Samsung’s Galaxy Tab is a 7-inch tablet that looks a lot like an overgrown Galaxy S phone, without the phone functionality. It debuted in the U.S. this month and will be available from all four major U.S. wireless carriers. (Note: Versions of the device sold outside the U.S. do have phone functionality; this is a limitation imposed by the U.S. carriers.) Reviews ranged from glowing (”It’s a Tablet. It’s Gorgeous. It’s Costly“) to scathing (”A Pocketable Train Wreck“).

I bought an iPad for one simple reason: I wanted a light, thin tablet I could easily use out on the patio, while riding as a passenger in a car, while lying in bed, or while sitting on the sofa in front of the TV. All of these are situations where a regular laptop or notebook, or even the bigger and heavier convertible tablets, just didn’t work as well. The iPad was the only thing on the market at the time that fit those criteria at a cost of under $1,000.

But I’ve had a love/hate relationship with the iPad from the beginning. I love the form factor and the ease of connecting to a network and setting up my Exchange email account. But I hate the lack of storage expansion, its frustrating inability to display Flash-based Web sites, and the difficulty of entering text on its keyboard. And it’s still just a tad heavier and bulkier than I’d really prefer for the uses to which I put it. Most of all, I hate Apple’s ironclad control over what apps I can install.

I’ve been eagerly awaiting a viable alternative. I’m a Windows loyalist from way back, and I’ve used Windows Mobile smart phones since I got my first, a Samsung i730 back in 2005. I still have an Omnia II running WinMo 6.5, but recently I was won over to Android, first by testing a Droid X and then by testing a Samsung Fascinate. I fell in love with the Fascinate, which is a Galaxy S phone, so I had a feeling I was going to like its big brother, the Galaxy Tab. And I was right. In fact, despite the Tab’s somewhat high price, I’ve decided to dump the iPad for the Tab. Here are 10 reasons why.

Note: This article is also available as a PDF download.
1: Size

Yes, I loved the iPad’s 9.7-inch form factor when I got it. That’s because it was so much smaller and thinner than the tablets (Windows-based convertibles and slates) I’d used in the past. But it still wasn’t quite enough. It’s just a little too big to slip into my favorite small bag. Want to put it in your pocket? Forget about it. And unless you’re a big, burly guy (I’m not), holding it in one hand isn’t easy to do.

Steve Jobs pronounced 7-inch tablets “dead on arrival.” He might think bigger is better, but I disagree. The Tab’s 7.48- by 4.74-inch dimensions (compared to the iPad’s 9.56-by-7.47) make it roughly half the size of the iPad. And that means it’s easier to hold onto and manipulate, easier to “thumb type” on, and easier to fit into a small bag or even a large jacket pocket.

2: Weight

At 25.6 oz. (a little over a pound and a half), the iPad seems light — especially if you’re comparing it to older style tablets that weighed 3 to 4 pounds. However, if you hold it up for a moderate period of time, you find that it gets tiring. This is especially important if you use your tablet for reading ebooks. And carrying it around adds a noticeable, if not burdensome, weight to your bag.

The Galaxy Tab weighs in at a trim 13.4 oz., less than a pound. The difference might not seem like much, but it makes it far easier to use for longer times without tiring and makes it more likely that I’ll bring it along at times when I might not bother to bring the iPad because of its bulk and weight.
3: Expandable storage

One of my biggest complaints about the iPad was the lack of a flash memory slot to allow me to add more storage space. Of course, Apple didn’t want me to buy an SD/microSD card from one of many vendors — they wanted me to buy a higher capacity, more expensive iPad from them. That type of blatant gouging is one of the reasons I hate giving any of my money to Apple.

The Galaxy Tab has a microSD slot that will officially accept cards up to 32 GB in capacity. I don’t know, but I wouldn’t be surprised if we can tweak it to use 64 GB cards when they become readily available, just as we could use 8 GB cards in phones that officially only accepted cards up to 4 GB.

Another nice thing about the Tab is that the memory card slot is easily accessible — unlike on the Galaxy S phones, where you have to remove the back to change out the card (although I give Samsung credit for not making you remove the battery to change the card, as you have to do with many of today’s phones). On the Tab, the slot is on the side of the device and you just open the small cover to access it.
4: Choice of 3G carriers

The iPad has finally come to Verizon Wireless — well, sort of. The problem is that it’s the Wi-Fi only version, since Apple doesn’t make an iPad with built-in support for CDMA/EVDO (the technology used by Verizon and Sprint). To use it with Verizon’s 3G network, you have to buy their MiFi mobile hotspot device and then connect the iPad to that via Wi-Fi. The upside is that you can connect up to five devices to the MiFi — but it means carrying around yet another (albeit small) component.

The Galaxy Tab is going to be available through all the major wireless carriers and will have 3G capabilities built in, so there is no extra device to carry.
5: Better Bluetooth

The iPad comes with Bluetooth 2.1 support, whereas the Galaxy Tab has Bluetooth 3.0. The later version supports faster speeds, up to 24 megabits per second. (Bluetooth 2.1 + EDR supports a data rate of 3 Mbps.)
6: Two cameras

The iPad lacks a camera of any kind. I don’t really mind not having a rear-facing camera, since my phone has a camera and is much better suited for taking photos. Holding the big almost 10-inch iPad up to snap a picture would be awkward anyway. But I always thought the tablet form factor would have been perfect for video conferencing — if only the device had a front-facing camera.

The Galaxy Tab has two cameras, a 3.2 MP rear-facing and a 1.3 MP front-facing one. And the device itself is small enough so that the rear camera will be a lot less awkward to use.
7: Flash

Steve Jobs has made it clear that he hates Adobe Flash and doesn’t want it on the iPhone or iPad. I’m not a big fan of Adobe myself, but there are just too many Web sites out there that rely on Flash, and the lack of support for it can make browsing the Web with an iPad a frustrating experience.

The Galaxy Tab includes Flash Player 10.1, so you can access those Flash-enabled sites. This does slow things down a bit, but it’s far better than not being able to access them at all.
8: Swype

The iPad is too big for thumb typing, and although you can (sort of) touch type on it, that’s likely to result in a lot of errors, in my experience. That leaves me doing a modified version of touch typing, in which I have to look at the keyboard while I’m typing, and it slows me down. Worse, it’s uncomfortable to try to do it for any length of time. Thus, I use the iPad for consumption but try to avoid creating text content on it.

The Tab, like the Galaxy S phones (and other Android phones I’ve tried) comes with Swype. It’s a different way to enter text, by sliding your finger from key to key, and at first you can’t believe it would really work, but it does. I first became acquainted with Swype when I got my Omnia II Windows Mobile phone, and within a week was able to enter text at over 50 wpm — on a phone! I swore I’d never have another phone that didn’t use Swype. After you get used to the longer distance your finger has to travel, it works fine on the Tab, and it’s far less tiring than typing on the virtual keyboard.

We keep hearing rumors of Swype coming to the iPhone/iPad, but so far, it hasn’t happened.

Even if you prefer to tap the keys instead of Swyping, the Tab has a feature that makes text entry much better than on the iPad: You can tap and hold a key to get a secondary character. On the iPad, if you want to type a number, you have to switch to the alternate symbol keyboard. On the Tab, you can simply hold down the appropriate alphabetic key to type the number displayed above the letter. Switching back and forth between the alpha and numeric/symbol keyboards on the iPad drives me nuts, so I love this feature.
9: Comparable battery life

One thing I really did love about my iPad was the battery life. Compared to just about every other portable computing device (other than a simple MP3 player), its stamina was amazing. I easily got close to 10 hours of fairly heavy usage out of it, and since I don’t normally use it that heavily, I could go a week sometimes between charges.

This was the deal breaker on most of the alternative tablets I saw. Many of them sounded great — until you got to the part that said “Battery life: 4 hours.” I wanted something that was comparable to the iPad, that would at least let me use it heavily for a full workday without recharging. The Galaxy Tab doesn’t quite measure up to the iPad in this respect — but it’s good enough. It’s rated at seven hours for video playback, and longer for less intensive tasks. That stacks up well against the iPad, with which I got about eight hours when streaming video constantly.

Another plus is that you can charge the Tab from your computer’s USB port, although you have to use the cable that comes with the device to do it since Unfortunately, Samsung used a proprietary connector on the Tab’s side. This was a strange decision, given that the Galaxy S phones have a standard mini USB port.
10: Freedom

For those who chafe at being under Apple’s thumb when it comes to software, the Tab offers something that’s priceless — the freedom to install apps that don’t have to be “approved” by the phone’s maker. The Android Market is a convenient and easy way to download apps, but you aren’t limited to its offerings.

Of course, the carriers do lock down their devices to an extent, and depending on where you buy it, the Tab may have vendor-installed crapware on it that you can’t easily remove. However, rooting the Tab is easy; there is a one-click app for that called z4root. And it’s likely that custom ROMs for the Tab will emerge in the near future, as they have for Android-based phones .(Just remember that rooting — similar to jailbreaking an iPhone/iPad — voids your warranty.)
Summary

The iPad is slick and pretty and does some things well. I had fun with mine, even though at times I felt like throwing it into the lake. But it lacked a lot of the things I want and value most, such as the ability to expand storage, to “type” at a decent speed,and to carry and hold it comfortably for long periods of time without it becoming burdensome. I also need to be able to view Flash content and do video conferencing. The Tab offers all that, and more.

Sure, the next generation of the iPad will probably include some of these features. But there are some that the iPad is likely to never give us, such as expandable storage and freedom of choice when it comes to our apps. Those things might not be important to everyone, but they’re important to me. So important that I’m dumping my iPad in favor of the Tab.

The iPad has already come under fire for its limitations. But despite some missing features, Erik Eckel thinks it holds value for mobile workers.

Apple’s new products generate ardent, obsessive, and fanatical coverage. Everyone from technology nerds to mass news media organizations trip over themselves attempting to be first introducing the world to Apple’s next big thing. Repeatedly revolutionizing the way people use computers (the Macintosh), listen to music (the iPod), and talk to one another (the iPhone) will do that (as well as generate $15.6B in quarterly revenue and $3.3B in net quarterly profit), which explains why the iPad debuted to such impressive fanfare last week.

For all the things the iPad is (a perfect netbook, an outstanding eBook reader, a portable email device, etc.), there are a few features I’d have liked to see the iPad include. Imagine how the device would change the way we work if it included cellular telephone capability (you could talk using a Bluetooth headset), fancy keys you could feel (instead, the keyboard simply appears onscreen) and plentiful storage space (initial models will top out at 64GB).

Regardless, the iPad will prove plenty popular with on-the-go business users. Here are the top 10 reasons why.

Note: This article is also available as a PDF download.
1: Email

The iPad’s included Mail application makes it easy to join mobile users to Microsoft Exchange-powered email networks. Exchange provides the foundation for most small business email networks, so integration will prove almost automatic. Non-Exchange users will find Mail compatible with most every other commonly used email platform, as well.
2: Internet

Base models include integrated 802.11 a/b/g/n wireless networking. Optional models include integrated 3G cellular data networking compatible with UMTS, HSDPA, GSM, and EDGE networks. As a result, business users will be able to access cloud-based applications, email, VPNs, and other systems and data most wherever they go. Sales personnel, field engineers, consultants, contractors, health care providers, students, instructors, and numerous other users will find the integrated network capacity compelling. As applications, platforms, information, and data increasingly move to the cloud (a trend that fueled netbook popularity), the iPad becomes that much more capable as a business device.
3: Ease of use

The reason Apple’s won such converts — and numerous industrial design awards — is that its engineers study the way things can work, not the way they work now. As a result, the Mac, iPod, and iPhone have changed the way people perform important or common tasks. The iPad’s patented Multi-Touch display permits precise and accurate gesture input. Spreading pinched fingers explodes a folder. Flicking a finger turns pages with the same speed the finger is moved. Tapping zooms in on an object. Everything is intuitive, making device interaction easy to learn. And at just a half-inch thick and a pound-and-a-half in weight, the iPad is among the thinnest and lightest of any netbook and certainly any laptop ever made. Add in the fact that the device can go 10 hours between recharging, and you have a user-friendly tablet computer.
4: Integrated keyboard

Imagine ripping the lid off a 9.7-inch wide netbook, installing the functionality of an iPhone on steroids, and then eliminating the clumsy mechanical typewriter-like keys in favor of a display-superimposed keyboard. That’s an iPad. Mobile users need not pack an additional external keyboard whenever heading to the airport, coffee shop, nearby cubicle, or other location to review email, documents, the Internet, and or other information. The iPad’s touch-screen display enables typing on a keyboard exponentially larger than that found on cell phones and sized closer to full-size laptops. For users insisting on a full-size keyboard, Apple’s included integrated Bluetooth, so external keyboards can be connected sans wires.
5: Applications, applications, applications

The true value of any computing platform is largely dependent upon the number of third-party applications written for it. Programs written for the iPhone will run on the iPad, and upon the release of the iPad SDK, iPad-specific applications will absolutely flood the market. If the iPhone is any barometer, just keeping track of available tools, utilities, and programs will prove mind-boggling. Already some 140,000 applications have been produced for the iPhone and downloaded some three billion times. Expect the same fervent energy to surround the creation and consumption of iPad applications.
6: iWork

Apple’s popular iWork suite will work well with the iPad. The tool set — which includes Keynote for generating presentations, Pages for creating documents, and Numbers for building spreadsheets — will be available to iPad users. The cost? Just $10 per application. The suite’s iPad compatibility ensures that business users have access to powerful applications necessary for functioning within today’s demanding office environments. iWork on the iPad will also provide a bridge for working with Microsoft Office users, as iWork enables opening, editing, and saving files using popular Office file formats.
7: iBooks

Amazon’s Kindle reignited hope among publishers that eBook adoption would finally take off. In fact, the Kindle sold so well, Barnes & Noble introduced its own competitor, the Nook, in December 2009. iPad sales will crush both the Kindle and Nook, combined. Hands down. That’s because, in addition to numerous applications, full Internet capability, email, and numerous other features, the iPad includes Apple’s iBooks app. Business users frequently travel, and the ability to tote numerous books without the weight will prove another popular feature. Think of the iPad as a full-color Kindle (that’s easy to read in low light), only with the addition of full netbook computer functionality.
8: Calendaring

Apple engineers have tweaked the Calendar included with the iPad. Much like the iPhone’s Calendar, the tablet PC can display events listed by day, week, and month. On the iPad, multiple calendars can be viewed simultaneously, thereby enabling juggling multiple schedules so common among office workers today. With the benefit of integrated wireless Internet (and optional cellular broadband data networking), consistent connectivity to an Exchange server means users can keep schedules synchronized without requiring third-party sync tools or other clunky measures.
9: Contacts

Few things are more important to sales personnel, field teams, and professional services staff than their address books. The iPad’s Contacts app provides a simple but powerful method of managing contacts and contact lists. With integrated data networking, synchronization becomes a breeze. Even better, when seeking a client or customer’s location, a quick tap of the street address opens Maps automatically. As realtors, traveling sales staff, and other mobile professionals can attest, these little time-saving tweaks are what helped fuel millions of iPhone sales.
10: The price

A good netbook is five hundred bucks. Apple’s iPad starts at just $499. With the right mix of applications, storage capacity, and network technology corresponding to each user’s specific needs, many business professionals will find a well-equipped iPad capable of replacing a much more expensive laptop in the field. For once, whether it’s Apple’s recognition that it’s debuting the iPad toward the tail of the Great Recession or a concession to detractors incessantly complaining about the high cost of Apple hardware (overlooking the more beneficial long-term total cost of ownership), Apple has priced a new device similarly to Windows-based counterparts.