Samsung Galaxy Tab A8: An Affordable Yet Quality Tablet For Your Whole Family

Undeniably, tablet devices have become the most sought-after during the pandemic. Its widescreen size makes it convenient for work or online school. Samsung is one of the most productive technology companies in releasing tablet devices. At the beginning of 2022, they have launched several new tablets, one of which is the Samsung Galaxy Tab A8.

Various exciting features make the Samsung Galaxy Tab A8 a tablet device that will make it easier for families to carry out various daily activities, ranging from studying, entertainment, and enjoying quality time with family.

A large 10.5-inch screen and an internal memory capacity of 32 GB (expandable up to 1TB via MicroSD card) are ideal for entertainment experiences, multitasking, and many more. The Samsung Galaxy Tab A8 comes with a 7,040 mAh battery to support more extended use. In addition, there are many other very useful features to ease user activities.

This time we will bring you the review for Samsung Galaxy Tab A8, which you can use for various activities such as online learning or working from home.

Design
An elegant, premium appearance and solid build quality are the hallmarks of Samsung tablets. Whether the price is low or expensive, Samsung always makes a good impression on the design sector. Similarly, you will find it from the Galaxy Tab A8.

Although the price tag is relatively affordable, Samsung's design on this tablet feels premium. Both in terms of look or feel when using it. When held, this tablet feels sturdy and looks neat with the tablet's back cover using aluminum material.

Although there are still some component uses of plastic material, the portion is relatively small. What's more interesting about the design of the Galaxy Tab A8 is the matte finish of the back cover, so that fingerprint smudges don't stack easily.

In addition, this tablet is relatively thin with a thickness of only 6.9 mm, and relatively light (508 g). The Samsung Galaxy Tab A8 comes with an asymmetrical screen bezel with one color choice for the WiFi variant, namely Gray.

Placement of buttons and ports

• Right Side: Mic, Power Button, Volume Button
• Top Side: Two Grill Speakers, 1 Mic
• Left Side: SIM Tray with 1 SIM + 1 MicroSD slot up to 1TB
• Bottom Side: Headphone Jack, Two Speaker Grills, USB-C Port

Appearance
The Galaxy Tab A8 comes with a fairly TFT wide screen measured at 10.5 inches. The display resolution is 1920 x 1200 pixels with an aspect ratio of 16:10 and a pixel density of 215 PPI. For us, this tablet screen is quite okay for viewers of streaming video content. What appears from the tablet screen is sharp enough and can be enjoyed by most people.

The screen refresh rate is still 60 Hz, but it's not a severe problem for a tablet. Because hand interaction on the screen of a tablet is generally not as intense as when touching the phone screen, the 60 Hz refresh rate on the screen of a tablet will look smooth.

The color display of the Galaxy Tab A8 screen is quite bright. The display is pleasing to the eye whether watching movies on Netflix, videos on YouTube, playing games or just browsing. For your information, the Galaxy Tab A8 has Widevine L1 certification, which means that you can enjoy Netflix movies on this tablet in Full HD resolution.

Performance
UNISOC, formerly known as Spreadtrum, began to show its existence amid the dominance of Qualcomm and MediaTek. This SoC is now ogled by various manufacturers, especially for middle-class and entry-class products.

On the Galaxy Tab A8, the UNISOC SoC used is the Tiger T618. This SoC is more or less on par with the Helio G80 and Snapdragon 662. The Tiger T618 is quite reliable and also used by Advan GX.

This SoC or chipset has eight CPU cores. Two of the cores are for the performance inches in Cortex A75 (2.0 GHz). Meanwhile, the other six cores are efficiency cores, namely Cortex A55 (2.0 GHz). This SoC has a Mali G52 MP2 GPU (850 MHz) with 12 nm fabrication. The Tiger T618 turned out to boost the Galaxy Tab A8's performance. We were pretty impressed with the performance that this device has.

Based on our experience, the tablet can do work such as editing documents in Google Docs, playing videos, replying to emails, and playing casual games. For information, the unit we tested was the 3/32 GB memory variant. Games like PUBG Mobile and Injustice 2 can be run well by this tablet in gaming tests.

With the multi-active window feature, the multitasking experience on this tablet is fantastic. With this feature, users will open two to three applications at once on the screen.

For example, during an online meeting using Zoom, you can also directly open the Notes application to take notes. Both applications will open simultaneously and appear side by side on the screen.

More or less, the experience is the same as when using a laptop. We find this feature very useful, especially for those who often run two applications at once on one screen.

Following items that we would be focusing on is the speaker, which is also one of the advantages of the Galaxy Tab A8. In addition to the stereo speakers, Samsung has embedded software support from Dolby Atmos.

Speaker
There are four speakers embedded in the Galaxy Tab A8. Two are on the bottom near the USB C port, and the other two on the upper frame. Therefore, the speaker configuration of this tablet is stereo. Based on our hands-on, this tablet speaker's sound is loud, and we didn't notice any distortion even though the volume was set at a high level.

The Dolby Atmos feature, which also provides an equalizer according to the user's activity scheme, allows the user to choose the setting from movie, music, and voice.

When we activate the Dolby Atmos feature, it feels like the burst of audio from the tablet's speakers is getting more "power." Listening to songs or watching movies is guaranteed to be even more enjoyable thanks to the support of this feature.

Battery Life
With a capacity of 7040 mAh, the battery capacity used for the Galaxy Tab A8 can be considered quite large, and Galaxy Tab A8 also supports 15W fast charging technology. Unfortunately, the charging adapter in the box only supports 7.5W fast charging. To enjoy maximum fast charging, you have to spend more to buy a 15W charger adapter.

Based on our experience, this tablet has a good battery life because it can sometimes last for more than one day of use. In testing, we use this tablet for various activities. We were starting from browsing, social media, to streaming. Overall, we didn't have much concern about the battery life.

Meanwhile, the 7% to 100% charging process takes 4 hours and 3 minutes with the default charger adapter. You can reduce the charging time by using an adapter that supports 15W fast charging.

Dedicated MicroSD Slot
Galaxy Tab A8 comes with a dedicated MicroSD slot. The slot can accommodate a microSD card with a capacity of up to 1 TB. A MicroSD slot is quite helpful for increasing storage capacity as you can store more movies, novels, music albums, etc.

Samsung Kids Features
One of the reasons this tablet is suitable for use by children is the Samsung Kids feature. This feature will make the tablet only display various content specifically for children.

Samsung Kids also allows parents to protect their children while using the tablet. Parents can activate the parental control feature to protect children when using the device and not being exposed to content that is not appropriate for their age and development.

With the parental control feature, parents can set Screen Time, the time limit for using the tablet, and determine what applications their children can access. Parents will also get updates on their child's activity while using the tablet.

Samsung Kids has a variety of games and creativity apps available. There are also applications for cameras, galleries, special browsers for children, art collections made by children, and recordings of their voices.

In the browser section, parents can determine what websites can be accessed and prevent them from surfing unwanted websites. On initial use, all these applications must be downloaded and installed first.

Camera
The Samsung Galaxy Tab A8 has an 8 MP camera on the back and a 5 MP camera on the front for selfies or video conferencing.

For the Galaxy Tab A8, the camera is more optimally used for video conferencing. So it's not wrong if you choose this tablet for online learning or online meetings.

But our little note, for video call display using the optimal front camera, you have to do a video call or video conference session in a place that is well lit. Because if done in a room with dim light, the video will look like a lot of noise.

Summary
In our opinion, the Galaxy Tab A8 can be a tablet choice that is quite capable for online learning needs or working from home, which usually spends a lot of time on online meetings. It also came with the widescreen with a pretty good clear resolution.

You can depend on the Samsung Galaxy Tab A8 when you do your business matter or watch Netflix on this tablet. This tablet is also very suitable for children, thanks to the presence of the Samsung Kids feature. Parents don't have to worry too much when their kids access this tablet.

The drawbacks that we found on this tablet are also minor and don't really interfere with the user experience. In addition, the use of the UNISOC T618 chipset turns out to bring good performance for everyday use, including gaming. Moreover, the games that can be played are popular and widely played.

With a very reasonable price, it seems that the Samsung Galaxy Tab A8 can be an option for all Malaysians.