.1.1 yesterday oh look it's another notification that came in uh but most of my apps the apps that i need to use run on it uh including apps that would normally only run on a phone uh i can window them in in various ways on this tablet which you know kind of makes me happy because i can actually enjoy those apps in a native like experience on a larger screen so samsung hasn't quite hit it out of the park but this is the best android tablet that i've ever used probably the the best one that you could possibly get at this point which is one of the reasons i targeted it um i like being able to switch modes samsung has something called dex which means you can either connect this to an external monitor and actually interact with your tablet directly on windows or mac os or you can actually switch over to a desktop-like mode on the tablet itself and that sometimes can automatically kick in when you've got the keyboard accessory this is the separate keyboard accessory that detaches which is both a blessing and a curse um but it it turns it into a better laptop alternative than the ipad has been and that's just been my experience specifically with software whether i'm running in dex mode or not uh dex needs to continue to be developed uh dex is still a little immature but it works well enough it's it's easily uh you know one of those things that you would overlook but once you start using it you understand just how awesome it is especially when you're moving from an ipad uh this feels more like a tablet os than ipad os does so again i've been making direct comparisons even though one's android one's ipad os but i'm looking more towards the the usability of the operating system on a device this size this form factor and i just feel that samsung's done a fantastically better job with it uh it's not desktop uh it's it's not a phone it's somewhere in the middle and i'm looking for a better software experience and the fact that they pack decks as well as a tablet experience uh into this uh despite the samsung-ness that samsung does that is throwing all their apps at you i feel you could largely mitigate that uh with uh good luck so good luck still works on this device as well as the other samsung devices that i have used good lock is free in the samsung store uh for you to use i think samsung team members actually develop it although it's largely unofficial to to customize uh the experience so it still works wonders for most of the customization features that i need here uh if you are a power user then you would certainly want to look into that uh samsung's got a promise for updates as i mentioned and they've been pushing updates down the pike i do after having used this for a week and worked it into my workflow with relative ease seamlessly i am excited for the next iteration of their flagship tablet absolutely excited um and in fact i believe that as google is going to a bishop be issuing updates around android 12 specifically optimizing apps for larger screens like foldables uh the tablet may very well come in tow it's a good indication that google has not given up on tablets samsung's done a pretty fantastic job with this uh the notification panel these are just some some notes i made for myself i love the fact that notifications you can swipe down from anywhere like if i swipe down on this side of the screen uh the notification panel drops down here if i swipe down here it goes down here it's just samsung's added something to the experience in fact i feel they've done more for android on the tablet than they have with the phones and i know they're they're they're a big deal with android phones but i feel they've gone a long way with this and again i would encourage samsung to continue down that path uh battery life gets me beyond seemingly a day of heavy use like i've sat in on meetings with this thing and worked it and didn't plug it in and got through to the end of the day and still had 40 battery life yet without plugging it in incredible so it definitely keeps pace uh with the ipad pro as far as that's concerned uh i i've been able to to get it uh you know to do everything i need to do uh for the live stream as in using the ndi app as i mentioned uh a nice bonus though the accessory itself this is like an extra two hundred dollars the uh um the the tablet case the tablet case i will say uh is is kind of important for me in my usage as kind of like a lighter laptop alternative i don't want to like uh uh get into the things that i don't like but it's it's a good keyboard this solid keyboard uh in terms not solid in the sense that this is a solid device it's a bit flimsy uh but it works and the key travel is good the key press is good uh but you know the thing that i like about the the case is that you flip this flap down and the s pen is right there and the s pen is kind of fun to use i admit not being a stylist user and it's not a stylist uh i have fun and my daughter has been having a total blast with this as well she enjoys using it and she's been sketching in the the samsung notes app uh so that's one default app that i appreciate samsung puts on the other ones uh it's kind of redundant in fact they have the phone app on here for you to like mirror the experience or like the what is it the auto transfer apps thing you know if you're using it on one device it'll transfer together i'm not as interested in that uh honestly uh but the pen comes with the tablet you don't have to buy it separately so the price was pretty good uh i got it for like a couple hundred dollars off this is the 256 gig model and the reason i went with this model despite me wanting to get one with 5g this doesn't have 5g it's painful you have to go through the carriers to get a 5g model samsung don't do that uh the the reason why is because carriers are only carrying the 128 gig version and the problem with that is 128 only comes with six gigs of ram the 256 and up comes with uh eight gigs of ram and this thing i'm telling you needs ram so i'm glad that i got the eight gig ram version 256 storage uh it also happens to have uh uh the ability i'm trying to find the the port there uh to support external uh uh storage so i i'd imagine like uh you know you'd be able to throw a micro sd card in there i've never used one for this reason before but you've got expandability options which again is a boon if you're looking for something like that so the price and the value i feel is more than fair the s7 plus though is the one to get because it's got the higher refresh rate and that once you go that direction it's impossible to go back uh to anything else um you know i i've liked a lot of the things that that samsung has offered though it's not like full customization i don't necessarily always like using the touchpad or the trackpad but they optimize this keyboard for android and specifically the samsung tablet experience and like i can turn off the trackpad or the touchpad which i love because there's no accidental swipes uh you know easy keyboard shortcuts though you know i'll get into some of the things that i don't like about it this is just high level overview i am very very satisfied with uh this particular purchase this is the thing that i'm using now on a daily basis uh and you know i'm very much looking forward to future software updates as well as hardware revisions uh in this particular series i am now a samsung galaxy tab user i'll be going into the comparison of the ipad pro here soon uh and and talk about what's going to happen with that i've pretty much made the switchhello galaxy i'm chris pirillo and you're watching the locker gnome daily report or tldr for short i'm actually recording this live on twitch i'm there every night at 6 00 pm feel free to join me and the community next time i'm broadcasting live and in recent days and weeks i've been talking about moving on from my ipad pro 11 inch the one with the 5g the one that i got i think earlier this year that i was happy enough with i was thinking of moving from that to another tablet and it really wasn't until very recently that i considered the samsung galaxy tab s7 plus a viable alternative to the ipad although there's not like a direct correlation and i do plan on doing a this versus that video between these two tablets at some point in the very near future as well but uh now that i've been using this uh particular device the samsung galaxy tab s7 plus for a week or so despite this being out for like over a year now it hadn't even been on my radar because i hadn't considered a a an android tablet but after the release of ios 15 after the release of ios 15 i decided that it was possibly time for me to look beyond ios as in the ipad because i just found it to be sub-optimal for an experience that i was looking for so today i wanted to go over things that i love uh tomorrow i'm going to be going over things that i hate about this particular device but let's go ahead and begin with my top uh reason to make any shift or my number one thing that i look for in any device and that is experience specifically in software and the software experience is not perfect with the s7 plus but i am enjoying it in fact i'll go as far as to say is android on this tablet i feel does better than uh ios on the ipad in the sense that you know there are a lot of ios apps out there most of them feel like blown up iphone apps or even when you run iphone apps on the ipad screen it just doesn't feel right uh it feels better android feels better on this tablet that's kind of what i'm saying than than iphone apps feel on uh the ipad pro not perfect but the screen is outstanding uh it's very responsive 120 hertz screen that means things fly along at 120 frames per second samsung's been making constant optimizations in fact i just got one ui 3.1.1 yesterday oh look it's another notification that came in uh but most of my apps the apps that i need to use run on it uh including apps that would normally only run on a phone uh i can window them in in various ways on this tablet which you know kind of makes me happy because i can actually enjoy those apps in a native like experience on a larger screen so samsung hasn't quite hit it out of the park but this is the best android tablet that i've ever used probably the the best one that you could possibly get at this point which is one of the reasons i targeted it um i like being able to switch modes samsung has something called dex which means you can either connect this to an external monitor and actually interact with your tablet directly on windows or mac os or you can actually switch over to a desktop-like mode on the tablet itself and that sometimes can automatically kick in when you've got the keyboard accessory this is the separate keyboard accessory that detaches which is both a blessing and a curse um but it it turns it into a better laptop alternative than the ipad has been and that's just been my experience specifically with software whether i'm running in dex mode or not uh dex needs to continue to be developed uh dex is still a little immature but it works well enough it's it's easily uh you know one of those things that you would overlook but once you start using it you understand just how awesome it is especially when you're moving from an ipad uh this feels more like a tablet os than ipad os does so again i've been making direct comparisons even though one's android one's ipad os but i'm looking more towards the the usability of the operating system on a device this size this form factor and i just feel that samsung's done a fantastically better job with it uh it's not desktop uh it's it's not a phone it's somewhere in the middle and i'm looking for a better software experience and the fact that they pack decks as well as a tablet experience uh into this uh despite the samsung-ness that samsung does that is throwing all their apps at you i feel you could largely mitigate that uh with uh good luck so good luck still works on this device as well as the other samsung devices that i have used good lock is free in the samsung store uh for you to use i think samsung team members actually develop it although it's largely unofficial to to customize uh the experience so it still works wonders for most of the customization features that i need here uh if you are a power user then you would certainly want to look into that uh samsung's got a promise for updates as i mentioned and they've been pushing updates down the pike i do after having used this for a week and worked it into my workflow with relative ease seamlessly i am excited for the next iteration of their flagship tablet absolutely excited um and in fact i believe that as google is going to a bishop be issuing updates around android 12 specifically optimizing apps for larger screens like foldables uh the tablet may very well come in tow it's a good indication that google has not given up on tablets samsung's done a pretty fantastic job with this uh the notification panel these are just some some notes i made for myself i love the fact that notifications you can swipe down from anywhere like if i swipe down on this side of the screen uh the notification panel drops down here if i swipe down here it goes down here it's just samsung's added something to the experience in fact i feel they've done more for android on the tablet than they have with the phones and i know they're they're they're a big deal with android phones but i feel they've gone a long way with this and again i would encourage samsung to continue down that path uh battery life gets me beyond seemingly a day of heavy use like i've sat in on meetings with this thing and worked it and didn't plug it in and got through to the end of the day and still had 40 battery life yet without plugging it in incredible so it definitely keeps pace uh with the ipad pro as far as that's concerned uh i i've been able to to get it uh you know to do everything i need to do uh for the live stream as in using the ndi app as i mentioned uh a nice bonus though the accessory itself this is like an extra two hundred dollars the uh um the the tablet case the tablet case i will say uh is is kind of important for me in my usage as kind of like a lighter laptop alternative i don't want to like uh uh get into the things that i don't like but it's it's a good keyboard this solid keyboard uh in terms not solid in the sense that this is a solid device it's a bit flimsy uh but it works and the key travel is good the key press is good uh but you know the thing that i like about the the case is that you flip this flap down and the s pen is right there and the s pen is kind of fun to use i admit not being a stylist user and it's not a stylist uh i have fun and my daughter has been having a total blast with this as well she enjoys using it and she's been sketching in the the samsung notes app uh so that's one default app that i appreciate samsung puts on the other ones uh it's kind of redundant in fact they have the phone app on here for you to like mirror the experience or like the what is it the auto transfer apps thing you know if you're using it on one device it'll transfer together i'm not as interested in that uh honestly uh but the pen comes with the tablet you don't have to buy it separately so the price was pretty good uh i got it for like a couple hundred dollars off this is the 256 gig model and the reason i went with this model despite me wanting to get one with 5g this doesn't have 5g it's painful you have to go through the carriers to get a 5g model samsung don't do that uh the the reason why is because carriers are only carrying the 128 gig version and the problem with that is 128 only comes with six gigs of ram the 256 and up comes with uh eight gigs of ram and this thing i'm telling you needs ram so i'm glad that i got the eight gig ram version 256 storage uh it also happens to have uh uh the ability i'm trying to find the the port there uh to support external uh uh storage so i i'd imagine like uh you know you'd be able to throw a micro sd card in there i've never used one for this reason before but you've got expandability options which again is a boon if you're looking for something like that so the price and the value i feel is more than fair the s7 plus though is the one to get because it's got the higher refresh rate and that once you go that direction it's impossible to go back uh to anything else um you know i i've liked a lot of the things that that samsung has offered though it's not like full customization i don't necessarily always like using the touchpad or the trackpad but they optimize this keyboard for android and specifically the samsung tablet experience and like i can turn off the trackpad or the touchpad which i love because there's no accidental swipes uh you know easy keyboard shortcuts though you know i'll get into some of the things that i don't like about it this is just high level overview i am very very satisfied with uh this particular purchase this is the thing that i'm using now on a daily basis uh and you know i'm very much looking forward to future software updates as well as hardware revisions uh in this particular series i am now a samsung galaxy tab user i'll be going into the comparison of the ipad pro here soon uh and and talk about what's going to happen with that i've pretty much made the switch\n"