History lesson. First there was the (awful) Froyo-running Galaxy Tab 7. Then came the Honeycomb-running Galaxy Tab 10.1. Then the 8.9, then the 7.0-Plus. Done, right? Wait! How’s about a 7.7? Sure, why the hell not!
It’s a decent tablet, but it’s a baby-step. Samsungers shrunk the bezel so they could make the screen 0.7 inches bigger, without noticeably increasing the tab’s dimensions. Over on the z-axis, this cutie spans just 7.9mm; that’s thinner than the Galaxy Tab 8.9 (8.6mm). Actually, it’s the thinnest 4G LTE tablet out there. The LTE is courtesy of Verizon, where this thing is an exclusive.
It’s also the first tablet that has a Super AMOLED Plus display (1280×800 resolution), which is bright and crisp. TProcessor speed is up to 1.4GHz from 1.2GHz, and there’s a Micro SD card slot too. And an IR blaster (from the Galaxy Tab 7 Plus), which is a feature I’ve actually come to really like. Couches and tablets go well together, and being able to choose a show from the guide on the tablet, then have it tune me right to it is awesome.
Unfortunately, this thing is outdated out of the gate. Its dual-core processor can’t hang with a quad-core beast like the Tegra 3 which drives the Asus Transformer Prime. Mr 7.7 is also running Honeycomb (Android 3.2) with Samsung’s blindingly-bright TouchWiz UI on top. Its a safe bet that TouchWiz will provide a significant speed-bump to its upgrade Ice Cream Sandwich (Android 4.0), because they have to figure out how to adapt it to the new software. It’s a damn shame because ICS is just a much, much better user experience, which is, y’know, kinda the most important thing.
The Galaxy Tab 7.7 will be available in the nebulous timeframe of “soon”. Tune in next time for the Galaxy Tab 7.4, 8.6, 6.4 and -3.infinity. And hopefully some Australian release news. We’ll let you know.
Q?
Tuesday, January 10, 2012 at 9:36 AMnot even the prime can keep up with the prime, new version out 2nd Q and the first one is yet to go on sale.
TSH
Tuesday, January 10, 2012 at 11:34 AMhaha too true
Chris
Tuesday, January 10, 2012 at 10:08 AMThis comment has been deemed inappropriate and has been deleted.
Hmac7
Tuesday, January 10, 2012 at 11:30 AMThey had these for sale at Harvey Norman…. which means they have already been released?
robert
Sunday, January 15, 2012 at 9:28 AMum JB’s have them for sale already… $522 for wifi 16GB version
LRE
Sunday, January 22, 2012 at 9:00 PMI saw one at JB’s – that screen is WOW! Next to the 10″ Galaxy, it made it look second-rate!
Duolever
Monday, January 23, 2012 at 10:17 AMThis tablet and the surrounding rubish arround its release is a joke. Serves us right because we put up with this nonsense and lies from people who really wouldnt be in business without us.
As for seeing a 7.7 at harveys or JB’s u 2 guys need ur heads examined also.
martyfmelb
Tuesday, January 24, 2012 at 12:42 PM@Duolever: well, they’re certainly available at Dick Smith, because that’s where I got this one :)
Mark
Thursday, February 2, 2012 at 11:41 PMI saw one at JB in Leichhardt. Can post a pic if you like.
Doug Cox
Wednesday, March 7, 2012 at 6:58 PMBought mine at Harvey Norman weeks ago for $499. Incredible eye-searing colour, especially noticed when reading magazines from the mag shop app. Just the right size and weight.